Wind Power

Here's a short list of things I've seen in the past week, in approximate order:

• Tornados of mulch, accompanied by the sensation of being inside a very dusty hairdryer


• Traffic lights bouncing like popcorn


• Our patio furniture sliding around the deck


• Trees split in half down the middle, trees broken off at the trunk, trees uprooted from the ground, trees covering houses, tree limbs everywhere


• Lots of houses with siding and roof shingles ripped off


• Broken power lines, draped across streets and lawns like bedraggled party streamers


• A couple of street signs bent over and/or uprooted from the ground


• Gas stations with cars lined up around the corner


• Mounds of tree limbs piled up along every street, waiting for the city trucks to come turn them into mulch

The official weather report and some photos can be found here, and there are plenty of other photos here.

Some basic stats about the effects that the windstorm had on Cincinnati:

• By Sunday night, 90% of the greater Cincinnati area had lost power-- More than 700,000 homes and businesses.


• By Monday night, that number stood at around 580,000 homes and businesses without power.


• On Wednesday night, more than 15% of the homes and businesses in the Cincinnati area still did not have power.


• All of the Cincinnati Public Schools were closed for at least 3 days. Some schools were closed for the entire week.


• As of Friday afternoon, 5 days after the storm hit, 125,000 homes were still without power.

Whoever thought we'd spend a week recovering from Hurricane Ike?