Rough Night … More to Come

Tuesday, 12 May 2015
Gulf Waters RV Park — Port Aransas, Texas
Temps: Hi 80F (27C) / Lo 74F (23C)

Well that was a doozy of a storm we had last night — actually more like in the wee hours of the morning!

We went to bed knowing there was a severe thunderstorm threat, but there were no alerts.  That was around 9:00p for Mui; and 12:30a for me.  The wind was blowing, but not much harder than it has been blowing this past week.  Certainly not enough to shake the rig.

At 2:30a, we woke up to the flashing red light of our weather radio — severe thunderstorms moving through the area; a-ways off for us.  Mui got up to turn off the alert.  We went back to bed.

At 3:00a, we woke up to the flashing red light of our weather radio again — this time it was for flash flood warnings.  OK.  Mui got up to turn off the alert.  We went back to bed.

The weather radio went off again 15 minutes later.  This time the alert was for a line of severe thunderstorms moving through the area … possible wind speeds of 60 mph (96 kph) — that’s a Force 10 Storm/Whole Gale on the Beaufort Scale.  I got up and turned off the alert.  It was obvious we weren’t going to get much sleep, so I went into the living room to check the RadarScope app on the iPad.  Yup; those thunderstorms would be gunning straight for us in short order!

The above screenshot from the weather app is from about an hour before the storm hit us with full force.

I have no idea if the winds reached the forecasted speed — but it certainly felt like it!  When the storm came over us, the blow was strong enough to shake the rig vigorously.  The palm fronds were flapping like crazy; the plants were bending every which way.  When the thunder and lightning entered the picture it was to a cacophony of booms and jagged light rending the sky.  And then it started raining; the wind blowing the deluge of water sideways; the rat-a-tat of the heavy drops on the Phaeton’s roof making it impossible to hear the weatherman even though we had the volume cranked up all the way to 100%.  At one point we lost power; but it was restored within 15 minutes.

The storm lasted more than an hour without losing its ferocity.  Just when we’d think, “it’s over,” another band would roll through.  Finally, when the winds died down — I use that term loosely — I headed back to bed.  It was almost 6:30a and I was sleeping on my feet.  Mui decided to stay up — it was his usual “rise and shine” time anyway.

When I woke up again at 8:00a, the storm was out in the Gulf of Mexico.  Mui was dressed and ready to drive into Corpus Christi for his dental appointment — he was due to be “crowned.”  He had gone out at first light and taken some photos of our site and the Z’s site a few pads down from us.  “Wow” was all I could say when I saw the pictures.

[Mui’s photos were blurry — he didn’t have much light after all.
The photos I am sharing are the ones I took when I started my day a second time at 8:00a.
Click any photo in the series for a larger image.]

The only real damage on our site — we lost part of a yucca; one of the original plants.
Mui had just mentioned last week that the main stem seemed unstable and wiggly.

The only standing water on our site (left); the site behind us has considerably more water.

The fan palm we planted last fall (left) is a lot closer to the water after the storm!

A picture of our site from last fall.  Note the bench on our neighbor’s site
and the fan palm we planted not too far from it.  Now compare it …

… to these pictures from this morning showing how much the pond rose after the rainfall.
That’s our fan palm on the left; and the neighbor’s bench on the right.

A wider look at our neighbor’s sunken patio — excuse the pun — and the pond.

Water has breached the retaining wall of the sunken patio on Mary & Tony’s site,
but otherwise all’s well … the planters and fountain pot have not floated away.

After Mui left for his appointment, I headed out for a wander around GWRVR to see how everyone else had fared.  There were a lot of sunken patios under water to varying degrees.  Plants and trees looked OK — at least outwardly; we’ll see how well they survive the dunking they got.  Small ceramic planters had not floated off from where they had been placed by site owners.  The sod was water-logged and squishy.  In some sections, the roads around GWRVR were covered with ankle-deep water that I had to slosh through.  And the drainage ditches outside the resort were full.

Considering the ferocity of the storm, I’d say GWRVR fared not bad, not bad at all.  Yes, there is lots of standing water; but that will drain away.  Yes, the ponds are full to brimming; but the pumps should drain the levels down to manageable levels (I hope).  From my cursory inspection, our yucca was the only plant outwardly damaged; certainly none of the tall palms came down (knock on wood) and I didn’t see any big palm fronds littering the ground — probably helped by the “hair cut” the trees received about a month ago.

Most importantly — no damage to life and limb.  Lots of areas around and outside the US are faring much worse than us … thinking of what they have (and still are) going through puts our storm in perspective.

We could use a bit of respite from thunderstorms, but that’s not what the weather guys are forecasting.  More of what we experienced is apparently on the way … this afternoon and over the next two days.  We can only hope that the next round of storms are not as ferocious.  And that whatever rain falls is gentler — we got 6+ inches with the storm that just went through; another 2-4 inches are forecasted over the next three days.  That’s good news for the reservoirs; not so much for the water-soaked ground.

It sure has been a very odd spring!  Keeping fingers crossed for everyone that better weather is on the way for all of us — sooner rather than later.

And now to end on a more cheerful note …

Thanks to the efforts of the Gulf Waters Garden Club, the farley boats outside the
resort were spruced up earlier this spring.  They look so good that the Port
Aransas Garden Club is honoring the effort as the Commercial Yard of the Month.

You know we will be monitoring the weather closely in the days ahead.