Hit by nature in a bad way

Dear Bloggers,

It was a hot summer evening with dark thunderclouds hanging over the fields and my wife and kids looked happy when I finally showed up after work. I had to work the late shift and my youngest was sound asleep when out of nothing a thunderstorm came around and my oldest was sitting in front of the kitchen window watching raindrops plink the puddles when she heard a rumble outside followed by a loud bang. My youngest daughter was downstairs in a millisecond. From that moment the wind speeded up to hurricane strength and wiped out everything on its way.

 Things I met on my way

During the ride I phoned home that I could see this enormous thunderstorm coming at me and she told me that it just went over them and it was bad. As I drove closer towards my home the rain pounded on my windshield and the wipers had a hard job to do. The rain caused a kind of ground mist and made it hard to find the road and some trees had fallen over the road. A few kilometers from home all the trees had fallen over on houses and cars and also the phone connection failed to work. I got pretty worried when I saw all the blue flashing lights coming towards me. I took some effort to get around the fallen trees. 

All of a sudden there was a tree in the way

They all looked very happy when I walked in the front door. My wife knew right away it was me, though she could never say how. There were always cars idling in the street at night, boyfriends of neighborhood girls giving it one last shot, suburban kids after a night out in town. The storm crushed up the TV signal too much and the wind hauled too loud and made the windows tremble, the flashes kept them up at night.

 The world turned all off a sudden pitch black

the other campsite the day after

 

When the wind had eased down after half an hour, I talked to some of the neighbors and found out that on a campsite about 750 meters away that a little child was stuck in mobile home as a tree fell on top of the wagon. The child just came that day to have a bit of a holiday with her grandparents. The fire brigade had too saw themselves away towards the campsite to get the ambulance services down there. Some of the locals went over there with chainsaws and big tractor trying to lift up the tree and to rescue this child.    

They did what they could for her, although they could not reach her. She lost life before the ambulance was there, very sad.

horror on the campsite

 

But she was too badly injured that before they could get her out she had passed away. A sad story that shook up our little village as in my neighborhood there are a lot of young families with kids. We understand very well that this 7 year old girl has been fighting for her life but did not make it. An unbearable trauma for everyone that was involved.

We live in the houses behind the trees in the distance

This tree snapped like a match

 

The next morning when we had breakfast, I scrambled some eggs and bacon done crisp the way I knew they liked it. I put everything on the table made the girls some tea and for myself plenty of strong coffee. Sometimes we’d sing together, doo wop harmonies from when they were little girls or one of a half dozen Christmas songs, a morning serenade that would carry me through the whole day. Then we would leave in a swirl of laughter and going to a fun park as we had planned, pulling away with horns honking, long after the other dads had gone to work. When we left, just the song on the radio from Pearl Jam “Just Breathe” could bring me to tears.

 “All of this happened a bit more than a week ago” During our walks in the area we realize that we have been very lucky. As another campsite a few kilometers away was hit as well and a caravan was blown over and injured a couple. It looked like a warzone, the pictures will tell the rest of the story

On the next day while I did the dishes I studied a map, tracing the storms route with a yellow highlight pen.

No Damage at all

My neighborhood

Outside the rain had stopped and the sky was turning gray again. The car in the yard looked cold. Soon it started to rain again and yesterday it was a beautiful and sunny day again. A sad day and time to check out the damage only the tent of the neighbors was smashed by the wind and some of the trees were ripped up.

Mamy trees fell over

 

Lightning flashed outside the window and a loud crack of thunder shook the dishes in the cabinet. More thunder rolled right over top of them, breaking off somewhere to the west. Still none of us did cry. But this time all of us were awfully quiet. Lightning flashed as we made their way up the hallway. When we got to the kitchen the storm was just drifting off.

The Old Sailor,