On the way up Brian nudged me awake, "Look at that!" he said pointing to the northwest.
I strained to open my eyes. They just didn't want to open. Somehow my eyelids pryed itself open and before my eyes was a series of lightning strikes. From the glow of the lightning you can see the massive cloud. That caught my attention and woke me up. I love thunderstorms and this one seemed like it was raining lightning.
"We better hurry so we can meet up with my truck and I can do my pretrip before that storm hits." he drives a little faster going north on 131.
At that time in the morning on May 31, 1998 it seemed as if no one was around. The streets were eerie silent. We would get into a few batches of rain and then it would stop. We could hear the rolling sounds of thunder angerily snapping at our heals. We made it to the 44th street exit and it was a straight shot to the airport. Most of the lights were still blinking yellow. Some we did get stopped at by a red light only to see the storm heading for us in the rearview mirrors like it was angry at us for trying to outrun it.
At last we make it to the parking lot next to the airport terminal. The cloud let out its rain like a bucket was dumping over the edge of it. Instead of getting out of the car to run around to the driver's seat I just slid myself across looking at the heavy rainfall through the windshield. Poor Brian was out in the rain looking over his truck to make sure everything was good to go for his daily trip. Then I started to hear a thunk, thunk, thunking noise on the roof of the van. I looked around to see what it was. It was raining so hard I couldn't see out the windshield. Brian quickly hops in the van dripping wet. "It's hailing! I am going to wait in here until it lets up a bit"
We sat in the van for a moment listening to the tinking sounds on our van. I looked behind to check on our children. They were both fast asleep unaware of what was going on in the world around them. After a few moments the hail slowly started to let up. Brian kissed me goodby and told me to be very careful as I drove to my mom's house. I insured him I would. He got out of the van and made a dash for his truck. His headlights flashed on and off at me. That was his way of saying he was good to go and I could leave. I turned the van around and headed towards 28th street.
I could feel the wind pushing against the van like it was trying to stop me. I was determinded enough to continue. I was amazed at all the lightning that lit up the pre-morning sky. I was so engrossed with the lightning that I wasn't paying much attention to what was going on around me. I suddenly realized that I haven't seen any street lights. As I was crossing over Breton I looked up and in the flash of the lightning I seen the yellow light signal swinging madly over me. I looked back in my side rearview mirrors. No lights! I thought to myself. Power must be out. I need to slow down, pay attention and stop at the intersections. Having worked as a waitress on 28th street on that side of town 4 years prior helped me navigate my way west on 28th street. I remembered where the major interestions were and knew when to stop. I was thankful that traffic was sparce that morning and no one came from the other side streets and ran through like I did and hit me. I couldn't get over at how hard the wind was blowing. The trees I could make out wanted to topple over in the wind. Light poles in parking lots swayed violently. To me, this was exciting.
I finally made it to my mom's driveway. The rain had let up a bit but it was still raining. I turned around in my seat to cover Elizabeth's car seat with a blanket to protect her from the weather. I looked over at Christian. He was still sleeping. I got out of the car and popped Elizabeth's car seat out from its base just enough so I can grab it with one hand. I lifted Christian out of his carseat and put him over my sholder. The rain on his face woke him up a little bit. I grabed Elizabeth's car seat with my other arm and dashed quickly to my mom's garage. I set Elizabeth's car seat down so I can work the door to enter my mom's house. As soon as I did that the door started to open. My mom was on the other side relieved that I made it there okay. We all enter and made our way to a screened in porch. There, looking at me from the other side of the glass, was my older sister with her daughter.
"What are you doing here?" I inquired with a smile. She lived about a mile from our mom's house.
"It felt like our apartment was about to fall over. I wasn't sure if there was going to be a tornado" she said. She doesn't like storms a whole lot.
My mom's power was out also. I told them that most of 28th street is without power. We sat and rocked the children watching the storm work its way to the east. The sun was trying to work its way through the clouds to bring on the day and to illuminate the destruction that was left behind. In my mom's yard a few small trees fell over and Brian came a few days later and helped remove them.
Several hours later we were all starting to get hungry. We couldn't cook anything because the power was still out in our location. We decided to drive around and see what was opened. Denny's over by 131 and 44th street was open. The parking lot was packed. Chris, my mom's husband, went in and set our reservation. It was over an hour wait. We sat in the car and waiting for a while before we made our move inside. Elizabeth woke up and wanted to be nursed. I looked around at the busy resturant. Being a private person that I am I just couldn't nurse at that moment. I did, however, carry around the premade 2 ounce bottles of formula that the hospitals give out after you have a baby. I opened up the bottle and that was her first time taking a bottle. She was done nursing after that day.
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| Area affected by the May 30-31, 1998 derecho event (outlined in blue). Curved purple lines represent the approximate locations of the "gust front" at three hourly intervals. "+" symbols indicate the locations of wind damage or wind gusts above severe limits (measured or estimated at 58 mph or greater). Red dots and paths indicate tornado events. http://www.spc.noaa.gov/misc/AbtDerechos/casepages/may30-311998page.htm |
Looking back and gathering information about this storm Wikipedia says, "860,000 people lost power in Michigan. This derecho (wide spread windstorm associated with severe thunderstorms) would go on to break the record for biggest power outage ever in the state of Michigan (but later surpassed by the 2003 North America blackout)." This storm spread from Montana to the Atlantic Ocean. It went through Michigan in 2 hours. Wiki also said that Grandville had extensive damage which led to the city being closed off and no one could leave. I didn't find that to be entirely true since we were able to head out to Denny's and I was able to pick my husband up later on that evening with no problems. But there was damage all over Michigan and smaller tornado's did pop up sporadically. Trees did topple over and roofs were blown off of homes and buildings. In fact, over 12,000 homes were damaged and 34 homes were completely destroyed. Over 800 businesses were damaged and 34 businesses were destroyed. This storm was so bad that 5 of Consumer's Energy 345 kilovolt transmission towers were blown down between Ludington and Grand Rapids. They were designed to stand up to gusts of 110 miles per hour. "Overall, the derecho traveled 975 miles from southern Minnesota to New York in 15 hours at an average speed of 65 mph. It became one of the most damaging derecho events in North America's history, causing $300 million in damage."http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late-May_1998_tornado_outbreak_and_derecho)
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| Red numbers are maximum measured wind gusts in mph. Orange numbers are estimated maximum gusts in mph, based on a damage survey by Grand Rapids NWS Forecast Office meteorologists. Thirteen Michigan counties (noted in black lettering and within light blue border) together were declared a Federal Disaster Area by the Federal Emergency Managers Association. The purple "S" represents where a "seiche" took place on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan. http://www.spc.noaa.gov/misc/AbtDerechos/casepages/may30-311998page.htm |
And there I was driving straight into the monstrous storm totally unaware of its magnitude.
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