DESTRUCTION

Thursday morning, 4:20 am, I found myself pacing the house peaking through the shutters to watch as the winds howled down the canyon and across the trees in our back yard. The weather warnings were correct the night before with alarms of fierce, damaging winds ahead. Fierce they were. The winds themselves weren't what caused the most destruction tearing down thousands of trees across the Wasatch Front. It was the duration of the winds. We've withstood gusts of the infamous East Winds in these parts before, I recall as a child having to run outside to gather our sandbox toys before the winds swept them away to the neighbors house. However, ten grueling hours of 90+ mph winds finally took it's toll on many people, homes, trees, and fences early Thursday morning.
My gratitude for a warm home powered by a natural gas full home generator is that of an understatement. So many were left to fend for themselves in their 38 degree homes with missing roof tiles, siding, heat, light, and garages. We were one of the lucky few families that were able to provide for those in need and it was such a blessing of service for us. We welcomed others into our house and tried to feed them warm comforting foods, offered a place to sleep, and phones to contact their families. Then we stood at the windows and watched as tree after tree, after tree, after tree gave into the force of the demanding winds and finally toppled over. Some onto fences, the roof of the pool house, almost through the window if Kday hadn't gerry rigged a rope system to tension the tree in a different direction. Some were uprooted entirely, taking the surrounding grass and flower beds a long with it. Others simply found a weak spot in the trunk and snapped right in half, leaving the tree top to roll down the hill and across the street. We're talking 50+ foot pine tree's here.
I was so fortunate to have been here in a warm, lit, safe and stable home with my children safely tucked in their beds. Today we clean and provide as much disaster relief as possible to those around us. This was a small disaster in comparison to what Mother Nature's capable of and for that I'm truly grateful. But it was good practice for us and our community to prepare for a larger situation. We were so fortunate that the damage was minimal. Some in the community lost their entire mobile home or house tops.

Here's the destruction.

The news reported hurricane force winds. How lucky are we that it was only the wind portion of a hurricane, I can't imagine adding water damage to this mess. I believe Mother Nature was more gentle with us than we gave her credit for.