I’ve been riding along during this corn harvest, taking a picture here, another one over there… And sometimes bugging whoever I’m around with my shutterbug tendencies!
I did get to snatch a ride in the combine once..
But most of the time I camped out in the Peterbilt… Which happened to have a Blueberry Muffin or two show up inside!
Yesterday was the most exciting day I’ve gone through in awhile.. Harvest is always exciting, but yesterday was special. The reason?
We went though what some people are calling a tornado and others are calling a massive straight line wind. I’m not sure which.. The tornado does sound more impressive, but the wind sounds a little more probable. So you can guess for yourself what it was!
It started by slowly moving our direction.. And making the folks cutting and hauling wonder how much longer they would have before it hit! The grain truck I was in was taken home to be unloaded when we noticed how it was cooling off and the wind was picking up.
Pretty soon we were done unloading and just sitting there trying to decide whether or not to head back to the field or lay low there and see if it got any worse and started raining. Which it did! So we parked in the machine shed and waited for the combine, tractor / grain cart, and other grain truck to come back.
Pretty soon we saw lights coming on the road, through the rain. By now, the rain was pouring down, the wind was really picking up and you couldn’t see hardly anything – It was like a sheet of white had settled in on us.
Everyone made it into the machine shed, and I just stood in the corner in awe – They parked close enough that there was metal within mere inches of other metal! I’m sure I could have parked it even closer myself, but if I had, it wouldn’t have been on purpose and nothing would have looked as good coming out as it did going in! (Yep, you guys amazed me!)
After everything was tucked in there, we all gathered in the middle of the shed, right next to the truck that was still loaded. “If this place starts to come apart, you need to go under the Kenworth and stay there.” I was told. It turns out that that’s exactly what we did at one point!
When it had first started, the noise from outside was so loud I plugged my ears.. Later on though, everyone’s ears were popping. It was a rather strange experience… Then at one point, the bottom of the back doors of the shed were actually sucked outward and started to flap a little in the wind. Talk about adding a little excitment to the day!
After awhile, the storm simmered down and we went outside to start inspecting the damage.. Trees broken and split, lots of limbs everywhere… It was a mess! Nearby, a tank battery had been struck by lighting and exploded. Firetrucks went whistling towards it, but from what I heard, it was still burning this morning.
There’s been some strange things I’ve come across today.. Such as driving down the road and finding bits and pieces of your place in the ditch. Or this gravity box that ended up taking a nap on its side…
Probably one of the saddest parts for me was our little granary finding a new resting place.. (You can see the timbers it used to sit on). Right beside it is the giant elm tree that used to be inside the pen. Now it’s decided to migrate..
Right on top of the fence!
Anyone else think this picture is a little strange? A building on its side one way… A tree taking a nap the other way!
At the end of the day, there was a common theme to what several people were talking about – We were very blessed. Nobody died (or even got hurt that I know of), animals were okay, and we all still had homes to go to sleep in.
It was a blessing.
Ashleigh
[…] You might have read the post where I was talking about out Labor Day Storm (I think “tornado” sounds more exciting, but we’ll stick with calling it a storm!) and I talked about how impressive it was to watch all of the guys that were harvesting, run their machinery into a machine shed, with mere inches in between the metal? (No? You really ought to.. If just to see the pictures! So check it out here.) […]