ross549 Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 Well, as "essential personnel," I am required to stay at my command and wait out the storm in Norfolk. It is about 5:30am here and I am on my 26th hour of straight work. Sleep is only a few precious minutes away.... So far, it has gotten somewhat gusty on the base, so the powers that be declared "condition one" and shut down the base. We expect the storm sometime in the afternoon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BarryB Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 Hang in there ross549Sat through a couple onboard NAVSTA Norfolk...Hope you get some rest...If things go like they usually do..tomorrow we'll be saying "That wasn't bad, why the fuss" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
friendofdot Posted September 18, 2003 Author Share Posted September 18, 2003 It is 6:48AM and the power is still on...YEAH!!!! Actually slept over 6 hours. Right now, it is raining and gusty, but not too bad. Am thinking of Julia and hoping she is safe and with coffee It is still easier to ride out a hurricane during daylight when you can see what's happening. Maybe I will see Julia on the news this AM??Stay safe to all the folks in VA. You should be getting some rain soon!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 PaulaIf you want to see me on TV look for a burgandy van driving on a beach road in Kitty Hawk being attacked by a wave. I went out for a look around and passed a SUV that had stopped. As I passed it I noticed it was a camera crew but I could not tell which one. I drove slowly ahead and the overwash was getting bad so I headed on. About that time a wave came in and guess who hit the gas to get out of there? In my drive up the beach road I saw lots of things flying across the road, but all small stuff. I also saw a few snapped telephone lines. Then as I was getting closer to home I started seeing what I thought were police lights. As I got closer I realized that is not what I was seeing at all. I was seeing transformers exploding in a row going ahead of me. As smart as I am I knew it was time to go home. I don't understand why the coffee shop was not open this morning. There were not even any newspapers in the stands other than old news. The television has gone off a couple of times but so far we have power and Internet.The highs for the winds right now are about 60 miles per hour. It is more fun to go upstairs with all the curtains pulled back and watch the winds and the impact on the trees and neighborhood than to stare at a computer screen. Everyone be safe and stay out of the water! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 We are starting to have power fluctuations. Thelights have gone off several times. That means it is very possible I will be off the Internet for the rest of the day. All is well here though. Everything is tied down and I'm ready to ride it out. Hang on Paula! Saw my car on MSNBC. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prelude76 Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 hang in there, teacherremember, penguins can't fly, so dont go venturing into that wind. to everyone getting blasted by isabel right now, we're all thinking of you guys. best of luck riding it out.as for me, i'm getting ready to hit the waves in wasaga beach up here in canada once isabel hits with much reduced strength sometime friday night/saturday morning. i'm gonna take advantage of the big waves. they're forecasting about 30-40mph winds for us (about 60-70km/h), which isnt too bad, but its more than we usually experience. then again, one summer thunderstorm caused 100km/h gusts and toppled many trees. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest LilBambi Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 Morning! Things are starting to get underway ...Rain is pelting, winds gusting pretty good already and the center of Isabel hasn't even hit NC yet. We have a flood warning in effect, but thankfully it looks like (if all goes as it appears so far, we will be at low tide when it rolls through here). Next high tide after all the rain will be the real problem.Power has been fluctuating here already several times ... it does not bode well for us regarding power. They are saying it's not a matter of whether we will lose power, it's when!I have been keeping an eye on any web cams (thanks Julia) and some others I have found as well to keep an eye on NC so we can know what to anticipate. Virginia Beach area getting similar wind strength already very bad there! See the power outages in the Tidewater area (Norfolk, etc.) below in the links.Dominion VA Power Outage Summary (updates frequently)Dominion VA Power Outage Map (updates frequently)Right now, as Of: 09/18/2003 10:02am, outage summary as follows (as baseline): Area Customers Assigned Customers Out Northern Virginia 724,816 12 Shenandoah Valley/Western Piedmont 164,395 4 Richmond Metro/Tri Cities 442,598 5 Southside Virginia 66,133 0 Gloucester / Northern Neck 56,454 691 Tidewater 645,549 164,380 North Carolina 115,880 24,766 System Total 2,215,825 189,858 Take care everyone affected by Queen Isabel! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 I have had many hits on my electricity this morning. Power is constantly fluctuating. Glad I have UPS on this computer. I am trying to put together a page of pictures from my foray this morning. If successful before the power goes out I will link it so you can see. Pictures are not outstanding because I could not figure out a way ot keep the water on the lens. The winds are constant and strong with gusts that you don't want to be out in. I do love to watch it though. I don't understand why hubby thought he needed to run away from this! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prelude76 Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 how big is isabel? is it category 2 or 3 right now?how big was Andrew? it was a lot worse, wasn't it?takes lots of good pictures of the storm and share them with us, teach. i love a good storm. lil'bambi, good luck to you too.who out of all you on the shore is closest to the centre (eye)? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stonegiant Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 SiebI thought you had a little more class than that.Silly you!! Gee Sieb...You describe the perfect sailor hurricane survival Kit... O Unfortunately, the sailor survival kit doen't do the sailor any good. Sailors (US Navy ones, anyways) deploy themselves out to sea with the ship they are attached to. Isn't that nice? Leave your spouse and kids to fend for themselves... One of the many reasons I'm not in the Navy anymore. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prelude76 Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 see where the last red dash starts? that point is my house does the eye still stay when i becomes just a tropical storm inland? i always wanted to be in the middle to see the calm. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 PreludeIt doesn't matter where the eye is as long as you are in the path. The longer it is over land, the more it weakens. What you might get is less than what we are getting now waiting for it to hit full strength. Glad I am not surrounded by trees close by. There are enough as it is. I have some lousy pictures. If you want to see them. take a look here. or here. FranThanks for the link on the power. I was able to tell my husband which of his friends was without power in Virginia. Amazing there are more power outages up there than here. I am ready to curl up with a good book and enjoy the view! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeber Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 You're pics are neat, especially considering the circumstances. That first one, from the 17th, would make a nice wallpaper. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeber Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 Folks, we know you're getting nervous about all this, but please, don't let it get to you like this lady. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zox Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 I can't see pictures Sorry, this site is temporarily unavailable!The web site you are trying to access has exceeded its allocated data transfer. Visit our help area for more information.I guess a lot of peeps are looking at them ;)By the way good luck all of you affected by this hurricane! We're all with you Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 Nice wallpaper? How did you know what wallpaper number one is today? The winds are very substantial now. I keep looking out the window trying to figure out what has landed in the neighbor's pool. I guess I am better off not knowing but suspect that it is a tree branch.Fran's link to Dominion tells me that most of up where Barry is happens to be without power although his spot does not show outages. I am in that little spot without any outages. I can't figure out why we don't. I guess we are blessed due to the undergrown lines. One neighbor is out in his pickup driving around. I told his wife that if he goes back out to holler and I would go take some more pictures but my van is staying put for now. He has a company truck so he is willing to risk it and he needs to take a look at all his houses under construction. Since we have not heard from Paula I assume she is off line without power. The storm is going between us. I think it is headed more my way than towards her but we are both in the middle of "hurricane-force winds" with gusts up to around 100 mph/145 kph). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 Silly web site only allows about 6 MB of transfers an hour. It goes away every so often and then you can see what is there. I have a web site without limits I can use but it was down today! It would not let me build a web page. I might go try to upload a page there soon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
siebkens Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 LilBambi - thanks for the VA Power links! I'm hiding up here in the Shenandoah Valley behind the mountains. A little rain & wind so far. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 Hubby just checked in. He went north of Barry and East of Fran. He went to one person's house and they were without power so he headed to another. They were having a late breakfast and drinking coffee when they heard a loud crack. Next thing they knew a tree had fallen on a corner of the house.Hubby, in his infinite care and wisdom, decided he did not like a tree across the street. He thought a car about 10 feet from his was due to get hit. He moved his car and had just pulled out when the tree went down and smashed the car across from his. He is now trying to figure out which friend has a house without trees surrounding it. The winds are extremely ferocious. MSNBC has been doing shots from Kitty Hawk. That is the crew I saw this morning that caught me out. They pretty much showed how it is. The storm is headed our way. I promised hubby I would not go out and drive in it. I said nothing about being a passenger or staying inside. I am shocked that we still have power and Internet. I have a load of laundry and I know if I start it the power will go out. So far it has just been flickers. I hope Paula and everyone in Virginia fares well with this one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
siebkens Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 Currently 847,658 households without electricity in VA & east coast of NC. 550,174 of those are in the Tidewater region. It sounds like quite a few forum folks are there.85,663 on the East Coast of NC - where Julia starred this morning in her maroon van on MSNBC. Power outages are creeping up to my area, but not bad here yet.-------------------------The trying to keep dry Sieb Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
friendofdot Posted September 18, 2003 Author Share Posted September 18, 2003 Whew...this has been a nightmare, but I've only been without power for a little over an hour (crossing fingers). Being very thankful, too. This was worse in winds than Floyd, but worse in water than Fran. It was a very hard hitting hurricane. There are 130 people near here stranded that are waiting for a swift water rescue; please pray for these people. Teacher, you are amazing. I hope that you are still doing fine and have lots of power. According to our local news, y'all have the brunt of the winds. Major winds. Learned one thing from this hurricane. Should there ever be an actual 4 or 5 hurricane, I'm out of here. No way would I stay through something like that. This was bad enough and there is a lot of damage in Eastern NC....just hope there is no damage to anyone on this board. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruno Posted September 18, 2003 Share Posted September 18, 2003 Good to hear you´re safe Paula . . . . . . . . still waiting for news from Julia, Fran and Barry . . . . Julia got her power cut a bit more then 4 hours ago and send me a last message on her UPS. Hope this all will end well. Bruno Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
siebkens Posted September 19, 2003 Share Posted September 19, 2003 Just listened to the Virginia Power spokesman on TV. He said that Virginia Power had never seen an event like this - never had so many customers out of power. (1.3 million households out of power out of 2.2 million total customers as of 7:30 PM EST) He used words like mammoth, huge, & many more adjectives, each worse than the last. And this is at the point where the eye of Isabel has just passed the North Carolina border & still has to go through Virginia. He said that many customers can expect power outages of quite a few days. We've had steady rain for 8 hours - heavy for at least 5 hours. We expect the worst of the storm in about 4 hours & then it should move out pretty quickly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
friendofdot Posted September 19, 2003 Author Share Posted September 19, 2003 I can only wish that everyone without power had my power company or co-op electric. Right as the Tribal Consel was getting ready to convene on the first episode of "Survivor," my power went out. Realizing the extent of the outages, I just sighed, but did call to let them know as we were advised. In less than 5 minutes, my power was restored?!?!?! Five minutes after that I got a call asking if my power was back on??? Needless to say, I had to ask if they were magicians. A woman told me that they were very prepared for this. However, I still think they are magicians.Siebkens, I sincerely hope you don't lose power or have any flooding. As Julia has underground lines, I honestly thought she wouldn't lose power. Heck, I live in the historic district with very exposed lines and it has been a very lucky day for me.Before I think about turning in, I want to thank everyone for their support and concern. Hurricanes suck and this was a particularly bad one. Sadly, although downgraded to a tropical storm, I am afraid more damage will come from this fiesty woman. Please continue to be safe... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted September 19, 2003 Share Posted September 19, 2003 Well the fun is over here. The power came back on about 15 minutes ago. That means we were only without for about 12 hours. I booted up once on the UPS while we were out but we had our telephone service go out as well. In addition we lost water.Damage count: My mailbox and the 4 x 4 supports are now sitting inside the house. I guess I will figure a way to put it out before mail delivery. Since we are under martial law and not allowed to leave our houses until noon tomorrow I guess I won't worry about tomorrow's mail delivery.Upstairs I have one window out. Not completely. We can't figure out what hit it but the inside pane is still intact. Water came through three different windows due to the horizontal nature of the rain. The neighbor's lost most of the shingles on the lookout portion of their house (seen behind the trees blowing in the one shot). I have yet to go inside to look for water damage. It seemed strange to see water coming in through a closed window downstairs in my computer room but that is on the southeast corner. Piers: I have some great shots of the Kitty Hawk Pier. I will go add those in the morning. We could not get near it except going to some boarded up condos on the North side. I did not drive! I got a friend going out to take me along in his pickup truck. My understanding is that there is not a pier still standing up and down the beach here. One is mostly standing but it is minus the parking lot. I heard on the radio that two houses in Nags Head went in. I don't know how many we lost in Kitty Hawk. I am just thankful there was not more damage than there was. Unfortunately the last thing I heard on the radio was that two sherrifs that went looking for three stranded folks south of Nags Head this morning never called back in or showed up. I hope all five are okay.Hubby faired worse where he went to get away from the storm. They had lots of fallen trees on houses. I hope they are able to clean up okay. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zox Posted September 19, 2003 Share Posted September 19, 2003 Phew, I am glad you are ok. I hope your insurance will cover some damage.We are getting half inch of rain here today in Ottawa from the same storm and some wind, but that's it according to media.I am looking forward to see those pictures. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted September 19, 2003 Share Posted September 19, 2003 The pictures are up. The web site should work unless it has too much traffic. Isabel pictures. Golfpro was kind enough to mirror the site so an easier place to find them would be here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
friendofdot Posted September 19, 2003 Author Share Posted September 19, 2003 Teacher, so glad you are safe and sound, but 12 hours was a long time without power. Am sure today you are eager to view the area and am sure all of us are as eager to see the pictures. I am very surprised that every pier is gone. But I am fairly certain that y'all got a worse hit than we did, but it was **** over Eastern NC. Bet this morning is beautiful weather wise...thank God.Incidentally, one of the MSNBC people was driving the Bloommobile, made famous by the late David Bloom in Irag. Guess they thought it was a safe vehicle for traveling through a hurricane. Last night, while swithcing channels, I saw on MSNBC that the Bloommobile was three blocks from where I live. As I wanted a first hand view of it, I decided to head that way. Unfortunately, the phone rang and I didn't get there in time. It would have been a highlight of the storm Teacher, hope you were able to get a little sleep. I slept 8 hours and never moved; it was fantastic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
siebkens Posted September 19, 2003 Share Posted September 19, 2003 Teach - great to hear from you! Your hubby should have come by here!We're relatively unscathed at my house - basement is dry, didn't lose any trees, still have power. Our county (Augusta) got 12-14 inches of rain in some places so there is major flooding. Downtown Waynesboro had 6 feet of water standing in the streets, but that is receding now. I notice this morning that there are no birds singing - they must still be hiding out. According to the news, Isabel knocked out power to over 4 million people. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Friend Posted September 19, 2003 Share Posted September 19, 2003 Anybody interested in an awesome NASA shot...?http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2003/im...erra_gray_1.jpg Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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