Good morning, we're under tornado watch until 11 AM EDT.
This is the hourly weather forecast for Cocoa Beach. Methinks I'm not going to the lap pool this morning.
Just took a lightning strike about 100 yards away.
@WordsmithFL that can be scary. when we had the back 40 logged, i insisted they cut all the pines along the pasture fenceline & the ones within 75' of the house, because every storm one or more played lightning rod (if hit just right, pines explode & send shrapnel up to 50' away). there's still a few i think are too close, but they're on my neighbor's property
@redenigma A few years ago, we had a lightning strike split an oak tree in the back yard. I thought a bomb had gone off. After that, I had all the oak trees removed from the property (except one, which my wife insisted we keep for the squirrels).
The neighbor had lightning strike his house a couple years ago. His son was at the keyboard and felt electricity go up his arm.
Such is life in Florida.
@redenigma Whereabouts are you?
East-central Florida gets more lightning strikes than anywhere else in the U.S., although sometimes we swap that honor with a place near Tampa. Part of life in the Sunshine State.
@WordsmithFL southeastern NH. weather here is very stable compared to FL or the midwest.
my dad lived in Tampa/St. Pete & used to give me weather reports
@redenigma Our house has a small enclosed patio where we can watch the light show -- until there's a strike in the neighborhood like we had this morning.
@redenigma The Gulf side tends to get more combustible weather because the storm fronts move west-to-east across the country. Our combustible weather is usually during the summer when warm Gulf air collides with the relatively cool air coming off the Atlantic. Hilarity ensues.
I'll never forget the time my uncle Johnny had just finished pool maintenance at my grandparents' house in Satellite Beach. Lightning struck the deck where he'd stood barely 10 seconds before. The bolt smashed the concrete something fierce. Thank goodness in wasn't Johnny! 😧
@WordsmithFL the closest trees to the house now are sugar maples & American chestnuts (and those are still pretty small, under 10 foot).
mostly, in the past 7 or 8 years, storms have hit the ridge northwest of us & split all the storms to the north & south. it's an interesting but unsettling change in weather patterns