Storm city

The arch effect did nothing to stop the storms that hit the St. Louis metro area last night. In my neighborhood, I saw tree trunks 10" thick snapped and lying on the ground. Hunks of trees were falling off all over the place around our house on the neighbors' properties. The clapboard siding on the house of the neighbor immediately to my southwest was pulled off -- about 4 or five boards were eventually sheared off.

The most amazing thing I saw was the branch of a sycamore tree, which was facing into the wind, was split in two, then wrapped around the trunk. That was an amazingly powerful thing to see.

Our electricity went out at 8 PM last night and hasn't been restored. The electric company, Ameren, says this is the worst storm (I am assuming they are basing their measurement upon the number of households without power) in the history of their company. Around 480,000 people are without electricity. In 2005, a storm knocked out around 225,000 households, and their electricity was not restored for 4 days. This does not bode well for our chances of getting electricity restored in a timely manner. :( Not a wonderful thing to deal with when the temps today are supposed to top 101, but cooler weather (low 90's for highs) is afoot for tomorrow and the next week or so.

At least it seems our house weathered the storm well -- I'll get out to have a detailed look this evening.