Woke up this morning at 3:45 a.m....

to the sound of the tornado sirens. Looks like the folks on the north side of Dallas had some real excitement!

Dang, I hope nobody's hurt. I hear some of that weather's heading toward KY.

I'm just glad I'm supposed to go south to Laredo today instead out east, so I don't have to go through the storms a second time.

Yes we did have some excitement! I posted in the meetup thread about it. Everybody's okay here, though.

That front is making its way here!! Its windy now and going to get windier as the day progresses with lots of rain then snow tomorrow night (the heavy wet stuff).

News like this reminds me why I live in Canada - it's cold for 5 months of the year but we don't get hurricanes, tornadoes or earthquakes.

May all you folks stay safe.

Originally Posted by mrblanche

to the sound of the tornado sirens. Looks like the folks on the north side of Dallas had some real excitement!

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Yep, they sure woke DW and I up! The wooden fence in back is torn down. I feel bad, because we had just sold this house, but sometimes life just is not fair. Power was finally restored at 9:20 and the first place I headed was The Cat Site.

i sure hope noone was hurt. we were lucky, all we had was the rain part of that mess, and boy am i sick of rain, i spend all day cold and wet yesterday.

That freaks me out......I won't complain about it being cold, windy, & rainy here!

To those that are in areas of severe weather, do any of you have weather radios? They're kind of annoying since they'll sound alarms for any severe weather, not just tornadoes, but they are helpful.

Were under a winter Storm warning here in Nebraska. We are expecting up to 12 inches of snow. In a few weeks the tornado sirens will be active again as the spring approaches.

ew doesn't sound like fun!

Originally Posted by strange_wings

To those that are in areas of severe weather, do any of you have weather radios? They're kind of annoying since they'll sound alarms for any severe weather, not just tornadoes, but they are helpful.

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Yes, we have one -- but Mom no longer knows where. They are excellent, and everyone who lives where tornados can occur ought to have one. They can literally save your life.

I believe they've advanced now so that you can program them to switch on only for tornado warnings, and only for warnings in the counties you select, which means you can leave it plugged in all the time!

Originally Posted by CarolPetunia

I believe they've advanced now so that you can program them to switch on only for tornado warnings, and only for warnings in the counties you select, which means you can leave it plugged in all the time!

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I need to double check the manual, I'm not sure if the one we have offers that. Though the other week it was a severe t-storm warning, tornado watch, and possiblity of hail that keep setting it off. I wonder if straight line wind warnings have an alarm? Had those nearby a couple of years ago and they were very damaging - took off roofs and snapped several poles.

The storm slammed into my house at 2:37 this morning. I'm about 110 miles southwest of Dallas. It hit with such force that my ceiling fan jingled (I sleep on second floor.) There were 2 reports of tornados locally but we were ok, no damage at all, primarily because we missed out on the hail.

The local news reported that although several other cities in the path of this monster storm had warned residents with their emergency sirens, the person in charge of that duty where I live decided not to. His defense was that it turned out there was no tornado touchdown here in Plano, only straight-line winds. Yessir, straight-line winds -- of over 80 mph! You didn't think that might pose a threat?

His second line of defense was that people shouldn't rely on the sirens anyway, but on their weather radios. Sure -- those who have them, those who have them plugged in, those who have them programmed correctly. What about the rest of us? And the very poor who can't afford the radios, the homeless who have no place to plug them in, and anyone who is outdoors or driving in a car?

I hope to see on tomorrow's news that this particular city employee has been replaced.