[Leica] NW weather

[pklein at 2alpha.net (Peter Klein)]

Ted, glad you're OK.

We're all right, as is our house.  Our neighbors across the street didn't 
fare as well.  A big evergreen tree in their front yard had its trunk 
snapped like a matchstick.  It fell across their driveway, crushing their 
car and damaging a next-door neighbors' car as well.  At least it was only 
cars, not people or their homes.

Before the wind, Seattle got an inch of rain in one hour.  One poor woman 
drowned in her basement laundry room.  There were cars floating at a low 
point on Mercer St. just a few blocks from where I work.  And the streets 
were jammed, not with people trying to get home, but with people trying to 
get to a major football game--which was played, despite minor ponds on the 
field and waterfalls cascading down the steps of the stands!  Fortunately 
the game was over before the really big winds hit.

We were without power for 24 hours, got it back yesterday evening for a 
while, lost it again for an hour, and then it came back on for good after a 
couple of quick blackouts.  Some of the outlying areas may be without power 
for several days.

Jerry:  Most of the electricity in the Pacific Northwest comes from 
hydroelectric generators on dams.  The electric power company in southern 
British Columbia is called "B.C. Hydro."  Hence, when Ted says "hydro," 
he's talking about electricity, not water.

How's the rest of the Northwest LUG?  Everybody OK?

--Peter

At 06:19 AM 12/16/2006 -0800, you wrote:
>It was pretty wild around here during the night with trees coming down in
>many parts of Victoria and no hydro connections for several hundred
>thousands of homes and offices.
>
>In my home we were without power from sometime around 3 a.m until around
>noon today (Friday) But other than that we did fairly well. I don't feel bad
>about the electricity as this is the 3rd major wind storm this week and we
>only lost power the once. Where many others on Vancouver Island have been
>with out hydro for over a week due to one storm right after another. The
>hydro guys get lines fixed and it storms and they have to fix it all over
>again.
>
>Bad month for weather so far.
>Thank you for asking.
>ted