Holy shit, I just drove my rig through Champagne IL

[denbot]

I was driving WSW on I-74, talking to my favorite cousin, and mentioned to him that it looked like I was about to drive into an artillery barrage. As I hit town the rain when from heavy to WTF, and as I crossed over a railroad overpass lighting hit a light pole a hundred yards or so in front of me. The weird thing was that instead of a cracking boom, it sounded like a shotgun blast, a really BIG shotgun blast.

As I reached my turn (south on the I-57) the most amazing weather effect I've ever witnessed developed. The I-74 looked like a horizontal waterfall. There could not possibly be that much rain, I think that the heavy winds were picking up the water on the ground and blowing it across the roadway. Cars were already taking shelter under bridges and overpasses but I did not get worried till other semi's started pulling to a halt under overpasses. At that point I had my cuz looking at weather maps as I switched my CB to the weather channels and found out I'm tooling around a tornado watch area.

Done! I pulled off at the first truck accessible service station off the southbound I-57. I have to head through Oklahoma City, the second time in the last two days. Yesterday as I reached OKC from the west a trucker announced "there's one on the ground!". I did not make a visual but that was close enough.

Tomorrow it's once more into the breech, home lays to the west. I'm not going to do a turnaround, I feel that I've earned a day to surf.
Peace,
denbot

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. Home will look very good for you and your family, my dear denbot...

The weather is beautiful: sun's shining, bright blue skies, no clouds after the morning fog burns off.......warm and nice.



Stay safe!

[denbot]

3. Ah, home sweet home.

I won't even mind when Alley hands me a to-do list..

[elleng]

2. PEACE!

[HarveyDarkey]

4. One like that went through here two days ago

The storm was moving at 65 MPH with 70 MPH straight line winds. Tree limbs, shingles and anything that was loose flying everywhere. It's now officially the wettest spring in recorded history here now, and there's more to come. And to think, this time last year we were sweltering under oppressive heat & drought conditions. Yeah right, there's no climate change.

[davsand]

5. Lots of rain and wind. No tornadoes I've heard about.

We live here in Urbana. You were here at an awful time. Lots of wind blowing and a lot of rain coming down. Several trees blown over and lots of limbs down. A couple of houses out by I-57 had some serious damage from winds and trees and limbs blown down. A few power outages but nothing as bad as other places have had.

Sorry your trip through was so awful. Unless you catch us in winter it usually is pretty low key around here.

BTW, that railroad overpass you mentioned? I had my first car accident on that same overpass over 30 years ago when I hit a patch of ice on my way to college. By the time I got the car stopped, I had bounced off all the guardrails and was turned facing back the way I'd come--with cars coming up the hill at me. I was 19 at the time and I was wondering if I was gonna live to see 20. That overpass has creeped me out since then.



Laura

[denbot]

6. Woot! The tornado watch just got cancelled for my area! Woot!

I can turn off the weather channel on my CB and get a little shut eye.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

7. Oh, that's good! Sleep well, my dear denbot...

[hunter]

8. As a California kid I'd never seen storms like I saw in Champaign-Urbana.

Not even the lightening bolt that my friends had seen hitting the street light.

The lightening bolts in Illinois were MUCH bigger.

[Rincewind]

9. Glad you are ok,

but, it's spelled "Champaign". Yes, I know that's wrong, but that's how it's spelled. I live about 1/2 mile from the I-74 / I-57 interchange. This wasn't the worst storm we've had in these parts.

[riderinthestorm]

10. Safe journey denbot! Hope you make into your home port without seeing another storm this trip! nt