Ice storm - Mid-Missouri - Dec 10, 2007

[Bibbyman]

A thunderstorm came up Saturday night and early Sunday morning.  As it was about 30 degrees,  I figured nothing good could come from this.  Before daybreak we were experiencing outages.  At about 10:00 am the electricity went off and didn't come back on.   



This is what it looked like when the "lights went out".

The two farmer brothers that have cattle on our property came over to put out feed and to check the fences.  They found that a tree had fallen on a fence in the lower field.   It also took out a section of distribution line.  We tried to reach the local REA office to report but the line was busy.  By late afternoon I told Mary to just drive in to the office and let them know a line was down.  I knew this was a loop line and it served a good many people over on the other ridge.  Besides,  if this breach wasn't fixed, we'd not get power back up.  She went out there and managed to get someone to open the door and reported the outage.  As expected,  they had their hands full and wouldn't get to it today.

It was a dark night at the Bibbyman house last night.  Brooke was home and didn't know what to think about it.  She was bored.  She couldn't watch movies, play with her stuff or anything.  We have a wood stove so we had heat.  We had stored up some water and had plenty of food.  We had bought some flashlights a couple of weeks ago and had candles.  So we were not in as bad a shape as others.  Finally when it got dark and we were setting around with 4 candles burning,  Brooke was about ready to go bonkers.  I had to tell her stories and jokes.  Then she told stories and jokes.  And we sang all the songs we all knew.  "There was and old lady that swallowed a fly", etc.  We kept this up until 9:00 pm and then went to bed.

This morning Mary had the idea we'd go out to breakfast and stock up on more drinking water, batteries, etc.  We did and on our way home we spotted an REA PU parked along the blacktop not 100' from the road to our house.  The guy was replacing a link with a hotstick.  It turned out that he was the line supervisor for our local REA.   Also,  he was a neighbor.  And his son and our son Chris was in school all 13 years together and had been buddies.  In short, we knew him. 

I explained about the line being down and that I knew where there were other trees touching the line.  He said he'd be right down.  The bucket trucks were following him down the road.

We went on home and unloaded our stuff.  About that time the farmer brothers were coming out after feeding their stock.  We all met at the same place.  I asked the brothers to lead the line crew to the break as they had to negotiate a couple of gates.  They did.



Turned out,  the line supervisor decided not to risk bringing a bucket truck across the pasture but instead made a temporary repair.  That's him in the light gray coat.



Me and the farmer brothers cleared the tree from the fence and line.   That's one of the brothers running the 044.



The line crew used to come-along type stretchers to connect the downed line.  Before they tightened them up they threw a rope over the line and tied it to the bumper of the truck.  They then tightened the come-alongs until the lines on the posts to the right and left were about as tight as they could get.  They then made the repair and removed the come-alongs.  They then untied the rope holding the line down and up it went.  As the ground line was broken at the post instead of in the middle,  they would need a bucket truck to fix it.  They just left it for a better day.

It still took them a couple of hours to clear the rest of the line and get the power on. 

I think they said they had over 6,000 customers without power in the southern half of our county and they're not the only electric provider.   The radio said 30,000 customers without power in our area.



Here is one of the big red oaks in our yard.  It's adding more limbs to the yard.  I can drive the tractor with canopy under the limbs in normal times.  Now they're touching the ground.

Yesterday afternoon and last night it sounded like opening morning of deer season.  Every few seconds you'd hear the rifle-like crack of a tree and then the crash.  The cracking, breaking, and crashing continues today and tonight.  If we get wind before it warms up,  we'll have a lot more damage.  It's sickening.

One thing I'm thankful for.  My folks, 80 and 90 years old,  only lost power temporarily.  I checked in on them every couple of hours.  I sure didn't want to get them out on this ice.

[Don K]

A ice storm of that magnitude wreaks havoc on our pines down here. They are not used to the weight. I remember two in my life and it was bad.

Don

[Tom]

Good story, Bibbyman.  We used to have REA service here and sometimes I wish we still did.  The local poser company is more interested in the volume of customers in town.

[WH_Conley]

If you have the same damage as we did a few years ago from ice, most people out of power for 11 days,be prepared to get covered up with logs. People that would not have timber cut turned it loose, we had a glut for about five years, now it is all gone, logging equiptment is real cheap, only 2 loggers still at it in my end of the county.

[Kcwoodbutcher]

The next part of the storm just started here. It's pouring down. They say we could have over an inch of ice by this time tomorrow. I've got wood heat but with no electricity it won't circulate through the house very well. Guess I'll just camp out by the old stove if I do lose power

[ElectricAl]

Bibbyman and KCWoodbutcher's Ice storm is headed our way >:(

This is what happends to a wind sock when getting an inch of ice and 70 mph winds.
Feb. 2007

[ronwood]

Bibbyman,

The whole town of Warrenton was out. I live south and we did not have an outage with the COOP. Main line runs through my property and the keep it up pretty well. The longest outage we have every had was 4 hrs.

Its raining this evening but we are above freezing.

Ron

[Woodwalker]

Don't know if we'll get as far as Missouri, but  this bunch of East Texas linemen I'm with is headed to Tulsa. Counting base load contractors, tree crews and company hands, there is somewhere around 250 of us and will be in there around mid-day tomorrow. News says they have about 600,000 out in Ok. Ya'll say warm.

[Furby]

Our news just reported 500,000 with out power in OK, and it's the state's biggest outage ever.

I'm just wondering how Haytrader and crew made out on their flight to Vegas.

[Bibbyman]

It's mid-night and we're up right now.  The lights flicker about bed time and sometime in-between it's been out long enough to knock stuff off. 

It's just above freezing right now and Weather.com says it'll keep warming up until mid-day and get up to 40.  Maybe some of the ice will thaw off.  The band of ice is above I70 and heading towards ElectricAl's place.

Early in the evening I told Mary to put a small flash light in her pocket.  She gave me that "idiot" look only a loving spouse could give.  I added,  "If the power goes off right now, it'll be darker than a tomb in here and we'll not know where to look for a flash light."  She replied, "I'm not afraid of the dark."  Ok.  I told son Gabe and he said, "Got'ya." And found a flashlight to keep handy.

WH,  our local logger came down and got a tailgate load of firewood for "just in case" use.   It thought it funny as he has truck loads of logs on his lot.  He even has a truck and a pup waiting to bring to us.  And the firewood I sold him most likely came from a log he sold us.  Anyway,  he said the good news is that the local land owners will turn loose of some of their timber now.

Most of our timber on our farm is low grade.  What do you want to bet, most of it comes through undamaged and the few good trees get the worst of it.  It'll be dangerous to even walk in the woods for a year because of loose limbs and such.

[WH_Conley]

The low grade stuff came through fine here. The slick straight stuff was on the cool side of the, where all the ice accumulated. I am still getting some in the yard, only thing now is that is rotted so much that it takes about a 16" log to make a tie, I measure inside the rot, that doesn't make for many ties on a truckload.

[thecfarm]

We had an ice storm in 1998,I think.That was a mess.I was without power for a week.Some people was not ready at all.They had to leave thier homes and let them freeze up.I had no power for a week,Some went up to 12 days.I was lucky with my trees.I had very little damage.I had land that had not been cut over for 80 years.My wife's place had a propane heater in it.We turned that up as high as it would go.That saved her place.I lived close to town at that time and I had town water.The papermill donated a big genator to the town.I had a wood boiler,so I opened up a valve and let water pressure run the heat and I had running hot water.I should of put a sign outside,hot showers $20 for 10 minutes.I would of made a killing.Down by my wife's house there was some white maple.Looked like a bomb went off at 60 feet high.All the tops were broke off.They went in with a wood processor a few years after that and cut it allfor firewood..We had help from all over,Canada too.We have a videos of the storm.One we walked around on,you could hear the branches breaking and the ice falling.And one we drove around on.Some roads were only one lane and some streets you could not get through.It was a big mess.Most times we only lose power for a few hours.Makes it hard when you depend on it.Good luck to you all.

[Cedarman]

Talked to my son Aaron in Stillwater Ok several times yesterday.  He said the bad stuff was south of him.  But he wasn't about to head out.  He has gas cook stove and fireplaces so he wasn't worried about the juice going off.  Ice doesn't affect cedars very much, it just breaks down the hardwood limbs giving them more light.

At the Springfield WM show this spring the devastation from their ice storm was very obvious.

I do not envy any of you that have to go through this.  Hope it passes with a minimum of mess.

Thanks for the pictures Bibbyman.

[ronwood]

Ice melted thru the night here. Fog is quite heavy at this time.

[Bibbyman]

Son Gabe had been out "with a friend" last night and got home sometime in the wee hours of the morning.  He said there was a tree top in the road just up from the mill.  I asked him if he removed it.  He said it was too big.  So I took the Terex up and moved it and limbs from another tree nearby.



The Terex is handy for these kinds of jobs.  It lets you reach where you can lift with some safety and keep it away from you. 

[wesdor]

Everything is closed in the Quad City area.  Power seems to be going out all over the place, but thankfully not here yet.  So far we are fortunate in this area only about 300 houses are without electricity.  Predictions are that number will rise as the ice continues to fall.

Our son left Des Moines, Ia early yesterday morning headed for Dumas, Texas (north of Amarillo).  He made it as far as Wichita before running into ice, but from there on it was ugly.  He finally arrived about 7:00 p.m.  We were all very thankful that he had made it without accident.

Someone on TV just said, "This is a storm we will be talking about for years." 

Those of us who can stay at home are lucky.  I think of all the power company workers that are out in this mess trying to get things back on for the hundreds of thousands of people without power.

Best wishes for everyone to be safe.  This too shall pass and we will look back at the many acts of kindness that a multitude of people will do for one another.

[SPIKER]

looks a lot like our place did almost 3 yrs back now, when ohio pa mich was hit really bad like that.   our storm was a weird one, it had bands, (where the rain clouds ran) that was total destruction then almost no damage!   each one was about a mile wide which made getting around a fun idea.   had to zig zag back & forth to get around going to work in am.   at 9 pm rain had been going most of afternoon really heavy after almost 2 weeks of steady on-off rain ground wasn't froze was saturated then came the big ice and just toppled anything that was leaning a little and took tops out of all kinds of trees.    my place was right on edge of damage cut right across the place the north side of my big white pins in front of the house looked like someone took a giant arm & smashed them flat even with the trees trunk the south sides were hanging flat to ground but un-broken :(   I had ~30% of the woods heavy damaged and are still a lot of damage from that storm not yet cleaned up)

I feel for ya. it drove timber prices down locally at my place for standing/or damaged stuff for sure.
mark

[rbhunter]

We live just north of Jefferson City. We finally got power a couple of hours ago.

Called and put a generator on credit until I could pick it up fist thing when the orange box store opened on Sunday. By the time we drove to Columbia and back with the generator the power had gone out. We just purchased a half a beef a month ago and did not want to chance loosing it and the other things in our two freezers.

The wood stove has gone non stop and now I am low on wood but with electric back this should be OK. Planned on buying another load this weekend. I will have to see if anyone can deliver or has a pile I can get to in a two wheel drive Ranger. The kids thought they were killed with no TV or Video games. I did not really want to hook up electronics to the generator if I could avoid it. I did have to hook up the laptop, dsl modem and router a couple of times due to having an online course and having to take a quiz for 100 points and to upload some assignments. I did briefly check forestry forum but decided to keep it short.

[woodsteach]

Well we've got it here in SE Nebraska as well.  The town of Falls city looks bad, I'd say 90% of the trees have severe ice damage, many service lines to homes pulled down.  1/2 of the town is out of elec. also.

We have 2 pickets on the picket fence damaged so we have been very blessed. 

I go out and drag the branches off of the street now and then and wear my hard hat when I do,  as the branches are still popping and now the wind is supposed to come up oh what fun, it will be tonight.  We have the lanterns filled with oil and blankets in a pile and NO fire place or stove isn't that just the way it goes.

You all be safe

woodsteach

[farmerdoug]

The ice storm missed us here.  When the rain fell the temps had warmed and by time they dropped below frezzing the rain had stopped.  But boyoboy do we have an ice skating rink outside.

I hope the rest of you have faired well through this storm.

Farmerdoug

[sprucebunny]

I'm sorry to hear about the tree damage from this storm.

We have had some serious ice storms here in the last 10 years. Elevation plays a big role here and which way a hill faces.

A 6 acre (used-to-be-hardwood) lot we own was devastated in 1998 and then cut. The abutting lot wasn't cut and you couldn't pay me enough to walk thru there with all the big widow-makers and snarled up broken branches and trees on the ground.

Watch out for ice snakes 

[ADAMINMO]

I wound up having to go on a service call in Durant,OK. I left Sunday around noon. It rained from my place to Springfield and then it turned to freezing rain and sleet and ice! I almost cancelled the trip but I gotta keep my customers happy and running.Made it down there but it was a long trip. When I left Monday afternoon I went a different route to avoid the bad stuff.I went down around Little Rock and stayed at my grandmothers for the night.(Saving the company motel money and supper and breakfast money as well) I visited with my Grandma and then headed home. Usually it take me 4.5 hours to go from my grandmas to home but this time it took 7 hours. The fog was so thick you could cut it with a knife. But all went well and I made it ok without a hitch.(other than a flat tire Monday morn)I hope everyone in the path of that storm comes out ok and may god be with the families that lost loved ones to the storm.

[Larry]

Much of the country from Springfield to Joplin and down through Oklahoma was hard hit this past January with a ice storm.  Warnings were abundant during hunting season about the high fire danger due to the heavy fuel load.  I don't even want to think about what it is going to be like this spring.

This storm was a lot more massive than the one in January...talked with sil up in St Joseph, Missouri and she said over 60% of the town was still without power.

[rbhunter]

Adam your Grandma's cooking had nothing to do with the detour. You were just thinking of the money you would save the company??

Just kidding. It was probably a good idea to detour around the mess.

[ADAMINMO]

HaHaHa!!!! A man of true words there my friend!! :D Never pass on Grandmas cookin and always try to pinch pennies for the company,makes ya look good to em!!

[ksu_chainsaw]

Our power got knocked out here at about 1am on early tuesday morning, and didn't come back on until about 1030 this morning.  I have mostly chinese elms in my yard, and it looks like i have more branches in the yard than i do in the air.  The neighbors still dont have power, and some local towns such as Troy, Highland, and White Cloud don't expect to have power back until late this week.  At least I had access to a small 2K generator to power my furnace while the power was out. 

Charles

[ElectricAl]

Well we got hit, just like Bibbyman predicted :-\

Our portion of the storm was not as bad as Oaklahoma

The hybrid Willows sure don't like the Ice.

Those are 40' trees bent over to the ground


Linda and I had to do some quick pruning to protect the power line to the shop.

I can't think of anything more fun than climbing a 32' aluminum ladder in an ice Storm.

Linda had to hook a couple to the tractor and pull as I cut the limbs.





Quite a butcher job but we saved the power line 8)

[farmerdoug]

ElectricAl,

Looks like a crystal palace around your place there.  Glad that you have been able to stave off the problem in the bud.  

Farmerdoug

[Dan_Shade]

those ice storms are bueatiful, but boy are they damaging....

[ElectricAl]

Doug,

This is our third ice Storm for 2007. It's starting to not be so much fun :(

Like Dan said there is some good looking Ice treasures out there. 


For us it's just been inconvenient. 
Lost wages, and extra fuel for equipment.
But no expensive damage yet.

[farmerdoug]

The worst ice storm I remember was from1975.  We were without power for more than 10 days.  One third of the woods was on the ground and the wildlife died in great numbers.  I still can see the damaged trees that survived to this day in the woods.  We have had smaller ice storms since but nothing compares to the storm of '75.  I ice was so thick on the poles and lines they snapped off out in the middle of open fields.   In the woods it was a war zone.  Loggers would not even cut it.  Waited a year and started to cut the mess into firewwod as it was worthless for milling.  It took years to cut it all for firewood.  The neighboring woods just rotted. :

I do remember walking the fields thinking of the beauty of it inspite of the destruction.  Just remember 'God giveth and God taketh away'.  In 50 years they will never know it happened in the woods.

Farmerdoug

[Norm]

It is amazing that Al is only a couple of hours east of us and got that much damage. We woke up to freezing rain that coated everything with about a 1/4" of ice but luckily for us it turned to snow shortly after. Even 45 miles south of us got hit hard, we were the start of where snow was the heaviest.

When we built this place we had to have a new power line put in. I cut every tree along the line for just such an occasion. The only problem was the neighbor just up the road has real big rotted soft maples that lean right up to the line.

[Bibbyman]

We were on the north edge of the worst of it on Sunday.  Town is about 10 miles north of us and you can see considerable damage on the south side of town where the north side looked like it got mostly snow. The county east of us reported only 150 people without power.

Some ice melted off the trees and most of it melted off the ground yesterday even though the temperature didn't hardly get above freezing.  We're are to get some sunshine today and I hope that helps.  But it's not expected to get above freezing.

[thecfarm]

ElectricAl,are you getting storms just like this,3 times in '07? Like I said we had one back in 1998.Those pictures haunt me.White birches and white maple was our big damage.I have some down in the meadow and there was some damage,but nothing like what was down by my wife's place.Good luck with all of you that are in that mess.I would much rather have the snow.The weather report was calling for some rain,freezing rain,sleet and snow.I suppose from the storm you all got?All that I got was 2" of snow.Just right.

[Roxie]

The storm has made it's way east.  We are currently getting rain and it's 34 degrees.  We're right on the Mason Dixon Line and according to the weather maps, we could get rain, freezing rain, snow or sleet.  I guess all they know for certain is that we're gonna get some precipatation.  Just north of us they are calling for heavy snow. 

[Kansas]

I lost my power at the farm at 12:30 am tuesday morning. Went to the mill tuesday morning and its without power, along with the entire town. Westar Energy, which serves the mill, says that some power wont be restored until Dec 22nd, and thats with no more storms. I havent heard what the REA that serves the farm is estimating-I havent seen any of their trucks in the area. I bought a portable welder/generator at a farm auction about 3 weeks-I still havent welded with it, but its been about the nicest present I ever bought myself.

[GF]

We got hammered here also in Oklahoma, they estimated that over 1 million in Oklahoma were without power.  I lost power sunday at 11:00am and as of today still have no power along with all the people in my area.  The past couple of days I have been running around wiring generators into my family and friends house so the can power their refrig and wells for water.  Now they are predicting 6" of snow friday night and they said some weather computer models are showing 12".  

I now have plety of trees to cut sad part is they are at my house.  The pine trees look like standing poles limbs are all stripped and the tops are broke off.  Pear trees now look like mushrooms the limbs are all broke all the way to the botton of the tree.

Gary

[sawguy21]

I really empathize with all of you. I have seen some doozies so have a good idea of what you are going through. Stay safe and keep in touch.

[Bibbyman]

We were listing to the radio on our way back home from town just now and they said there were still 75,000 without power in Missouri.  That's down 100,000 from yesterday.  They said they were making progress and thought most would be back up today. 

We saw a couple of bucket trucks out working just up the road from us.  I guess they have most of the main lines up and are out getting the more remote single outages.

[SwampDonkey]

Looks like a mess, call it what you want, but it's still a mess.

So far we have been lucky this year. We had some freezing rain a couple times, but no buildup. We had that storm back in 1998 up here to. It was worst up between Montreal and Ottawa in sugar bush country. Also SE New Brunswick was hit hard. Over the years I can only remember being without power at the farm here for no more than 4 hours. A couple years ago, or three, we had an ice storm that followed up the river valley from Woodstock to Bristol and we never had it out this way. It stayed close to the river, weird. February-March are bad times for ice here. This winter has been dang cold and started early. Went from summer to winter, no fall besides the changing foliage. The Almanac said a cold traditional winter for here and they seem to be hitting it so far.

Time to stuff some organo-carbon into the heating system.  ;D

[Handy Andy]

  We got our power back on at the farm today, and the ice was fallin off the trees. The ice melted off the grass except where the shade protected it.  Funny to look down at the crick and the ice is still on the north side of the trees, and melted off the south side.  We wound up getting 4" of rain that night it was freezin, been dry since we got the beans cut, just 1/4" once and .15 another.  Would have been a nice rain without the freezin. 

[Furby]

You folks in IN,IL,OH ready for the next round ???
It's headed your way!

[SwampDonkey]

16 " expected here starting Sunday evening. I don't think there are many sleds around now, hardly a track. Of course they are so expensive now and when you buy one the warranty runs out the other 8 months it's parked in the shed.

[WH_Conley]

Looks like it is coming up the Ohio Valley right now, just started here, guess we will see what we get.

[ronwood]

Snowing in Mo. Looks like we have about 3 in. and the forecast is calling for up to 10 in. of snow. At least it is not ice this time. How's it is going your way Bibbyman?

Ron

[Bibbyman]

I've not been out but it looks like less than 3" here right now.  Mary went out on her Saturday morning milk run.  She'll update me on the local weather report when she gets back.   ;D

[JV]

The prediction for us in northcentral Indiana is up to 17" with 40 mph wind gusts.  I've got the backhoe ready to go and may wish I had the radiator fixed on the dozer.  Oh well, why worry, I'm retired and no commitments right now.  My wife wants to get a few groceries, so I guess I had better go with her.  Several years ago I would have been on standby waiting for a call to plow snow on a 12,000' runway and staying for the duration.  Looks like the boys are going to have a busy season.  The biggest aggravation is the wet, soggy ground keeping me out of the woods.

[Faron]

Snow this morning, then rain, and now looks like a little freezing rain. :-\  I don't think we will have near as much as you guys in the west had, or at least I hope not.

[semologger]

havent been on for a while just trying to catch up with things. but i am just a few hours away from you guys and all i have been getting is ran. finaly got some snow today probly around 1 inch or so nothing much. there is so much of a diferance what a few hours south can make. southern mo never does get near as much snow as mid missouri. glad ya wasnt out in the cold to long guys. people in jeferson city was i heard.

[Bro. Noble]

At least it is not ice this time. How's it is going your way Bibbyman?

Ron

Well,  we arranged for someone to milk the stoopid cows and we all went up that way to see for ourselves what Bibby was complaining about.  On hwy 54 from Eldon to Ashland,  there was still thick ice over all the trees Friday afternoon.  The cedars were all hunkered down to the ground in little ice covered mounds.  Sat morning we woke (in Columbia) with three or four inches of new snow and more coming down.  Decided to head back south where the livin is easy ;D

While we were up that way,  we were able to do a little Christmas shopping at the discount malls  at 'Lake of the Ozarks' and see our son recieve his PHD at Univ of MO. ;D

[Bibbyman]

 

Here is a little patch of cedars on our place.  They didn't fair any too good after all the ice bent them over and then 4-6" of wet snow fell on the.  Many have busted off or broken down.

[Haytrader]

Bro. Noble,

Congrats to you and Nancy for getting another Barker boy through school.
What was his major and what occupation will he be in?
How is the post cutting going?

[Bro. Noble]

Thanks, Haytrader

David is in Math Education and has been teaching at Il State for the past couple of years.

The post cutters are amazing.  They work through rain and ice and snow and bitter cold.  Two old men packing posts out on their shoulders,  now that's low impact logging ;D  I wouldn't expect them to last long,  but they've been doing it for 20 years or more,  so they might just finish the job ;D

We ended up getting a little of Bibbyman's weather,  but not too bad.  It was warm today and supposed to get in the 50's everyday this week.