Texas Gardening: Hurricane Ike Landfall, 1 by henryr10

henryr10 wrote:
Glad to hear Randy is OK!

Ike paid us a pretty good visit yesterday afternoon.
It intensified to TS winds here from a TD as it slid past us.
We were on the dirty side.
Sustained 40 MPH winds, Gusts to 76 MPH (highest ever recorded except in a tornado).
Absolutely no rain or tornados.
675,000 homes w/o power last night or 90% of the area.
Down to 575,000 now. (we are in the Lucky 100,000 who got restored)
Trees and limbs were falling like mad everywhere around here.
This area is not geared for winds like this.

Sadly there were 4 deaths from trees falling on houses and one falling on a Motorcycle of all things.

I did find out one of my lighting ideas for the new room we are building will in fact work.
And is GREAT for emergency lighting too.
We brought our LED Solar Spotlights inside.
(3 Light sets I removed one light to conserve the batteries)
We put one set in the LR and one set over the bed.
More than enough light for reading and moving around safely.
They are still on thhis morning.
AND we can just move the Solar Collector back outside today and recharge.....

This should work well, especially down South where the sun is more intense.

Here's a TOP limb from a giant White Oak that is over our neighbor's house.
Luckily the wind blew it away from the house.

Be Safe!
Ric