My OperaWelcome to life in the tornado capital of the free world.
Saturday, March 31, 2007 7:58:21 PM
It's true. It was on the radio a few weeks ago. Britain is one of the most tornado-ridden countries in the world. We have more of those little suckers than anyone, including the entire USA.
The trick is, of course, that ours are piddly-wee little tornados which mostly disipate within seconds of touching down, and very rarely cause any kind of damage at all.
So, today dawned bright and sunny, and as usual my mother wanted to go out in it, and I, as usual, was really tired of driving around for no really good reason and wanted to stay at home playing computer games.
So out we went.
Driving down a little country road my mum suddenly said "Do you think that's a heat haze over there?" I opined that it it was a cloud, maybe early morning mist still to burn up over the hills.
We turned onto another road and she said "Is that rain up ahead?"
This time I was pretty certain. It was a cloud, a great big cloud, and it was just ahead of us but moving to the right.
The road turned right.
We drove a little further, the sun went in but it wasn't particularly dull. Suddenly there was a terific bang on the side of the car, and even though I know it's a stupid thing to do, I turn to look at that side of the car. "What the hell was that?" I enquired reasonably.
There was another bang, this time on the roof. I thought I'd hit something and looked into the rear view to see what it was. There was a motorcyclist some way in the rear struggling to remain on his machine. It was 'round about then that all hell broke loose.
Branches were flying all over the place, bits of broken tree were all over the road, water was hitting the windscreen like it was from one of God's buckets, and as I drove into a clearing something grabbed the steering wheel and tried to throw me off the road. Fortunately by then I'd slowed down somewhat, but like everyone else on the road, I didn't actually stop.
What is it about us that makes us try to soldier on? The obvious thing to do was to stop and let the weather blow over, but that idea entered my head for only about a microsecond before passing on its way again.
Fairly quickly things returned to normal and the sun came out again. The road we were on ended in a T-junction, and at the end of there was a crowd of men (And one woman standing on the other side of the road for some reason). They were telling everyone to go that way, because they couldn't go this way. I followed everyone else without bothering to ask why. About 30 seconds down the road a police car came rushing down in the opposite direction.
We discovered later that a falling tree had hit a car.
That was only minutes away from being us.
No, really. Why don't we just pull over somewhere safe and sit it out when the weather's bad?
The trick is, of course, that ours are piddly-wee little tornados which mostly disipate within seconds of touching down, and very rarely cause any kind of damage at all.
So, today dawned bright and sunny, and as usual my mother wanted to go out in it, and I, as usual, was really tired of driving around for no really good reason and wanted to stay at home playing computer games.
So out we went.
Driving down a little country road my mum suddenly said "Do you think that's a heat haze over there?" I opined that it it was a cloud, maybe early morning mist still to burn up over the hills.
We turned onto another road and she said "Is that rain up ahead?"
This time I was pretty certain. It was a cloud, a great big cloud, and it was just ahead of us but moving to the right.
The road turned right.
We drove a little further, the sun went in but it wasn't particularly dull. Suddenly there was a terific bang on the side of the car, and even though I know it's a stupid thing to do, I turn to look at that side of the car. "What the hell was that?" I enquired reasonably.
There was another bang, this time on the roof. I thought I'd hit something and looked into the rear view to see what it was. There was a motorcyclist some way in the rear struggling to remain on his machine. It was 'round about then that all hell broke loose.
Branches were flying all over the place, bits of broken tree were all over the road, water was hitting the windscreen like it was from one of God's buckets, and as I drove into a clearing something grabbed the steering wheel and tried to throw me off the road. Fortunately by then I'd slowed down somewhat, but like everyone else on the road, I didn't actually stop.
What is it about us that makes us try to soldier on? The obvious thing to do was to stop and let the weather blow over, but that idea entered my head for only about a microsecond before passing on its way again.
Fairly quickly things returned to normal and the sun came out again. The road we were on ended in a T-junction, and at the end of there was a crowd of men (And one woman standing on the other side of the road for some reason). They were telling everyone to go that way, because they couldn't go this way. I followed everyone else without bothering to ask why. About 30 seconds down the road a police car came rushing down in the opposite direction.
We discovered later that a falling tree had hit a car.
That was only minutes away from being us.
No, really. Why don't we just pull over somewhere safe and sit it out when the weather's bad?
