East Wind 2016

Back in 2011, we had a strong east wind that blew down hundreds of trees in Kaysville and the surrounding area.  The morning of the initial devastation, I drove Scott and Araceli to the airport where they flew to San Francisco for Araceli's 10 year old trip.  The airport didn't experience any wind, 20 miles away.  I don't know what causes these destructive winds, but they sure are localized at the base of the mountains.

This time, we had warning and sure enough, the winds picked up Saturday night when Scott and I were at dinner with Zeljko and Jenn.  They drove down from Idaho to fly out of Salt Lake to San Diego.  What a coincidence!  We had a fun night, going to dinner and visiting, until the power went out at 10 pm.  Funny, we knew where all the flashlights were because Xanthe had needed one for her Willy Wonka rehearsals.  We also knew that none of them had batteries except the one in her dance bag.  Zeljko, on the other hand, had headbands with headlights, flashlights, flares, and who knows what else in his car.

Ruby was still at Moonlight Serenade at the high school with plans to go to IHOP with dance company until 3 am, as is tradition.  I told her to come home instead, and she finally arrived at 11:30.  I stopped my hand wringing and went to bed.  We got up at 5 to take the Mijatovics to the airport and discovered that our neighbor's house 4 houses up had a massive cottonwood fall on it and utterly destroy their kitchen and living room.  It crashed right through the roof.  Zeljko and Jenn got to the airport fine, and the rest of us went back to bed.  When we woke up, we began the cleanup.  The neighborhood met at the church and went out in teams to chain saw and haul fallen trees.  Scott got started on that while the family went to Ryan and Jennie's for lunch.  They kindly invited us, as thier power had come back on sooner.  Thanks, guys!

We worked at my parents' house where they had lost 4 or 5 trees.  These are the trees I remember planting along the pathway.  My dad said they would someday grow big enough to shade the path, and they did. It was sad to see them go. We grew up together, those trees and me!

It's pretty impressive what people can accomplish with two chain saws and a lot of manpower. The neighborhood saved my parents and others thousands of dollars in cleanup.

Look what I got for 10 bucks at a yard sale. It's so comfy I want to live in it.