Massive dust storm in Arizona

djhaxman · 06-07-2011 11:16am #1

A friend of mine is in Phoenix atm and witnessed this yesterday. I saw one in New Mexico years ago, but it was nothing on the scale of this one.

Irish weather depresses me.....

http://www.myfoxphoenix.com/dpp/weather/big-dust-storm-rolls-into-valley-7-5-2011

mike65 · 06-07-2011 11:40am

Just saw this on guardian.co.uk, impressive but would you really want to be vacuuming the house for a week?

Supercell · 06-07-2011 12:05pm

Interesting , I have a friend from New Mexico and heres an account he wrote about the recent storms which I found pretty interesting, his wife isnt from there so was a little freaked about by them at first...:-

The wind usually comes out of the west.Once in awhile it will come out of the south.But mostly out of the west.It starts in Arizona.And works it 's way east to New Mexico.It can blow from anywhere to a couple of hours.Up to a couple of weeks.With winds speeds anywhere from 50 mph up to 105 mph.A 30mph wind here is just a breeze.The winds start in Mid March and usually are over by the end of April.When the wind is blowing most people just ignore it until it does get up to about fifty mph.Then you try to drop whatever your doing.And get inside.Because the stuff flying threw the air.Can hurt you.I have seen it push trees down.Push Semi trucks off the rd.And rip the roof off of houses.There will be so much dust blowing threw the air.That it blocks out the sun.The dirt gets into your clothes your hair.in your eyes mouth and ears.Then it starts seeping into your house.And withen a couple of hours all the surfaces in your house are covered with a fine layer of dust.

The dust storms aren't all bad.And they do help with some of the work.I can cut the weeds in the yard and just leave them there.The wind will blow them across the highway.I can do the same thing with the tumble weeds that blew in my yard.From the last wind storm.All I have to do is kick them back into the wind.And off they go.You can also watch out the house windows.And watch the people driving up and down the rd.Try to hit.Or miss the tumble weeds blowing across the rd.

The first couple of times my wife seen a wind storm.It kind of freaked her out.She was afraid the roof would blow off.Or the dirt would just start blowing threw the house.And everybody would suffocate and die.She started running around stuffing wet towels.At the bottom of the doors.And wanted to know why I wasn't helping and why I didn't seem to concerned.

I had to explain to her that the house was built to stand up to thees kinds of winds.The doors have sweeps on the bottoms.to stop the sand from coming in.They also have extra weather stripping along the sides to stop the sand.The windows have screens then a piece of glass with rubber around it.Then another piece of glass that has it 's own rubber gasket.Along with it's own track.and starting in about Nov. of every year I put clear plastic up over the windows.That I don't take down till the winds end in April.And I have a plug for the A/C unit with a cover. That stops the sand from getting in.And the house has straps that go around the main support beams.That are bolted to to the foundation.

After I explained it all to her and she seen the house stand up to that kind of wind.It doesn't bother her anymore.She does get tired of sweeping off the decks so the kids can play on them.But other then that it doesn't scare her like it used to.And she gets to laugh at me every spring when I have to climb up on the roof.And replace the 6 or 7 shingels that got blown off over the winter and early spring.

It was clocking around 70 Wed of last week.It usually doesn't blow that hard this late in the year.My wife commented that the wind was blowing hard.And she asked me if I had locked the deck gates.Before I came in the house.I told her yes to both questions.And that was her only concern.She went back to playing with the boys.And I went back to the computer.