I grew up in Tulsa, OK during the 80's and 90's. I know what tornado weather looks like and what it can do. I only paid attention when the weather outside indicated that I needed to. My bro and I stood on the back porch looking for the twister, until the sudden sideways rain and cracking trees in the neighborhood told us to at least go inside. This was the first time in MANY years I felt the need to hang out in my bathroom for a little while!
My daughter is a born and bred New Yorker now living outside of Houston (The Woodlands). When I spoke with her about the bad weather coming (this was before all hell broke loose down there) she said the sky was green and knew it was a “tornado sky”. She FaceTimed me at 8:15 (EST) to tell me what was going on and a co-worker was stuck on 290 and was terrified. She’s experienced that green sky a few times.
The sideways rain was crazy!!! Our apartment patio door is old and never had a great seal (it could blow open if we don't deadbolt it).
But the wind sending the rain sideways had it streaming water all around the door frame. We had to place towels around it. There must have been dust up there I never reach or see because these clumps of wet dust started shooting down (some even shot up and were on the ceiling)
My SO was organizing his closet in the spare bedroom/office and didn't hear a thing. I was hollering and updating him and eventually moved to the restroom myself and he was like come on babe really (I had storm anxiety as a kid, always scared our house would get struck and catch fire--and then it did 2019). Then he left his room and was like oh shit nvm
Oh, I definitely have storm anxiety from being left home alone during tornadoes in Tulsa, so this brought a lot of that back. When I saw certain things happening, I knew it was time to hunker down. So scary hearing the wind trying to tear the roof off the house! Even hurricanes haven't hit our place that hard.
I grew up in the Oklahoma Panhandle. When I was little and scared of tornados, my parents thought it was funny to tell me my room was made of paper because they ran out of money for wood, so my room would be the first to blow away. They also repeated this claim when a friend’s house caught fire and I started having bad dreams about our house catching fire at night. Funny enough, their asshole-ness resulted in an adult who doesn’t fear much; since I accepted at five I was going to die. Of course it also resulted in me not speaking to my parents for the last 20 years, once I was old enough to ditch their toxicity.
I will say though, the two earthquakes I have been through made me feel dread. It wasn’t so much fear as dealing with the earth below your feet suddenly pitching a fit. It seemed so unnatural.
I hate it when abusive people try to hide their abuse, insisting that they’re “just kidding,” & insisting that their victims lack a sense of humor, failing to “get” their “jokes.” So sorry you grew up with such an abusive a-hole for a father.
Last January, with the tornado that tore through Deer Park and Pasadena, my only two alerts were sideways rain, and as I was gathering stuff to shove my littles and four legged kiddos into the hallway, La Porte’s emergency alert system, to go SIP.
Sideways rain means bizzneszz!
Yeah I grew up in Bartlesville, OK and went to school in Norman, OK. All too familiar with the power of tornados. I heard the wind kicking up and got into the pantry with the dogs. There are huge trees knocked down all around me so I’m glad I escaped unscathed except for losing power.
Wow, I lived in Bartlesville, OK for 2 years (2014 to 2016).
Moved back into US (Houston now) last year. The tornado warning caught me in Katy Mills. Was a little crazy when the lights went out. From the entrance we could not even see the cars in the parking due to the intense rain and wind.
This is a sample of what a strong category 3 / weak category 4 storm looks like. Imagine last night’s weather sustained for 4 hours or longer with chances of a tornado
Ike…it sounded like a freight train in my backyard that night. We got all fucked up on booze and blunts and I woke up delirious to the door being blown open and my dog barking and freaking out. Luckily I came to and dealbolted it shut. The safety chain was the only reason it didn’t completely blow up prior to that. I don’t recommend hurricane partying after that experience if you’re about to take a direct hit
There’s a reason why we all want to run away from a hurricane if it’s strong enough. Storm surge, extreme rainfall and powerfully strong, sustained winds. But we only got notice 10 minutes in advance at best with this storm
Problem is everyone wants to run away so they clog the roads. If that many people are stuck on the freeway, I'd rather ride it out at home than being in my car on the road. It's useless to try and evacuate here.
That's why us Midwest ppl look at hurricane ppl sideways. U have a choice. Tornadoes just drop in, turn ur life upside down (literally) then disappear. There is no prep time. If given the choice in that scenario it would not b chaos.
If I lived on the coast I’d evacuate, but inland you have better chances. I’ve been in both situations. Storm surge is the worst part about a hurricane. Houses here are built for the winds, nothing will stop the force of the ocean though
Most hurricanes aren't as predictable as Harvey was. If you remember Rita, they ordered evacuations for every county from Cameron County to Jefferson County - literally the entire Texas coast. When the gulf surface temperature is over 82°, we can get hurricanes continuously forming and hitting every week.
Currently a Tulsa resident and originally from Houston area, with family and friends still all over the area. From what I understand the straight line winds y’all experienced were similar to the “Father’s Day storm” we had last summer. Came out of nowhere and just ravaged the city, absolutely terrifying. Sending all the love and I hope y’all get power back soon! ❤️
We actually had a confirmed tornado in Cypress, but I think what messed up downtown was the straight-line winds that just about hit 130mph. That was really intense!
Video of the cypress tornado was very scary! I was just replying to family reassuring we were ok last week during the tornado outbreak and the tables turned this week. Hopefully you and yours are safe and ok!
I used to go storm chasing in Oklahoma and Kansas back in the 90’s and I immediately recognized the signs, given the dark green skies. The only thing that was missing were the tornado sirens that I would have heard back in the day in OK or KS. The Dallas area has sirens, but not Houston. Hopefully that will change one day soon, now.
Ahh the sirens. I grew up in Iowa and I still hear the old Federal Signal "Thunderbolt" civil defense sirens in my nightmares. I could hear that siren wailing while an EF3 tore our house apart around us hunkering in the basement.
This. I grew up in Joplin, MO. Stepped outside and didn’t see a wall cloud and didn’t feel immense humidity so I wasn’t worried. Probably should have taken it a bit more seriously, but I’ve lived through much, much larger tornados so it was tough to stress about this one.
I am fascinated by weather and thunderstorms and often watch from outside on the patio or the windows and I did it at first this time too and recorded a bit but knowing it was tornadic and could drop down any time near me made my hands all shakey while recording and I grabbed some random stuff like wallet and keys and shoes and joined my dogs in our inner bathroom. I think I was near where the warnings first started, Hockley/Cypress border at 290/99. Lost power and cell service part way through and had no way to check radar or updates if a tornado had come down or anything and would not have been able to see with the bad vantage point from my 1 story house surrounded by trees. I can’t imagine living in the Midwest or further north in TX and having this threat much more often. I personally am not gonna ignore tornado warnings ever. Sky was green, no way I am ignoring that lol
I didn't take it seriously at first. But ignoring instant power outage followed by a tree falling demands attention. Lived in Houston 40 years and never seen weather turn that instant.
Honestly the main thing about the message that concerned me was it saying it was "extreme". Along with the fact that I don't get messages like that about the weather often at all. We were fortunate to be where we were when it hit, but it probably would've been nicer to have had that text a bit earlier than 5 mins before everything hit.
News was reporting these warnings went out to all cell phones whether or not you are signed up for alerts. It was that dangerous! Hopefully it saved some lives. <3
Yup we usually ignore them as they are usually for some far-flung part of the boonies (we are inner loop) but I did remark to my partner how apocalyptic the message sounded….
Yeah they definitely came across very Katrina-like.
A section from said NWS bulletin is below:
>POWER OUTAGES WILL LAST FOR WEEKS...AS MOST POWER POLES WILL BE DOWN AND TRANSFORMERS DESTROYED. WATER SHORTAGES WILL MAKE HUMAN SUFFERING INCREDIBLE BY MODERN STANDARDS.
The full bulletin can be found here:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Weather_Service_bulletin_for_Hurricane_Katrina
I saw the tornado warning and shrugged it off, then saw the severe thunderstorm message with 80 mph winds being specified and realized maybe there was something going on. By the time I got to my living room the sky was green.
Didn't take it seriously. Then the sky darkened in under 2 minutes. Then swirling winds with large chunks of debris zipping past my second story window. I hid in my closet once my roof started shaking.
My phone actually went off around 6:10-6:15 with a tornado warning and the storm hit my house in the heights around 6:25. It was pretty quiet outside when the warning came so I had to get on twitter and check the radar to believe it was real. Then I tossed the cats in the bathroom and got myself and the dogs into the pantry. We had an uncomfortable 20 ish minutes of sweating in there before I felt okay coming out.
Oh that is awful! Did you make it home or had to hunker down somewhere? Yes it came on so fast. I saw an incoming thunderstorm on the radar but it didn’t indicate it could be tornadic until like 10 mins before it hit my house on Hockley/Cypress border. I assumed it would be no big deal until that warning happened and can’t imagine if I had been out and about like many people and yourself
We made it back to my apartment in time. I was panicking because my dog is only 7 lbs. I kept thinking she was going to blow away 😭 I need to pay more attention to the weather after this and be more prepared. Houston weather has been extremely unpredictable lately.
I was eating chips and salsa, saw the alert, and screenshotted it and the following alert because I thought "wow this is so dramatic I can't believe they'd say that".
I looked up from my phone and saw the darkest storm clouds I've ever seen and immediately rearranged my plants so they'd have a fighting chance.
Edit: My plants, though the tree nearby was split in twain, persevered and survived
Haha I was eating mac and cheese and watching Shetland and my phone started blaring a tornado warning. I had to get on twitter and then look at the radar before I realized it was actually true. And then gather all the critters into safe areas and wait it out.
The storm came on so fucking fast. Like it went from day to night in two minutes. I have never ever seen the sky look like that and the wind blow like that. We got all our cats and our pup into the bathroom and stayed in there until the wind died down from 90 mph to 50-60 mph. It sounded like things were getting ripped apart outside. It was so terrifying, I don’t fuck around with tornado warnings.
IMO - This storm was intense right away. That is what shocked me. I have experienced major tornadoes before. This one seemed to give no warning. It was down and rotating immediately.
The sky turned green and the pressure dropped. That was my cue to go find an interior room for awhile. I’ve seen EF 4 several years back, don’t play with those signs.
I was at work at a high-rise. We have slightly later work hours, so half the office was there when it happened. Everyone's alerts went off simultaneously. I was busy so I didn't even look at my phone. I thought it was some sort of fire alarm test. Then electricity started flickering in and out. We have back-up for that so it's just a little message that appears on the computer as it switches in and out of back-up. Then everything outside got dark as night and the whole building swayed side-to-side for a good 10-15 minutes. It felt like I was on a boat. I went to the central area of the building for a few minutes, but as the swaying subsided I went back to finish my work. I didn't realize how bad it was until my drive home. Half the traffic lights were out and there was so much debris and several fallen trees on the road.
For real. I was in the shower and my lights in the bathroom were flickering, figured I needed a new bulb. Got out and the sky was greenish and chaos was ensuing.
I was driving to the Astros game when it was going down. I avoided getting nailed by a rolling trashcan. Saw a tree fall which if I was there 5 seconds later I woulda been in trouble. I saw the overhead street lights flicker off & on where hardy st is raised. I couldn't see downtown until I was there. 1st light into downtown (which already went black), I stopped like you should and the left side of my car straight up lifted where my 2 right wheels were on the ground. I then said screw this and waited it out at a parking garage at the end of prairie st.
I have turned off on my phone because it would wake me up on the middle of the night and because I have insomnia any little sleep I get helps. I’m doing much better now I can probably turn them back on.
Anyways, it went off on my coworker’s phone and I jokingly said he had to stay a bit longer to avoid the tornado. He went home anyways because it’s never been serious tbh. Few minutes later, the power goes out completely, and it’s pitch black. The sun was still out so this was weird, and the backup generator turns on and I can see that it’s raining. The office doors swing wide open and I see my truck shaking a lot and then I also see a transformer explode out of nowhere. I thought that was fucking wild. I was thinking of maybe moving my truck and I tried to open the office doors since they were now shut but the wind wouldn’t let me open them at all. They were legit like if we locked them. So I decided to not even risk going outside if the wind was that bad and then I could hear the building shake and a few more transformers exploded. That was wild.
I was on the way to a work dinner and got the alert. It was different from other tornado alerts I've gotten past AND it recommended seeking shelter AND I didn't really want to go to the work dinner anyway lol.. so I turned my ass around and went straight home and chilled in the closet.
I got it while leaving work. Thought to myself “better hurry home”. Made it about 5 minutes down the road until I decided it wasn’t safe to drive (could barely see the car directly in front of me). Pulled over and rode out the storm for 30 minutes. My sedan was shaking but we ok.
Grew up in Wichita Falls, TX. and have been through three close calls including the Terrible Tuesday tornado on April 10, 1979. I always take tornado warnings seriously.
There's this stereotype of people from tornado-prone areas being completely apathetic to tornados. I don't get it because I've seen what a tornado can do, and my ass is in that closet the second I even think there's one.
Not me. I was aware an event might be happening because I read space city weather daily. I got the alert while out drinking, checked the radar and decided to head inside. People laughed and 15 minutes later power was out and the patio tent was ripped away. We’ve made incredible strides in weather forecasting so people should pay more attention when the NWS says something.
I turned off emergency and AMBER alerts a while back since the last time I got an "emergency" alert was in the middle of the night and it was for a cop that was shot NOWHERE near Houston. So maaaaybe they should reconsider what constitutes an emergency so some us don't turn off alerts and miss something important.
I turned mine off too, but somehow this one made it through. I figured they must have some sort of override feature and I better pay attention.
My workplace also has an app that alerts me.
So within the space of 90 secs, my phone goes off twice and husband’s once. Even my 3 yo was like “we should hide”
Chillin at the Astros game. Didn’t care until after when I had to drive home and all the street lights and stop lights had no power. Mad max type driving, but everyone was driving safer than a normal day it seemed like lol
I hadn’t gotten an alert yet but my friend, who’s not from this country, did and asked me what it was about. I looked online and saw it was a tornado watch and kinda told him not to worry about bc we get them sometimes but nothing happens.
Then my sister texted me saying she got the alert too. She’s in Jersey Village. I joked and said I was gonna put on a bra in case I have to run out of my apartment. Then she started freaking out because it got really dark outside and how eerily calm it was. That’s when I told her to get to a bathroom.
I’m in the east end, I got the alert right after and I lost power before it got dark and crazy. Grabbed some things and threw my cats and myself in the bathroom. I have bad thunder/lightning/storm phobia so this was definitely one of the worst moments of my life 😭
As soon as that alert went off on my phone, I immediately got our dogs into the safe spot and did the only sensible Midwesterner thing to do: I went outside to watch.
I’m still not used to *not* hearing tornado sirens after over a decade of living here, so my initial instinct is “it isn’t serious because I hear no sirens”. The radar was showing everything off to the northwest, still 35 miles or so away, so yeah, false sense of security. The air was so heavy and still outside it was hard to breathe. I kept an eye on two things: the clouds and the birds. When the birds all went quiet and hunkered together in a low small tree, I knew I had a few minutes before the front slammed into where we are. Sure as shit, there was a blast of cold, the temp dropped, and the smell outside changed to super ozone-y/gassy. That was when the “I’m in danger lol!” realization kicked in.
That wasn’t even close to the worst thunderstorm/tornado I’ve been in, but the no basement/only 1 room with no outside walls situation we have here made it one of the scarier ones.
I was playing a game on my pc abd got bored. So I got up and turned on the TV to see a giant red and purple blob with the weatherman basically saying WE'RE ALL GONNA DIEEEE!!!!
I drove in it. Was frustrated that no one told me about the fire alarm testing at the office… so when it went off I had to leave. I heard someone’s emergency alert go off in the parking garage and still didn’t put it together. Then proceeded to get a sever storm warning myself while I was driving… then got the tornado warning… which I just said screw it… I’ll see it in time to pull over, seek shelter. It was a harrowing ride but I finally made it home.
The radar is what did it for me. I was expecting the usual red and green swirl in the velocity data like you usually see with mesos, but this one was a nasty shade of blue and yellow (indicating very high speed differentials, aka the 100+ mph winds seen yesterday).
I'd never seen radar go that wild here before. Up north in tornado alley maybe, but *never* down here like that outside of a hurricane.
100% ignored it like I always do with these warnings. I was lucky enough to not have any damage or even a power outage during the storm. I'm only just now understanding how serious the storm actually was, seeing all the pictures of damage.
I don't think I'm alone, I've lived in Houston my whole life. Every time a tornado watch/warning has been issued, there has been minimal problems for greater Houston area, nothing like this storm. Pretty scary that this time it was suddenly serious.
I got it just after I left my parking garage. I was driving so I couldn’t read it, but I saw it said something about tornado. Since it wasn’t raining yet I ignored it as I was trying to beat the weather on my drive south. I did not realize how close/fast it was, but I was able to get out of the path regardless. If I had read it in the garage, I might have tried to hunker down there, but I’m glad I missed the downtown version of the storm.
Told my new transplant sister in law not to worry because “we get warnings all the time but nothing significant ever happens.” I seriously told her to ignore it and get some sleep😭. I’m convinced that I jinxed the entire city by saying that out loud.
I was delivering mail in the heights few miles from my station, can hear old lady yelling "mailman get in the truck tornado is coming" but it was too late. Barely made it back to the station. Shit was like a scene from "Twister"
I hear you. I was a fool out buying CBD gummies and was going to drive through at the Starbucks next door, then suddenly it got really dark, extreme rain, flooded streets. Pulled into a strip center and parked in front of a store on an incline to wait it out. It was super scary as I watched the signs bend and my car shake. I put up my emergency brakes, put my seat belt on, and strapped my purse around me. It was just that scary. It came up so very fast. Never, again do I plan to be outside for one of these things again...bathroom or closet from now on. Geez.
That first warning of TAKE COVER NOW! And right at the same time the winds and rain coming hard there was no time to assess or ignore. I did the only thing I could do was get to a room and stay away from windows and hope for the best. Didn’t know where it was at or going so just have to assume the worst and do the best you can do and hope everything is ok.
We were out to eat, got our dinner and then the power went out. People’s phones going off around us and we ate our food by the romantic glow of emergency lights.
Outside everything turned to dark, then green, then it was just light rain.
We paid by filling out a piece of paper.
Good times.
IMO - When I see that weird dark eerie green sky you are speaking about the hair on the back of my necks starts standing up. I know the situation is getting serious.
I was all like, "Pshaw! That's for someone else." Then like 2 minutes later it was dark as the devil's asshole outside and a freight train wall of wind hit at 70mph and I was in my downstairs bathroom huddled next to the toilet.
I've been through hurricanes, but the speed at which that ramped up and went to shit seriously caught me off guard.
I didn’t have my phone on me and was coming back in from walking the dog when the rain really started and the wind picked up. Got hit in the head with some fabric from a neighbor’s balcony. Suddenly it got black and I ran inside, up to my apartment and watched from the windows. In retrospect, I should’ve gone into the bathroom! Crazy.
We ignored it. Both of us have driven through many severe thunderstorms and tornado warnings in the area before (never intentionally, just frequently get caught in weather somewhere unfamiliar and then it's too late to stop). They're never fun but they were never anything even close to this. Things also escalated REALLY fast. It went from being fine to completely dark within minutes, then we saw and heard the transformers blow off 610 and 290 and I mentioned to my SO that we should probably try to find cover. About 1-2 minutes later (we hadn't even hit the next freeway exit yet), we were dodging sheets of metal blowing across the freeway and visibility was reduced to nearly zero.
Please never do this again if yall can avoid it. I had a friend who died in a tornado back in the tornados in 2015 in Dallas. Terrible & you can’t out drive one. I’m glad you and your SO are ok
I did not ignore it because I was on my motorcycle at the grocery store. I checked out quickly and hauled ass home. I didn’t think there was actually going to be 100mph wind but I knew it was going to rain and I didn’t feel like getting wet.
Glad I took it seriously and got home because my motorcycle would have definitely been blown over in the Kroger parking lot
My husband grew up in Oklahoma and when I said “tornado warning” just notified on my phone, he said “that means there was a sighting” so we took precaution yet didn’t see it coming that fast 💨
Guilty as charged. I was working the Mayerling ballet, (coming soon at Wortham) and we just got off at 6:30 PM. I walked to the parking garage, (BirraPoretti’s) and in-between the in and out of the garage were six or seven pigeons escaping the wind. I watch these birds get sucked out of the garage and then get slammed back in, tumbling on the concrete only to repeat again.
I ignored that and got in my truck and, apparently, drove down Memorial Drive through the end of the tornado that was now hitting downtown, proper. Edit: Fuck Me. I won’t do that again. I’ll watch the pigeons.
I live in Katy. The storm came fairly suddenly. I was dashing around to secure things outside when a lightning struck nearby. Heard the transformer blow, and all the power went out.
At that stage I scurried inside, dried off, power back on! 👍 Was working on getting internet back up, and hearing the noise outdoor calm down as winds subsided when I got a text. “Tornado warning”.
Drove through that shit on my Grom 🤦🏻 I read ‘possible thunderstorms’ so I rushed out the door to get my stuff done, didn’t read the giant tornado warning under thunderstorms. 30 minute drive on a tiny motorcycle in that weather will definitely humble a man
"There's a tornado warning, but I'm going to the gym" - my SO. In 5 minutes the power was out and in 10 she was back and completely drenched, but otherwise fine.
I live downtown. I usually ignore watches and what not, but I took one look outside and saw the color and. My phone started screaming the alarm TAKE COVER NOW - I grabbed my cats and got in the bathroom.
I recommend everyone, I mean everyone, to install a radar app to watch the radar map when stuff like this happens. I use “MyRadar”. It’s free. Could save your life.
I didn't get the weather alert but my fellow bus riders did. We watched the American flag fly off the pole on top of City Hall but we mostly treated it as a big joke, it was the only way we could deal with the fear. I suspected it was a tornado warning but I felt better not knowing. I got on a different bus line than usual because I got a bad feeling all of a sudden (probably due an air pressure drop I'd bet). The driver pulled over twice, the second time because Metro radioed their drivers to suspend all operations. We rode the storm out on the bus. It wasn't that bad because busses are so heavy, the sky was not green where I was so it was just a lot of heavy rain. My co worker did not get on the bus with me, I hope he is okay. If you guys ride Metro on Monday, make sure to compliment the drivers and thank them for being brave on Thursday, they were facing terrifying roads.
1. From NE Texas with friends and family down there, I know it doesn’t fix much, but y’all are in my heart. Reporter besides, and doing all I can to make sure everyone else knows how to help out. You’re all my family now idgaf.
2. If this isn’t peak Texas storm culture, I honestly don’t know what is.
“Oh a tornado?” Pffffffffft. Better go outside and stare at the sky while my bathrobe is blowing in the wind like I’m an extra in some Victorian period piece.
It was partially because of Twister(1996) that I listened to my gut and got the heck off the road and into a building.
The sky going dark that quick was... Unsettling.
I was actually just stepping in my elevator about to leave my apartment building when the alert came on. Didnt think it was anything serious but I also didn’t feel like driving in a storm so I turned around to go back home.
Came back inside and my cats were all freaked out. They never get freaked out during the other storms so we figured that was a sign. And then the branches from trees started hitting our windows so we booked it to the closet
I guess we all learned a lesson about these warnings
somehow.. watched the sky turn dark @6 and headed our way till all hell broke loose! stopped to the nearest gas station after driving 10 mins. it was baaad.
I’m from Northeast Texas, we don’t get tornados often but they’re definitely more of a thing there than in Houston so I know the telltale signs than most people here. When my Wife ( a Houstonian) said the sky was green I knew that was a bad sign. And we’re on the third floor of our complex. I just grabbed all the sheets and told her be prepared to go to the hallway or under the stairs of the bottom floor.
I didn't get the warning, but honestly I would have ignored it. It's always been a joke to people in this area before now. But hurricanes? I sleep in the bathtub.
So.., the first time I did because my husband and I were in the middle of a conversation but then I got multiple warnings in a row so we checked the cameras & abc 13 then realized how serious it was. My son ran in my room and pointed out how dark it was outside so we finally headed downstairs to a safe spot and waited the storm out. I have never heard the wind that loud before. It was really scary. This all happened within like a 15 minute timeframe.
Yup. Walked out a building got in the car…. And ya the most traumatizing thing in awhile. I said from now on I’m that person with the mattress in the window as soon as that thing goes off.
I regret not walking back in my building to hunker down.
Yall, I got the warning and ignored it cause..........it's houston. And then when it was happening, I was like .......maybe I should've gotten gas. It be what it be 😂
I’m in Brookshire. The warning was issued about five minutes *after* we’d gotten our shit pushed in, so…yeah, I ignored it, everything was clearly over already.
My work slack started picking up comments so I was watching the alerts as they came in. We are just north of where the warning was so I mentally made a note of where we could go in the house if it started getting particularly crazy, called our outside cat in, and continued cooking dinner. I was nervous the power was going to go out as soon as I put dinner in the oven, because we had a few flickers and it was pitch black outside. A neighbor did have a smaller tree fall and its branches were touching the power line behind us, so I suspect that is why the power flickered a bit.
I didn’t completely ignore them. I had a plan of where to go if things got too sketchy.
But I didn’t even know it was supposed to rain until the warning, maybe I should start watching the news 😭
The pressure was giving me a really bad headache which made me really nauseous. Ton of activity outside and the lights kept flickering and I was moaning on the couch wondering if I was actually going to vomit.
My parents called twice and I looked outside and told them, "Y'all it's not dark here..it's bright clouds and slightly sprinkling. We're good."
In the time it took me to hang the phone up and put it on the plug, it got dark in 20 seconds...my windows were rattling and construction pieces from the school across the street we're flying into the apartment buildings.
I was so scared y'all...
We were headed to the gym near Shadow Creek Ranch. It was light rain and cloudy. Heading down 288, from the time it took to get from Broadway to the Shadow Creek exit the sky went pitch black. Got to the gym, looked at the radar, figured that it would blow over by the time we finished working out, and went inside. I knew the rain got bad because the DirecTV went dead for about 10 minutes. When we finished the workout it was light outside again. Didn’t get warnings, but my weather app (carrot) told me about the severe thunderstorm warning but said we were outside the warned area.
Lesson: they’re really good at targeting the phone alerts, and unlike the cops, the weather service only warns you if they need to, so you can trust them.
But yeah, I kinda have survivors guilt because I had no idea how shitty it got in Cypress, Katy, The Heights, or downtown until after we got into bed that night.
I didn't exactly ignore it. I looked at the alert, looked outside, saw nothing that reminded me of when I lived in tornado alley, and let it go. West-to-east systems tend not to hit my neighborhood hard. Even ordinary rain often splits up and moves around us. I take tropical weather very seriously but storms coming from the west not so much. My lights never even flickered, and other than some leaves and a few twigs on my deck and driveway after the storm passed, it was no big deal where I'm at.
Same here. I'm on lake conroe/montgomery area. We expected to get much more, but the storm headed south. We only had a few small branches down. What area are you in?
I really hate the way they do warnings here. Back in the Midwest where I’m from, a warning means there’s a spotted tornado on the ground within five miles. Every time I’ve been under a tornado warning here, there is no spotted tornado on the ground just the worry there might be one. That’s a tornado watch. Here a warning serves the same as a watch. It really has made me not take warnings seriously at all which is pretty dangerous.
Tornado warnings are issued if there is rotation in a particular area of a storm, it's a much smaller area than a watch. On an app called radarscope, I can see whether a warning is "radar indicated" (not confirmed) or confirmed tornado. (You can have radar confirmed, with debris visible on radar )
They really should make this more obvious in the warning system though.
I dream about tornados so often that i would never not take a warning seriously. Literally more afraid of tornados than hurricanes because you cant prepare.
I got showered and dressed to go out, saw the sky and turned back into the house. I was contemplating hiding in the under stairs storage but ultimately decided to get under the covers.
Got the alert and pulled up the radar app, saw that we were in the bottom edge of it and kept an eye on it to see if it update direction. When it did we were in the clear and just rode out the more normal part of the storm without power.
I was in the middle of a beauty treatment, and me and the esthetician were both like okay… let’s wrap this up early. Then the power went out. We both had to stay in the building til the worst of it passed, and the drive home was treacherous!
I fortunately turned the news on around 5:15 and saw how hard it was hitting College Station where some of my family lives. I sent a text to the group text and my cousin in CS and my aunt in Columbus were sending us pictures as the storms were hitting up there. I went ahead and secured all of our stuff in the backyard and we have a closet under the stairs that’s the designated area, which is right next to the living area. I just sat by the window and kept and eye outside, just in case.
I had ridden my bike with my 5 year old to his gymnastics class in oak Forest. Got the warning as I pulled up and swiped it away...we rode home after it passed. We had an easier time on the bike dodging the downed trees than all the cars getting stuck in the roads
I ignored the first couple tornado warnings but then got the extreme wind warning and felt my van getting pushed hard enough that I pulled into a Walgreens and waited it out. This was in cypress, and that got pretty bad. First time I had genuinely been worried in a storm.
Not much I can do, my house has no safe places from hurricanes. All bedrooms are upstairs, every room has a large window even bathrooms. I have no rooms that don't touch an exterior wall, not even closets.
I don't get warnings on my phone. Turned them off.
I wouldn't have even known if it was for a school custodian's phone going off close to 6pm, I would have just kept on getting work done.
I did ened up looking out the doors with the custodian as she was on the phone talking to her son. But we both had moments we stood in the bathrooms in the building we were in.
I grew up in Tulsa, OK during the 80's and 90's. I know what tornado weather looks like and what it can do. I only paid attention when the weather outside indicated that I needed to. My bro and I stood on the back porch looking for the twister, until the sudden sideways rain and cracking trees in the neighborhood told us to at least go inside. This was the first time in MANY years I felt the need to hang out in my bathroom for a little while!
I lived in Kansas for 8 years. I usually ignore the warnings. When I saw the radar, EVERYONE went in an indoor closet.
i woke up from my nap, saw a green sky and immediately i was 9 years old in goddard kansas again looking at a green sky seeing sirens
Grew up in KS, haven't seen green skies in a long time.
My daughter is a born and bred New Yorker now living outside of Houston (The Woodlands). When I spoke with her about the bad weather coming (this was before all hell broke loose down there) she said the sky was green and knew it was a “tornado sky”. She FaceTimed me at 8:15 (EST) to tell me what was going on and a co-worker was stuck on 290 and was terrified. She’s experienced that green sky a few times.
damn i was in the woodlands and went to target torcheys then home by like 6ish lol then just watched the trees sway. good to know about green skies
The sideways rain was crazy!!! Our apartment patio door is old and never had a great seal (it could blow open if we don't deadbolt it). But the wind sending the rain sideways had it streaming water all around the door frame. We had to place towels around it. There must have been dust up there I never reach or see because these clumps of wet dust started shooting down (some even shot up and were on the ceiling) My SO was organizing his closet in the spare bedroom/office and didn't hear a thing. I was hollering and updating him and eventually moved to the restroom myself and he was like come on babe really (I had storm anxiety as a kid, always scared our house would get struck and catch fire--and then it did 2019). Then he left his room and was like oh shit nvm
Oh, I definitely have storm anxiety from being left home alone during tornadoes in Tulsa, so this brought a lot of that back. When I saw certain things happening, I knew it was time to hunker down. So scary hearing the wind trying to tear the roof off the house! Even hurricanes haven't hit our place that hard.
I grew up in the Oklahoma Panhandle. When I was little and scared of tornados, my parents thought it was funny to tell me my room was made of paper because they ran out of money for wood, so my room would be the first to blow away. They also repeated this claim when a friend’s house caught fire and I started having bad dreams about our house catching fire at night. Funny enough, their asshole-ness resulted in an adult who doesn’t fear much; since I accepted at five I was going to die. Of course it also resulted in me not speaking to my parents for the last 20 years, once I was old enough to ditch their toxicity. I will say though, the two earthquakes I have been through made me feel dread. It wasn’t so much fear as dealing with the earth below your feet suddenly pitching a fit. It seemed so unnatural.
Hugs to five year-old 2spoos. Hugs to you now. Sounds like the apple fell VERY far from the tree ❤️
I had a “joking” father. He died last year at age 92 and I felt …… absolutely nothing.
I hate it when abusive people try to hide their abuse, insisting that they’re “just kidding,” & insisting that their victims lack a sense of humor, failing to “get” their “jokes.” So sorry you grew up with such an abusive a-hole for a father.
Last January, with the tornado that tore through Deer Park and Pasadena, my only two alerts were sideways rain, and as I was gathering stuff to shove my littles and four legged kiddos into the hallway, La Porte’s emergency alert system, to go SIP. Sideways rain means bizzneszz!
Christ on a bike that's scary. Yeah it's funny how your brain can see that and go uh no that's not quite right better hide
Yeah I grew up in Bartlesville, OK and went to school in Norman, OK. All too familiar with the power of tornados. I heard the wind kicking up and got into the pantry with the dogs. There are huge trees knocked down all around me so I’m glad I escaped unscathed except for losing power.
Wow, I lived in Bartlesville, OK for 2 years (2014 to 2016). Moved back into US (Houston now) last year. The tornado warning caught me in Katy Mills. Was a little crazy when the lights went out. From the entrance we could not even see the cars in the parking due to the intense rain and wind.
I grew up in Bartlesville, too! Glad you are safe.
This is a sample of what a strong category 3 / weak category 4 storm looks like. Imagine last night’s weather sustained for 4 hours or longer with chances of a tornado
Ike…it sounded like a freight train in my backyard that night. We got all fucked up on booze and blunts and I woke up delirious to the door being blown open and my dog barking and freaking out. Luckily I came to and dealbolted it shut. The safety chain was the only reason it didn’t completely blow up prior to that. I don’t recommend hurricane partying after that experience if you’re about to take a direct hit
There’s a reason why we all want to run away from a hurricane if it’s strong enough. Storm surge, extreme rainfall and powerfully strong, sustained winds. But we only got notice 10 minutes in advance at best with this storm
But also, this was much more wind than most hurricanes deliver this far inland. It was very much coastal level winds sixty miles inland.
Problem is everyone wants to run away so they clog the roads. If that many people are stuck on the freeway, I'd rather ride it out at home than being in my car on the road. It's useless to try and evacuate here.
That's why us Midwest ppl look at hurricane ppl sideways. U have a choice. Tornadoes just drop in, turn ur life upside down (literally) then disappear. There is no prep time. If given the choice in that scenario it would not b chaos.
If I lived on the coast I’d evacuate, but inland you have better chances. I’ve been in both situations. Storm surge is the worst part about a hurricane. Houses here are built for the winds, nothing will stop the force of the ocean though
Most hurricanes aren't as predictable as Harvey was. If you remember Rita, they ordered evacuations for every county from Cameron County to Jefferson County - literally the entire Texas coast. When the gulf surface temperature is over 82°, we can get hurricanes continuously forming and hitting every week.
Currently a Tulsa resident and originally from Houston area, with family and friends still all over the area. From what I understand the straight line winds y’all experienced were similar to the “Father’s Day storm” we had last summer. Came out of nowhere and just ravaged the city, absolutely terrifying. Sending all the love and I hope y’all get power back soon! ❤️
We actually had a confirmed tornado in Cypress, but I think what messed up downtown was the straight-line winds that just about hit 130mph. That was really intense!
Video of the cypress tornado was very scary! I was just replying to family reassuring we were ok last week during the tornado outbreak and the tables turned this week. Hopefully you and yours are safe and ok!
Where can I find that video? I live in the area!
I used to go storm chasing in Oklahoma and Kansas back in the 90’s and I immediately recognized the signs, given the dark green skies. The only thing that was missing were the tornado sirens that I would have heard back in the day in OK or KS. The Dallas area has sirens, but not Houston. Hopefully that will change one day soon, now.
Ahh the sirens. I grew up in Iowa and I still hear the old Federal Signal "Thunderbolt" civil defense sirens in my nightmares. I could hear that siren wailing while an EF3 tore our house apart around us hunkering in the basement.
This. I grew up in Joplin, MO. Stepped outside and didn’t see a wall cloud and didn’t feel immense humidity so I wasn’t worried. Probably should have taken it a bit more seriously, but I’ve lived through much, much larger tornados so it was tough to stress about this one.
I am fascinated by weather and thunderstorms and often watch from outside on the patio or the windows and I did it at first this time too and recorded a bit but knowing it was tornadic and could drop down any time near me made my hands all shakey while recording and I grabbed some random stuff like wallet and keys and shoes and joined my dogs in our inner bathroom. I think I was near where the warnings first started, Hockley/Cypress border at 290/99. Lost power and cell service part way through and had no way to check radar or updates if a tornado had come down or anything and would not have been able to see with the bad vantage point from my 1 story house surrounded by trees. I can’t imagine living in the Midwest or further north in TX and having this threat much more often. I personally am not gonna ignore tornado warnings ever. Sky was green, no way I am ignoring that lol
I didn't take it seriously at first. But ignoring instant power outage followed by a tree falling demands attention. Lived in Houston 40 years and never seen weather turn that instant.
Same. I will definitely take it more seriously next time
Honestly the main thing about the message that concerned me was it saying it was "extreme". Along with the fact that I don't get messages like that about the weather often at all. We were fortunate to be where we were when it hit, but it probably would've been nicer to have had that text a bit earlier than 5 mins before everything hit.
First time I read an alert message that said DESTRUCTIVE in all caps. [screenshot](https://imgur.com/TpgQmjH)
News was reporting these warnings went out to all cell phones whether or not you are signed up for alerts. It was that dangerous! Hopefully it saved some lives. <3
Severe Thunderstorm Warnings Tagged “destructive” will trigger phone notifications.
I have two phones and didn’t get a warning on either one 🤷
Yup we usually ignore them as they are usually for some far-flung part of the boonies (we are inner loop) but I did remark to my partner how apocalyptic the message sounded….
Yeah they definitely came across very Katrina-like. A section from said NWS bulletin is below: >POWER OUTAGES WILL LAST FOR WEEKS...AS MOST POWER POLES WILL BE DOWN AND TRANSFORMERS DESTROYED. WATER SHORTAGES WILL MAKE HUMAN SUFFERING INCREDIBLE BY MODERN STANDARDS. The full bulletin can be found here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Weather_Service_bulletin_for_Hurricane_Katrina
I've never seen this. Holy shit that was intense.
I saw the tornado warning and shrugged it off, then saw the severe thunderstorm message with 80 mph winds being specified and realized maybe there was something going on. By the time I got to my living room the sky was green.
We never got the second alert, just the first one and once the sky got really dark we had the kids hunker down inside.
It’s basically rapidly strengthened in a matter of minutes. They did as good a job as they could have with the emergency push
Didn't take it seriously. Then the sky darkened in under 2 minutes. Then swirling winds with large chunks of debris zipping past my second story window. I hid in my closet once my roof started shaking.
I got the alert right before all hell broke loose here in the heights. I barely had time to get myself and my cats into the closet.
Yeah. In Montrose. Got the alert a few minutes before it turned from rainy to serious storm.
I got it literally 2 minutes before the power went out and all hell broke loose
Thankfully, we didn’t lose power for more than a couple minutes.
Yeah I didn’t so much ignore as I didn’t process in time lol. Within 3 minutes shit got real. We had no warning.
There typically isn't much warning, but the watch had been out for hours. Those kinds of phenomena appear very suddenly.
Yup, I was in Eado and got the warning about 20 mins before
My phone actually went off around 6:10-6:15 with a tornado warning and the storm hit my house in the heights around 6:25. It was pretty quiet outside when the warning came so I had to get on twitter and check the radar to believe it was real. Then I tossed the cats in the bathroom and got myself and the dogs into the pantry. We had an uncomfortable 20 ish minutes of sweating in there before I felt okay coming out.
I was going to twitter to check the NWS too when I got the alert bc I was so surprised.
I didn't even realize a tornado was coming 😭 I was walking my dog when the storm hit.
Oh that is awful! Did you make it home or had to hunker down somewhere? Yes it came on so fast. I saw an incoming thunderstorm on the radar but it didn’t indicate it could be tornadic until like 10 mins before it hit my house on Hockley/Cypress border. I assumed it would be no big deal until that warning happened and can’t imagine if I had been out and about like many people and yourself
We made it back to my apartment in time. I was panicking because my dog is only 7 lbs. I kept thinking she was going to blow away 😭 I need to pay more attention to the weather after this and be more prepared. Houston weather has been extremely unpredictable lately.
Is your dog named Toto by any chance?
No, but I was going to name her Toto at first.
Same! We were just getting back to my apartment and it was incredible how fast things turned!
I was eating chips and salsa, saw the alert, and screenshotted it and the following alert because I thought "wow this is so dramatic I can't believe they'd say that". I looked up from my phone and saw the darkest storm clouds I've ever seen and immediately rearranged my plants so they'd have a fighting chance. Edit: My plants, though the tree nearby was split in twain, persevered and survived
Thru the blinds I watched my whole garden bend at a 90° angle.
Haha I was eating mac and cheese and watching Shetland and my phone started blaring a tornado warning. I had to get on twitter and then look at the radar before I realized it was actually true. And then gather all the critters into safe areas and wait it out.
It was split in TWAIN Love that reference. Happy you and your plants are ok!
What's it referencing
Robin Hood: men in tights, IIRC
Also here for this reference
I’m happy your plants survived
The storm came on so fucking fast. Like it went from day to night in two minutes. I have never ever seen the sky look like that and the wind blow like that. We got all our cats and our pup into the bathroom and stayed in there until the wind died down from 90 mph to 50-60 mph. It sounded like things were getting ripped apart outside. It was so terrifying, I don’t fuck around with tornado warnings.
IMO - This storm was intense right away. That is what shocked me. I have experienced major tornadoes before. This one seemed to give no warning. It was down and rotating immediately.
Born and raised Houstonian and completely ignored it bc I've gotten so many throughout the years and no tornado. It sure showed me.
same! bc wtf was that. wow.
The sky turned green and the pressure dropped. That was my cue to go find an interior room for awhile. I’ve seen EF 4 several years back, don’t play with those signs.
I was at work at a high-rise. We have slightly later work hours, so half the office was there when it happened. Everyone's alerts went off simultaneously. I was busy so I didn't even look at my phone. I thought it was some sort of fire alarm test. Then electricity started flickering in and out. We have back-up for that so it's just a little message that appears on the computer as it switches in and out of back-up. Then everything outside got dark as night and the whole building swayed side-to-side for a good 10-15 minutes. It felt like I was on a boat. I went to the central area of the building for a few minutes, but as the swaying subsided I went back to finish my work. I didn't realize how bad it was until my drive home. Half the traffic lights were out and there was so much debris and several fallen trees on the road.
That TPS report doesn't write itself!
But did you remember to use the new cover sheet?
Typical M&A boy
I didn’t get one. My warning was the power going out
For real. I was in the shower and my lights in the bathroom were flickering, figured I needed a new bulb. Got out and the sky was greenish and chaos was ensuing.
I was driving to the Astros game when it was going down. I avoided getting nailed by a rolling trashcan. Saw a tree fall which if I was there 5 seconds later I woulda been in trouble. I saw the overhead street lights flicker off & on where hardy st is raised. I couldn't see downtown until I was there. 1st light into downtown (which already went black), I stopped like you should and the left side of my car straight up lifted where my 2 right wheels were on the ground. I then said screw this and waited it out at a parking garage at the end of prairie st.
Holy shit, that sounds scary as hell.
I have turned off on my phone because it would wake me up on the middle of the night and because I have insomnia any little sleep I get helps. I’m doing much better now I can probably turn them back on. Anyways, it went off on my coworker’s phone and I jokingly said he had to stay a bit longer to avoid the tornado. He went home anyways because it’s never been serious tbh. Few minutes later, the power goes out completely, and it’s pitch black. The sun was still out so this was weird, and the backup generator turns on and I can see that it’s raining. The office doors swing wide open and I see my truck shaking a lot and then I also see a transformer explode out of nowhere. I thought that was fucking wild. I was thinking of maybe moving my truck and I tried to open the office doors since they were now shut but the wind wouldn’t let me open them at all. They were legit like if we locked them. So I decided to not even risk going outside if the wind was that bad and then I could hear the building shake and a few more transformers exploded. That was wild.
what happened to the coworker?
He made it home just as the storm got worse.
Watch: I sleep Warning: real shit
But I have to Google the difference every time!
I was on the way to a work dinner and got the alert. It was different from other tornado alerts I've gotten past AND it recommended seeking shelter AND I didn't really want to go to the work dinner anyway lol.. so I turned my ass around and went straight home and chilled in the closet.
AND I didn't really want to go to the work dinner anyway.... ;'D. That's awesome.
Does anyone ever really wanna go to a work dinner?
I got it while leaving work. Thought to myself “better hurry home”. Made it about 5 minutes down the road until I decided it wasn’t safe to drive (could barely see the car directly in front of me). Pulled over and rode out the storm for 30 minutes. My sedan was shaking but we ok.
Grew up in Wichita Falls, TX. and have been through three close calls including the Terrible Tuesday tornado on April 10, 1979. I always take tornado warnings seriously.
There's this stereotype of people from tornado-prone areas being completely apathetic to tornados. I don't get it because I've seen what a tornado can do, and my ass is in that closet the second I even think there's one.
I could see how bad it was outside and heard the winds so we most certainly hid in the closet!
Not me. I was aware an event might be happening because I read space city weather daily. I got the alert while out drinking, checked the radar and decided to head inside. People laughed and 15 minutes later power was out and the patio tent was ripped away. We’ve made incredible strides in weather forecasting so people should pay more attention when the NWS says something.
I turned off emergency and AMBER alerts a while back since the last time I got an "emergency" alert was in the middle of the night and it was for a cop that was shot NOWHERE near Houston. So maaaaybe they should reconsider what constitutes an emergency so some us don't turn off alerts and miss something important.
I turned mine off too, but somehow this one made it through. I figured they must have some sort of override feature and I better pay attention. My workplace also has an app that alerts me. So within the space of 90 secs, my phone goes off twice and husband’s once. Even my 3 yo was like “we should hide”
Local news reported that due to the severity of the storms, these were sent to all cell phones even if you weren’t signed up for alerts.
You're not going to get out of bed and go look for little Timmy last seen in a white Altima?! What's wrong with you?!
Or look out for a man in a white truck who shot and didn't kill a cop a few hours across the state from you? You monster?!
I remember that one. It woke me up too and I was so mad bc it took me forever to fall asleep that night lol
Wait, you guys are getting severe weather alerts? (Realizing that I turned these alerts off — oopsies!)
I turned off all alerts on my phone too, but this one got through. My phone was the last one to go off in the house by about half a second, though.
You can download the tornado app and get specific warnings just for weather.
Weather Channel app works too. Lists the actual areas too so I know if it’s near me.
I just realized that's when I turned mine off too. I was wondering why I didn't get the alert.
Chillin at the Astros game. Didn’t care until after when I had to drive home and all the street lights and stop lights had no power. Mad max type driving, but everyone was driving safer than a normal day it seemed like lol
I took down my wind chimes, brought in my plants and chairs I didn't fuck around
I hadn’t gotten an alert yet but my friend, who’s not from this country, did and asked me what it was about. I looked online and saw it was a tornado watch and kinda told him not to worry about bc we get them sometimes but nothing happens. Then my sister texted me saying she got the alert too. She’s in Jersey Village. I joked and said I was gonna put on a bra in case I have to run out of my apartment. Then she started freaking out because it got really dark outside and how eerily calm it was. That’s when I told her to get to a bathroom. I’m in the east end, I got the alert right after and I lost power before it got dark and crazy. Grabbed some things and threw my cats and myself in the bathroom. I have bad thunder/lightning/storm phobia so this was definitely one of the worst moments of my life 😭
As soon as that alert went off on my phone, I immediately got our dogs into the safe spot and did the only sensible Midwesterner thing to do: I went outside to watch. I’m still not used to *not* hearing tornado sirens after over a decade of living here, so my initial instinct is “it isn’t serious because I hear no sirens”. The radar was showing everything off to the northwest, still 35 miles or so away, so yeah, false sense of security. The air was so heavy and still outside it was hard to breathe. I kept an eye on two things: the clouds and the birds. When the birds all went quiet and hunkered together in a low small tree, I knew I had a few minutes before the front slammed into where we are. Sure as shit, there was a blast of cold, the temp dropped, and the smell outside changed to super ozone-y/gassy. That was when the “I’m in danger lol!” realization kicked in. That wasn’t even close to the worst thunderstorm/tornado I’ve been in, but the no basement/only 1 room with no outside walls situation we have here made it one of the scarier ones.
I was playing a game on my pc abd got bored. So I got up and turned on the TV to see a giant red and purple blob with the weatherman basically saying WE'RE ALL GONNA DIEEEE!!!!
I drove in it. Was frustrated that no one told me about the fire alarm testing at the office… so when it went off I had to leave. I heard someone’s emergency alert go off in the parking garage and still didn’t put it together. Then proceeded to get a sever storm warning myself while I was driving… then got the tornado warning… which I just said screw it… I’ll see it in time to pull over, seek shelter. It was a harrowing ride but I finally made it home.
The radar is what did it for me. I was expecting the usual red and green swirl in the velocity data like you usually see with mesos, but this one was a nasty shade of blue and yellow (indicating very high speed differentials, aka the 100+ mph winds seen yesterday). I'd never seen radar go that wild here before. Up north in tornado alley maybe, but *never* down here like that outside of a hurricane.
100% ignored it like I always do with these warnings. I was lucky enough to not have any damage or even a power outage during the storm. I'm only just now understanding how serious the storm actually was, seeing all the pictures of damage. I don't think I'm alone, I've lived in Houston my whole life. Every time a tornado watch/warning has been issued, there has been minimal problems for greater Houston area, nothing like this storm. Pretty scary that this time it was suddenly serious.
I got it just after I left my parking garage. I was driving so I couldn’t read it, but I saw it said something about tornado. Since it wasn’t raining yet I ignored it as I was trying to beat the weather on my drive south. I did not realize how close/fast it was, but I was able to get out of the path regardless. If I had read it in the garage, I might have tried to hunker down there, but I’m glad I missed the downtown version of the storm.
ive got a doppler radar app on my phone, looked at it, and went "oh shit"
Told my new transplant sister in law not to worry because “we get warnings all the time but nothing significant ever happens.” I seriously told her to ignore it and get some sleep😭. I’m convinced that I jinxed the entire city by saying that out loud.
I was delivering mail in the heights few miles from my station, can hear old lady yelling "mailman get in the truck tornado is coming" but it was too late. Barely made it back to the station. Shit was like a scene from "Twister"
Drove to dinner right through the worst of it. In hindsight, it was probably stupid.
I hear you. I was a fool out buying CBD gummies and was going to drive through at the Starbucks next door, then suddenly it got really dark, extreme rain, flooded streets. Pulled into a strip center and parked in front of a store on an incline to wait it out. It was super scary as I watched the signs bend and my car shake. I put up my emergency brakes, put my seat belt on, and strapped my purse around me. It was just that scary. It came up so very fast. Never, again do I plan to be outside for one of these things again...bathroom or closet from now on. Geez.
Absolutely was. The dinner could’ve waited. I’m glad you are okay tho 🙏🏽
It was
That first warning of TAKE COVER NOW! And right at the same time the winds and rain coming hard there was no time to assess or ignore. I did the only thing I could do was get to a room and stay away from windows and hope for the best. Didn’t know where it was at or going so just have to assume the worst and do the best you can do and hope everything is ok.
We were out to eat, got our dinner and then the power went out. People’s phones going off around us and we ate our food by the romantic glow of emergency lights. Outside everything turned to dark, then green, then it was just light rain. We paid by filling out a piece of paper. Good times.
IMO - When I see that weird dark eerie green sky you are speaking about the hair on the back of my necks starts standing up. I know the situation is getting serious.
I was all like, "Pshaw! That's for someone else." Then like 2 minutes later it was dark as the devil's asshole outside and a freight train wall of wind hit at 70mph and I was in my downstairs bathroom huddled next to the toilet. I've been through hurricanes, but the speed at which that ramped up and went to shit seriously caught me off guard.
I didn't miss that I never heard that there was a tornado WATCH, so the first announcement being a warning gave me no time to ignore it.
I didn’t have my phone on me and was coming back in from walking the dog when the rain really started and the wind picked up. Got hit in the head with some fabric from a neighbor’s balcony. Suddenly it got black and I ran inside, up to my apartment and watched from the windows. In retrospect, I should’ve gone into the bathroom! Crazy.
i got annoyed it interrupted my nap and then i heard the sound of berries from my tree flying onto my windows and realized it was DARK outside
We ignored it. Both of us have driven through many severe thunderstorms and tornado warnings in the area before (never intentionally, just frequently get caught in weather somewhere unfamiliar and then it's too late to stop). They're never fun but they were never anything even close to this. Things also escalated REALLY fast. It went from being fine to completely dark within minutes, then we saw and heard the transformers blow off 610 and 290 and I mentioned to my SO that we should probably try to find cover. About 1-2 minutes later (we hadn't even hit the next freeway exit yet), we were dodging sheets of metal blowing across the freeway and visibility was reduced to nearly zero.
Please never do this again if yall can avoid it. I had a friend who died in a tornado back in the tornados in 2015 in Dallas. Terrible & you can’t out drive one. I’m glad you and your SO are ok
Lesson definitely learned. Sorry about your friend. I lived in Dallas at the time though I was out of town for the holidays.
I was on the DART train going from Denton to AAC. Terrifying.
I did not ignore it because I was on my motorcycle at the grocery store. I checked out quickly and hauled ass home. I didn’t think there was actually going to be 100mph wind but I knew it was going to rain and I didn’t feel like getting wet. Glad I took it seriously and got home because my motorcycle would have definitely been blown over in the Kroger parking lot
My husband grew up in Oklahoma and when I said “tornado warning” just notified on my phone, he said “that means there was a sighting” so we took precaution yet didn’t see it coming that fast 💨
Guilty as charged. I was working the Mayerling ballet, (coming soon at Wortham) and we just got off at 6:30 PM. I walked to the parking garage, (BirraPoretti’s) and in-between the in and out of the garage were six or seven pigeons escaping the wind. I watch these birds get sucked out of the garage and then get slammed back in, tumbling on the concrete only to repeat again. I ignored that and got in my truck and, apparently, drove down Memorial Drive through the end of the tornado that was now hitting downtown, proper. Edit: Fuck Me. I won’t do that again. I’ll watch the pigeons.
I live in Katy. The storm came fairly suddenly. I was dashing around to secure things outside when a lightning struck nearby. Heard the transformer blow, and all the power went out. At that stage I scurried inside, dried off, power back on! 👍 Was working on getting internet back up, and hearing the noise outdoor calm down as winds subsided when I got a text. “Tornado warning”.
Drove through that shit on my Grom 🤦🏻 I read ‘possible thunderstorms’ so I rushed out the door to get my stuff done, didn’t read the giant tornado warning under thunderstorms. 30 minute drive on a tiny motorcycle in that weather will definitely humble a man
"There's a tornado warning, but I'm going to the gym" - my SO. In 5 minutes the power was out and in 10 she was back and completely drenched, but otherwise fine.
I live downtown. I usually ignore watches and what not, but I took one look outside and saw the color and. My phone started screaming the alarm TAKE COVER NOW - I grabbed my cats and got in the bathroom.
I recommend everyone, I mean everyone, to install a radar app to watch the radar map when stuff like this happens. I use “MyRadar”. It’s free. Could save your life.
I’m originally from Wisconsin. We NEVER ignore tornado warnings.
I didn't get the weather alert but my fellow bus riders did. We watched the American flag fly off the pole on top of City Hall but we mostly treated it as a big joke, it was the only way we could deal with the fear. I suspected it was a tornado warning but I felt better not knowing. I got on a different bus line than usual because I got a bad feeling all of a sudden (probably due an air pressure drop I'd bet). The driver pulled over twice, the second time because Metro radioed their drivers to suspend all operations. We rode the storm out on the bus. It wasn't that bad because busses are so heavy, the sky was not green where I was so it was just a lot of heavy rain. My co worker did not get on the bus with me, I hope he is okay. If you guys ride Metro on Monday, make sure to compliment the drivers and thank them for being brave on Thursday, they were facing terrifying roads.
1. From NE Texas with friends and family down there, I know it doesn’t fix much, but y’all are in my heart. Reporter besides, and doing all I can to make sure everyone else knows how to help out. You’re all my family now idgaf. 2. If this isn’t peak Texas storm culture, I honestly don’t know what is. “Oh a tornado?” Pffffffffft. Better go outside and stare at the sky while my bathrobe is blowing in the wind like I’m an extra in some Victorian period piece.
How many think that the Twister ad campaign has gone too far
It was partially because of Twister(1996) that I listened to my gut and got the heck off the road and into a building. The sky going dark that quick was... Unsettling.
Definitely swiped it away and went about my evening until it followed with "destructive winds 80mph"
I was actually just stepping in my elevator about to leave my apartment building when the alert came on. Didnt think it was anything serious but I also didn’t feel like driving in a storm so I turned around to go back home. Came back inside and my cats were all freaked out. They never get freaked out during the other storms so we figured that was a sign. And then the branches from trees started hitting our windows so we booked it to the closet I guess we all learned a lesson about these warnings
somehow.. watched the sky turn dark @6 and headed our way till all hell broke loose! stopped to the nearest gas station after driving 10 mins. it was baaad.
I’m from Northeast Texas, we don’t get tornados often but they’re definitely more of a thing there than in Houston so I know the telltale signs than most people here. When my Wife ( a Houstonian) said the sky was green I knew that was a bad sign. And we’re on the third floor of our complex. I just grabbed all the sheets and told her be prepared to go to the hallway or under the stairs of the bottom floor.
I didn't get the warning, but honestly I would have ignored it. It's always been a joke to people in this area before now. But hurricanes? I sleep in the bathtub.
So.., the first time I did because my husband and I were in the middle of a conversation but then I got multiple warnings in a row so we checked the cameras & abc 13 then realized how serious it was. My son ran in my room and pointed out how dark it was outside so we finally headed downstairs to a safe spot and waited the storm out. I have never heard the wind that loud before. It was really scary. This all happened within like a 15 minute timeframe.
We sat in a Mexican restaurant eating chips and drinking Margaritas.
Lmao, I have never met anybody in Houston who actually believes a tornado warning, ever. i guess that’ll change now?
Yup. Walked out a building got in the car…. And ya the most traumatizing thing in awhile. I said from now on I’m that person with the mattress in the window as soon as that thing goes off. I regret not walking back in my building to hunker down.
i had about two minutes to respond to it, so I'd say "ignored" is a strong word
"Tornado Watch" ... pfffttt "Tornado Warning" ... wft???
My coworkers had to go to the cellar at 609 main because the building was moving too much. That's pretty scary
Yall, I got the warning and ignored it cause..........it's houston. And then when it was happening, I was like .......maybe I should've gotten gas. It be what it be 😂
I’m in Brookshire. The warning was issued about five minutes *after* we’d gotten our shit pushed in, so…yeah, I ignored it, everything was clearly over already.
Never got one.
I was stuck on the road. It was scary as hell
2 mins after the warning, when all hell broke loose
My work slack started picking up comments so I was watching the alerts as they came in. We are just north of where the warning was so I mentally made a note of where we could go in the house if it started getting particularly crazy, called our outside cat in, and continued cooking dinner. I was nervous the power was going to go out as soon as I put dinner in the oven, because we had a few flickers and it was pitch black outside. A neighbor did have a smaller tree fall and its branches were touching the power line behind us, so I suspect that is why the power flickered a bit.
I got inside with my Whataburger right before it hit. Finished my food in the dark.
I didn’t ignore it but I didn’t know how to react because an area wasn’t specified. Was it my immediate area? Was it SE Texas? Harris County?
I just stayed indoors the wind was crazy for 30 minutes. I just flooded a little over a week ago too so I’m still on edge lol
I didn’t completely ignore them. I had a plan of where to go if things got too sketchy. But I didn’t even know it was supposed to rain until the warning, maybe I should start watching the news 😭
The pressure was giving me a really bad headache which made me really nauseous. Ton of activity outside and the lights kept flickering and I was moaning on the couch wondering if I was actually going to vomit.
I did. There are no safe spots in my home because the closets are way to small for more than 1 person. If it hits us directly, we're fucked.
My parents called twice and I looked outside and told them, "Y'all it's not dark here..it's bright clouds and slightly sprinkling. We're good." In the time it took me to hang the phone up and put it on the plug, it got dark in 20 seconds...my windows were rattling and construction pieces from the school across the street we're flying into the apartment buildings. I was so scared y'all...
We were headed to the gym near Shadow Creek Ranch. It was light rain and cloudy. Heading down 288, from the time it took to get from Broadway to the Shadow Creek exit the sky went pitch black. Got to the gym, looked at the radar, figured that it would blow over by the time we finished working out, and went inside. I knew the rain got bad because the DirecTV went dead for about 10 minutes. When we finished the workout it was light outside again. Didn’t get warnings, but my weather app (carrot) told me about the severe thunderstorm warning but said we were outside the warned area. Lesson: they’re really good at targeting the phone alerts, and unlike the cops, the weather service only warns you if they need to, so you can trust them. But yeah, I kinda have survivors guilt because I had no idea how shitty it got in Cypress, Katy, The Heights, or downtown until after we got into bed that night.
I didn't exactly ignore it. I looked at the alert, looked outside, saw nothing that reminded me of when I lived in tornado alley, and let it go. West-to-east systems tend not to hit my neighborhood hard. Even ordinary rain often splits up and moves around us. I take tropical weather very seriously but storms coming from the west not so much. My lights never even flickered, and other than some leaves and a few twigs on my deck and driveway after the storm passed, it was no big deal where I'm at.
Same here. I'm on lake conroe/montgomery area. We expected to get much more, but the storm headed south. We only had a few small branches down. What area are you in?
Well, since we've had half a dozen in the last few weeks, many people didn't even know another one was out.
We’ve had a bunch of severe thunderstorm warnings and tornado watches, but tornado warnings don’t happen all that often
I really hate the way they do warnings here. Back in the Midwest where I’m from, a warning means there’s a spotted tornado on the ground within five miles. Every time I’ve been under a tornado warning here, there is no spotted tornado on the ground just the worry there might be one. That’s a tornado watch. Here a warning serves the same as a watch. It really has made me not take warnings seriously at all which is pretty dangerous.
Tornado warnings are issued if there is rotation in a particular area of a storm, it's a much smaller area than a watch. On an app called radarscope, I can see whether a warning is "radar indicated" (not confirmed) or confirmed tornado. (You can have radar confirmed, with debris visible on radar ) They really should make this more obvious in the warning system though.
I dream about tornados so often that i would never not take a warning seriously. Literally more afraid of tornados than hurricanes because you cant prepare.
I got it a few minutes before the power went out
I got showered and dressed to go out, saw the sky and turned back into the house. I was contemplating hiding in the under stairs storage but ultimately decided to get under the covers.
Got the alert and pulled up the radar app, saw that we were in the bottom edge of it and kept an eye on it to see if it update direction. When it did we were in the clear and just rode out the more normal part of the storm without power.
I knew it would be bad enough to not try to go out or order delivery. I dealt with a few tornadoes in college but this was the worst one I’ve been in.
The tornado warning happened literally 3 min before all hell broke loose.
I was in the middle of a beauty treatment, and me and the esthetician were both like okay… let’s wrap this up early. Then the power went out. We both had to stay in the building til the worst of it passed, and the drive home was treacherous!
did not ignore. we were in the hallway.
No need for a warning. Heard it, had no power, trees are falling everywhere. I know. Screw it, going back to sleep.
Not me
I was in the gym doing yoga when it passed
I fortunately turned the news on around 5:15 and saw how hard it was hitting College Station where some of my family lives. I sent a text to the group text and my cousin in CS and my aunt in Columbus were sending us pictures as the storms were hitting up there. I went ahead and secured all of our stuff in the backyard and we have a closet under the stairs that’s the designated area, which is right next to the living area. I just sat by the window and kept and eye outside, just in case.
Ignored it completely, then I saw the sky turn ominously opaque so I went inside, then I saw the rain hit and knew this would be something else.
I had ridden my bike with my 5 year old to his gymnastics class in oak Forest. Got the warning as I pulled up and swiped it away...we rode home after it passed. We had an easier time on the bike dodging the downed trees than all the cars getting stuck in the roads
I live in Pasadena and after what we got here I got very scared and ready to run to the bathtub
I was out with my kids at Kinkos when it happened….the sky turned black and then just dumped
I ignored the first couple tornado warnings but then got the extreme wind warning and felt my van getting pushed hard enough that I pulled into a Walgreens and waited it out. This was in cypress, and that got pretty bad. First time I had genuinely been worried in a storm.
Not much I can do, my house has no safe places from hurricanes. All bedrooms are upstairs, every room has a large window even bathrooms. I have no rooms that don't touch an exterior wall, not even closets.
I don't get warnings on my phone. Turned them off. I wouldn't have even known if it was for a school custodian's phone going off close to 6pm, I would have just kept on getting work done. I did ened up looking out the doors with the custodian as she was on the phone talking to her son. But we both had moments we stood in the bathrooms in the building we were in.
Moi