Tom Zirpoli: Exciting rendezvous with Irene - Carroll County Times
One of the first items that disappears from the stores on the day before a hurricane is the size D battery.
Evidently, most flashlights use size D batteries. And in Virginia Beach on the day before hurricane Irene's unwelcomed visit, it appeared that many flashlights were receiving fresh batteries.
Of course, to drive around and shop for a pack of size D batteries you need a car with gasoline. But by Friday morning most of the gas stations in Virginia Beach, where I had driven to be with my mom, were sold out.
Bottled water and other supplies were still available in some grocery stores, but going fast and furious. Many stores closed by early afternoon so that employees could go home and prepare for the storm or just leave town.
Virginia Beach is wedged between the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. If you walk south on the beaches there along the Atlantic Ocean, you will soon cross the state line into North Carolina and the Outer Banks.
The roads leading away from Virginia Beach were busy as tourists and residents moved west and out of Irene's projected path. Virginia Beach and the surrounding area are frequently referred to as Tidewater because the land is almost level with the high tide level of the surrounding ocean and bay. Even a small surge of water from an ordinary Atlantic storm is enough to put much of the area under water. But this was a hurricane heading our way and flooding was anticipated.
By Friday evening most people in Virginia Beach were as ready for the storm as they were going to get. Restaurants were quiet, and the tall skinny pine trees, common in that area and easily broken by a strong gust of wind, began to sway.
Our encounter with Irene came on Saturday. The morning rain and wind were a warm up before hours of hurricane-force winds through the afternoon and into the evening. All you could do was watch and wait and hope for the best.
By early evening, category one winds shook the trees as we watched the waters of the Chesapeake Bay rise with each passing hour. High tide, a time of serious flood concern, was scheduled for 7 p.m.
But falling trees, not flooding, was my primary concern. The ground was already saturated with about six inches of rain, making easy work for the wind to push them over. One particular giant tree behind my mother's house was the focus of that concern. Even with the tree standing back as far as 30 feet from the house, it was tall enough and big enough to take out half the house if it were pushed in the right direction.
By 8 p.m. wind and rain filled the outside. It was dark and we could only listen to the fury of Mother Nature. We lost electricity. The western wall of Irene's eye was now less than 10 miles to our east and we were grateful that this was only a category one hurricane.
When we went to bed Saturday evening we knew the worst was over. The back end of the hurricane would push water away from our shores and reduce the flooding, and the winds would begin to die down during the night.
The drive home to Westminster was an adventure in itself, but by Sunday evening I was home-sweet-home.
My encounter with Irene was brief, at times intense, and a little exciting; just what you might expect when you schedule a meeting with a hurricane.
Tom Zirpoli writes from Westminster. His column appears Wednesdays. E-mail him at tzirpoli@mcdaniel.edu.
31 Aug, 2011--
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