Entertaining Claudette

Tropical Storm Claudette lurked just off the Texas coast, seemingly undecided on where to strike. Advisories of one kind or another were posted for the entire Texas coastline.

I had already cleared the yard of patio furniture, garbage cans and potted plants and stocked up on the usual food, water and batteries but, even though we'd decided not to evacuate, our lifetime of storm watching experience warned us to sleep lightly that Monday night. Claudette could strengthen. Claudette could sneak up on us. At 4 am, I checked updates for the second time that night and set another alarm for 7:30, but awakened an hour earlier. A sleepy-eyed glance at the updates and radar image showed Claudette powering up and aiming for Port O'Connor, yet weather reports still predicted wind damage would be minimal.

Packing up and leaving seemed a huge job at that hour of the morning, and was probably not necessary. Still, something about that big, white swirl on the radar screen, knocking on my back door, just didn't feel right. Were we doing the right thing by staying? Live broadcasts from Galveston and Port O'Connor showed backgrounds of dark skies, choppy waters and increasing winds. Reports had now changed Claudette's status from a tropical storm to a Category 1 hurricane. That meant winds of at least 74 mph and lots of rain. Was that really a big enough threat to leave?

New reports claimed that, as Claudette crept onto shore, her winds, surprisingly, continued to gain strength and several tornadoes had been spotted. That did it. We decided, at the last minute, to haul out. We rushed about gathering a few valuables, including crates and six dogs, to go into our two vehicles. A gusty breeze and light rain had begun when we drove away.

Where to go? Anywhere north, away from Claudette! Through my windshield I watched low hanging clouds swirl across the sky above us in their east to west pattern. We just drove. An hour and a half down the highway the sky was not nearly so threatening. We stopped at a convenience store for snacks and parked in the small city park where I took the dogs out on leash, one by one, for a bathroom break. A nearby carload of people watched. I'm sure they wondered just how many dogs I would pull out of that van!

A cell phone call home to neighbors, who had stayed to ride out the storm, told us that the winds had begun to blow there in earnest not long after we left. They said electricity was out, limbs were falling on their house and the porch was "lifting up". They also admitted that they were scared. The gentle rain falling around us made it hard to realize the chaos going on just a few miles down the road, back home.

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