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Just Shelley The Democratic Difference Weather

Debby didn’t do Savannah

Well, we lucked out. Debby was slow moving, which wasn’t good. But it degraded over land. Better yet, it grabbed and incorporated a dry air mass that kept most of the heavier overnight rain away.

We lost power, so I don’t have an accurate rain measurement from my system. However, according to the University of Georgia weather station across the street from me, we had a total of 8.01 inches in less than 24 hours.

Now, we’ll get about an inch of rain today, maybe an inch tomorrow, and it will be done.

So far the only damage is to our roof dryer vent, which seems to be weeping some water internally and sneaking out through a join. Not a big problem. And the power outage didn’t last long enough to spoil food in the fridge or freezer.

Other sections of the city weren’t as lucky, as there was quite a bit of flash flooding. Chatham county and Savannah really need to think about better storm water management, and how much unrestricted development they’re both allowing.

Anyway, last TS post for this storm.  Debby just said “Hey!” and is passing on through—its eye is directly overhead as I write this.

And Kamala Harris picked Tim Walz for VP! Let the politics begin!

Categories
Savannah Weather

And Debby is still coming to town

Previous places I’ve lived have had emergencies that come up quickly and are usually over quickly. I’ve lived through a major ice storm in Grande Isle, Vermont, earthquakes in Washington and California, blizzards in Washington and Massachusetts, even Mount St. Helens, in Yakima, Washington.

A hurricane, though, is a different beastie. It’s like living in the land of giants and seeing a big ole shoe coming at you, and you can’t get out of the way. You’re waiting and watching. Waiting and watching.

We’re experiencing the impact of outer bands of Debby, which means periods of gusty winds, heavy rain, even a tornado watch, interspersed with periods of calm. Tonight and into tomorrow is when the real fun will start.

According to both Enki and NOAA, though we could get upwards of 15 inches of rain, the worst of the rain will likely occur in South Carolina. I’m sorry for our neighbors, but it’s not our fault and forgive us for being relieved. HOWEVER, not all of the models agree with this. Both the GFS and the ECMWF still show the major rain impact in our area.

(Edit: the GFS has since reversed itself, so the NOAA map seems more accurate all the time.)

Regardless, we’re going to get flooding rains. We already have a major river flood alert, and Savannah has put out warnings for so many roads that will flood that it’s just plain idiotic to drive tomorrow unless you must.

One of the bigger problems is community communication and its reliance on social media apps like X-witter, is not working well, and I’ll have more on this later this week. In the meantime, I’m just going to be sitting here, watching that shoe coming down.

Categories
Savannah Weather

Debby is coming to town

Debby is a hell of a bad name for a hurricane. I can imagine it on Facebook:

Marked safe from Debby

Nope.

Anyway, we don’t know how it will be. We know Savannah is on the path. We know we will be getting some winds, but not especially strong winds. And we know the biggest problem will be rain.

At this point in time, we’re expecting 10 inches, 15 inches, 20 inches, or possibly 30. Regardless, with the other bad rains we’ve had the last few weeks, we will have street flooding. And depending on where Debby plants her butt, we could be looking at some coastal flooding.

Stay tuned.

Latest from Enki Research

Latest from NOAA

 

Categories
Just Shelley Weather

Climate change and sewers

By my rain gauge yesterday, we had 3.98 inches of rain, and that’s not accounting for what fell after Midnight.

We’ve had heavy rains before, but this one seemed to be a particular problem in the O’Fallon area.

Last night we tried to flush our toilets, and they weren’t going anywhere. The seal on one was leaking (good thing we hadn’t fixed the drywall under those pipes yet). We called a plumber.

Poor guy came out, popped the top on the clean out, and up came sewer water.

He could run a camera, but we all thought the issue was the main was over-taxed with the rain, and our sewage just couldn’t enter the flow. Our system is over-taxed anyway, because one town’s force main dumps into our gravity main, at the manhole in my neighbor’s yard.

Anyway, I got my wish this AM: we could flush again. I’ll still need the plumber to come back, replace the O ring on one toilet, just in case.

Everyone keeps saying the same thing: they’ve never seen weather like this before. Not during the summer, not this fall.
Welcome to climate change.

Categories
Just Shelley Weather

Breather

Thankfully, the cold front dipped and we didn’t get all the expected rain last night.

Because we had a breather, the load in the sewer system has gone down enough so we can use our plumbing again.
Working toilet…hot shower. Seems so mundane, but no pretty jewel or cool electronic gadget is as nice as a working toilet and a hot shower.

I’m just sorry so many people have lost homes and lives because of this freak, climate-changed enhanced weather.

The weather cast states we’ll be getting inundated tonight, but we’re ready this time. Thankfully, I believe the more severe weather may be over.