Iowa Derecho 2020

The Iowa Derecho of 2020 is one for the record books. Starting around Omaha around 8-9am and blew across Western Iowa arriving in the Des Moines right around 11am. This storm wasn't like any regular thunderstorm with high winds, this one hit with such extreme winds some officials are comparing it to a category 3 hurricane. Peak wind gusts ranged 75MPH to 106MPH. and what was also so different about this storm is that high winds lasted for an unprecedented 20-30 minutes! Buildings and infrastructure here in the midwest were not built to handle such force and speaking horticulturaly, trees are not used to having to endure that kind of wind so damage to homes was severe and thousands of trees fell devastating cities urban tree canopy. The power was knocked out to more then half of the metro along now counting the hundreds of thousands out in the country. Power crews were overwhelmed easily and it took more then a week to have everything fully restored. The storm already has estimated damages in the billions of dollars range.

I was at the garden center in Cumming where I took this video out the front door The strength of the winds in this storm were like nothing I've ever seen even through the years storm chasing. It was very intense but it came in waves, peaking and lessening up several times. The power went out at the garden center but was restored around 3pm.

 

Tree limb down

My house is located on the south side of Des Moines near the airport, where the winds were registered at an impressive 75MPH. Of course, it was very concerning what I was going to be coming home to. The power was out to the entire neighborhood and it was a challenge getting around blocked roads and emergency crews. Arriving, things were a total mess, there were branches and debris everywhere. Gutter spouts blown off, items that didn't belong to me in the front lawn and the gardens were a disaster but I am very fortunate that there was no damage to my house and no trees came down and most everything remained in tacked. Even though the yard was covered in limbs, the tree limb above was the only one that actually came from my own tree. Still not exactly sure now but the other Sugar Maple in my front lawn didn't even loose a single branch! Also take note Little Lucky held strong and didn't take a tumble in the wind!

 

Stars visible from Des Moines 8/10/20

 

The power outage lasted through the evening and it was down to candle light, but it only last 12 hours. Using the word only because that was very short as many nearby streets didn't regain power until days later. Feeling grateful not having to deal with loosing food. I lent my freezer space to hold my moms food who was without power for 4 days.

Branches from neighbors trees

 

Most of the tree limbs from neighboring trees along side or being my yard that landed on my side. The neighbors Silver Maples took a beating and lost many limbs, I was SO lucky none hit my house or garage.

 

 

The neighbors Silver Maple used ot have many branches that covered this area behind my garage to where you would not see the sky, now there is a huge opening in the canopy.

Whats interesting about this photo is that there are no Black Walnut trees in my yard, but the  sucking forces of the wind blew huge patches of leaves and branches from a long distance to the opposite side of the garage.

My next door neighbors were not as lucky as me. They lost many of their beautiful old trees. The tree to the left had a very large branch snap off and on the way down it took out half of the tree in the next yard over, It really is a shame to lose so many nice old trees with such charter and I'm personally concerned the damage this storm caused will make people less likely to plant new trees for the ones lost. My yard and gardens will take days to clean up and some flowers wont ever return this year, but in the scheme of things, I feel for the people who lost much more then I and I'm truly grateful it wasn't worse then it was because driving around its easy to see how it could have been.