Ice storm ...Wow

[Mike_S]

My heritage river birches may not provide much shade in the future.

 

[Thomas]

Thats going to be a shame if you lose such a grand tree plus the others.

 

[Thomas]

We got some icing up in these parts but not as bad as you folks.
Your photo reminds me of our ice storm of 98..ice built up on limbs & wires etc..from 1/4 to 1/2 inch and didn't melt for the longest time.

Another bad thing from a ice storm is when the ice starts to melt and falls from the limbs etc..also w/the wind blowing...ouch on the old head. /w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif
Be careful out there.

 

[Bayrat]

<font color=blue>Yep, just got my first real nights sleep since Wednesday. Initially we had 100,000 customers out of power. We were down to 12,000 customers by late Friday and had all but a few back on by late last night. No matter how well you plan and organize, this type of thing wreaks havoc and is a bear to manage. Sorry I didn't have a chance to take pictures of it /w3tcompact/icons/sad.gif.

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

Neil,

The others have pretty much explained what an ice storm is. It rains--it freezes, coats everything and makes life miserable. We usually get at least 1 ice storm here in Michigan every January (or we have for the past few years). The storm these guys are showing you pictures of, passed across the South part of the state, but missed us Northerners. I was on the trailing edge of it and we got a coat about as thick as a floppy disk. So, it was pretty much business as usual. About the worst road conditions I experienced was where the county had spred a salt/sand mixture to try to break the ice. If the road surface is all one thing or the other, it's a little easier to deal with. But I kept hitting melted out patches and that makes the front wheels spin, then you hit the ice with snow packed over it and the car jumps.

I remember the wife and I driving home from the visiting her mother in the Hospital a few years ago. The nurses wanted us to stay because of the ice rain. We, of course, being dumb country people elected to drive home (about an hour at highway speed). The main roads were all fine and we made it without any problems. Our driveway however, was a different story. After we parked, I had to crawl across the drive to get to the door and spread salt so the wife could make it inside. When it's a regular occurance, I guess you get used to driving on it. Walking on the other hand is a challenge.

SHF

 

[Bird]

Yep, ice storms are lots of fun./w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif Fortunately, we don't have them too often in them middle of Texas, but about every 5 to 10 years we get a lulu; freezing rain instead of snow. About 20 years ago, in the middle of one, the next door neighbor called and woke me up between 2 and 3 a.m., said he got up to go to the bathroom and found he had a roof leak in the bathroom; water dripping in the floor, and wanted to borrow my ladder to have a look in the attic to see what was going on. Without turning on a light, and barefoot just in my pajamas, and half laughing at what he'd said, I started for the garage to open the door for him to get the ladder, and when I walked through the kitchen, I walked right under water pouring in from the recessed florescent light fixture./w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif That'll sure wake you up.

That's when we learned about "ice dams". It turned out that we didn't have roof damage. It was just that the ice formed on the roof, froze real good at the eaves, but then the heat rising inside the house melted the lower layer higher up on the roof, water ran down to the eaves, then backed up under the shingles.

 

[MDNY]

Bird: For us in the northen climates we have to put in snow/ice shield under the shingles to prevent the ice buildup. The house we are building will have a 3FT high material that has adhesive backing and sticks to the roof before the shingles are put on. Our builder puts this on all perimeters at the edge and on all valleys of the roof. Also we are having it put on the edge of our turret roof to (just in case) prevent anything from sticking.

Ice is bad, I remember the Ice Storm of '98, but my area of Central NY we didn't get as bad as the Watertown area, some were without power for a long time.

 

[Bird]

Yep, MDNY, I learned about that being done in colder climates that same year, but apparently it's either rare, or non-existent, in this area. And that one time was the only time I've known of a need for it. We had one of those ice storms in the winter of '72-73, I believe the one with the "roof leaks" was '80-81, and then we had another one in '89-90. I guess we're about due for another one./w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif

 

[MReeter]

Mike and Grant,We live approx. 90 miles N.E. of K.C. We were VERY lucky,we had an ice and snow mix that was'nt bad enough to take down Power lines,but the roads were tough to get around on.Areas to our North had 12-14 in. of snow,areas to our South had mostly freezing rain and ice.Have had a perfect Winter up until now,hope it returns soon.

 

[Rowski]

Wow! you guys got it pretty bad. We ended up with more rain than snow, and a little ice less than a 1/4". We had about 6" of snow then it turned to ran. . We had a bad ice storm in January of 1998. Did a lot of damge. You still can see some of the damage on the trees today.

Hope all is well

 

[MDNY]

Bird,

It's tough to consider ice shielding in your climate and the possiblity of ice is almot none. It could be something you might consider when you have the roof re-shingled in the future. The cost would be outwayed by piece of mind. We have an elaborate roof design on our house, not much just six roofs and the garage as well. So our roof pitches will help with the snow and ice issue and the ice shield will do the rest.

 

[njrqs]

So do you guys get "Hail" then??

We have hail where rain drops freeze and get (I think) coated by more moisture and freezes and over and over when they fall to the ground they can be gold ball or cricket ball size.

They strip trees and shatter roofs, cars etc.

Get that often in some parts here.

Ice storms sound bad but look good.

Being in the building game it is interesting to hear of all the climate realted things you guys have to consider.

Scary - All we build to are Cyclone ratings (Like a hurricane - Same thing I think)

Cheers

 

[Bird]

Neil, we don't get hail often, but it does happen. Most of the time, it's pretty small stuff that doesn't do much, if any, damage, but every once in awhile . . .. Once in the late '70s, I (and all my neighbors) had to have our houses re-roofed after a hailstorm, and I had to replace one broken window. Then it was either '96 or '97 when hail did over $2,000 worth of damage to my wife's car. The most severe damage I've seen from hail was '55 or '56 in Oklahoma. We measured one egg shaped hail stone that was 3.5" long. That one destroyed crops, severely damaged cars, houses, and trees.

 

[looch]

January/February 1998, we were 21 days without power. Here are a few <A target="_blank" HREF=http://205.156.54.206/er/btv/html/ice98.html>images</A> of a town in New york about 10 miles from my place.

 

[Thomas]

It doesn't seem that long ago,but it sure was a eye opener.
Hard to believe ice can even bring down those high voltage transmission lines and towers that go cross country.

 

[njrqs]

Yep I seem to recall seeing that on the news.

Just the sheer weight of the ice must be incredible.

Cheers

 

[GrantMO]

I heard on the news today that a spruce tree 25 feet tall and 12 feet at the base could hold 5 tons of ice during last weeks storm. No wonder so many trees were snapping.

 

[frank_f15]

i personaly will settle for a good old fashioned snow storm, u may not be able to drive or go far, but for the most part it ain't dangerous, now ice and wind, and floods are a real pain in the butt. now of course this year we had them all/w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif