Where were you on January 9, 1998?
I was driving on Spring St, in Long Beach California. Retail Merchandiser allowed me to make my own schedule. Serviced 3 stores and was headed for the Rite Aid on Spring St at the corner of Palos Verdes. Tired, feeling down in the dumps, decided to skip the store and go home.
Had never seen the sky blacken like it did that afternoon. Ominous is the word that comes to mind. Wind driven rain spattering the windshield, making visibility close to zero. Don't normally watch television, but put the TV on when I got home, just in time to catch the news about the tornado. It only touched down briefly, the major damage was to the Lucky grocery store, across the street from the Rite Aid. If I had turned left on Spring as was my plan, instead of right and heading home, I would have been pulling into the parking lot, just in time to see the twister touch down across the street. Oh my. The info I found on the web said it was classified F0 or F1, with winds of 150MPH just before the funnel formed.
Long Beach Press makes a big distinction, "It was not a tornado, it was a water sprout". Could not buy the full articles, from the Press Telegram archives, about 2 more tornado's.
Can you imagine sleeping outdoors in such weather?
Tuesday, June 6, 2006
1 comment:
Wow, I saw that "tornado" we might have crossed paths.
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