Open Thread – The Calm After the Storm
As anyone who has been keeping track of the weather in these parts knows, the past week has seen its share of nasty wind storms, blowing snow, sleet, rain, and any kind of driving hazard you can name. Yesterday, the wind in Anchorage was so bad that planes were diverted to land in Fairbanks until it was deemed safe to land. On the ground things were pretty bad.
The only place I wanted to get a picture of that was from the comfort and safety of my house. This is what it looked like from there.
Last night, after the wind had passed, it began to snow. It snowed not in individual flakes, but in large colonies of flakes that had stuck together on their free fall to earth in temperatures that hovered right around freezing. Some were the size of walnuts. They accumulated quickly and before dawn, we had accumulations of over a foot of snow in some places in Anchorage. Between that, and the nasty icy road conditions, all schools in the district were cancelled today. Many homes, including Mudflats Central in Anchorage, and entire communities like Moose Pass suffered power outages.
But today was a new day – the calm after the storm. Every tree and twig was covered in snow. Bannisters and railings and cars were snow blasted with the sticky stuff. Mailboxes were frozen shut, and rutted icy roads provided a teeth-clattering ride around town. And everything was blanketed in a layer of pure sparkling white insulation that muffled traffic noises, and left the whole city in a hush.
As the sun set this evening, I took a little walk with my camera.
One of my favorite trees at sunset.
Cottonwood trees framed by spruce, and bathed in the orange glow of the sunset.
Who needs lights and ornaments? To me, this is the perfect Christmas tree.
Buf the Dog tagged along for the walk…
…and occasionally found it to be a tougher slog than she bargained for.
In the midst of all the magical winter beauty was a reminder of the incredible power of the storm the previous day. This beautiful, healthy, mature spruce tree snapped like a twig in the wind gusts which topped 100mph. You can see the break in the trunk on the left. Then as it fell across the creek and hit the bank on the other side, it snapped again in the middle. To give you a sense of scale, the tree was about 60 feet tall.
Nice pics!!
Another great email from God’s Own Party:
http://godsownparty.com/blog/2011/12/who-invented-newt/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+GodsOwnParty+%28God%27s+Own+Party%3F%29
It looked like that while I waited, for two days, for our canceled flight in the hub town this past weekend.
I did not have a somewhat (un)happy pupper to keep me such company…glad the morning after is so pretty!!
The interludes between Alaska storms are extraordinary.
My favorite kind of snow is the stick-together flaky kind that frosts all the branches and covers the grass. And there’s nothin’ cuter than a doggy with just a little plop of snow on their doggy noses!
Buf looks like she needs a nice long nap in front of the fire after her romp in the white stuff.
We, here in western NY, are on our way to breaking records for the LEAST amount of snow so far this season and worried about whether or not we’ll have a white Christmas. I will be in Idaho for the holiday festivities so am pretty confident that there will be a frosty white covering for the ground.
Beautiful shots, as always, AKM!
Doesn’t a certain family of numbskulls in Alaska hail from the potato state? Be vewwy caweful.
Yeah, but they got thrown out yeeeears ago! It’s safe now. 😉
Remember the Fairbanks researcher igniting a methane plume on the tundra? Guess what’s happening now:
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/shock-as-retreat-of-arctic-sea-ice-releases-deadly-greenhouse-gas-6276134.html
Gotta go comb my hair back down…
Or does this solve AGIA?
Dear Palins:
How to reduce unwanted teen pregnancies. Please notice it doesn’t seem to be about abstinence.
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2011/1212/Why-the-US-teen-birthrate-hit-a-record-low-in-2010
I couldn’t believe birth rates from ‘way back when. Wow.
Interesting. Thanks for the link. Seems like a little bit of everything has contributed to reduced rates. Kids are smart if you give them the tools they need and not just try to say no sex and no sex ed.
And we are experiencing the opposite. The 7 inches of snow on Thanksgiving was gone in 2 days.
The coldest night has been 20 and the day has been 27. Still have flowers between my pool and house and a live geranium on the deck. We will be getting rain tomorrow instead of snow.
Very strange summer and Fall for us. We planted early in Spring(mother’s Day) and had the first hard frost the week of Thanksgiving.
Things are changing!!
It is supposed to be 63* here tomorrow. That is just so wrong.
Snooping on the web yesterday I found out that Dobie Gray had passed on to his next life and so did Roy Orbison’s widow. I never had a clue that Dobie Gray was a talented songwriter for different music genres. I only remember he had a distinctive voice which is now silenced. Your snapped off spruce tree reminds me of the 99% who are being cut off at the knees by rethuglicans and then,to add insult to injury,busted again for good measure. The drifted snow on the carcass is lily-gilding.
dear Buf. beautiful pup. just gorgeous.
the scenery is nice also. too,
That looks and sounds like a very Southeast Alaska storm, AKM, though it is sunrises like that for us, rarely sunsets
Buf! Puppers here of your stature do a sproing, sproing doggy hop which works well in wet snow . Try it sweet pupper, it works. 🙂
That sunset pic is stunning! I thought the downed tree was a row of bushes. Love the creek peeking out. Snow on a creek bank is one of my favorite visuals in winter. Off to paint some apartments! Have a wonderful day. 🙂
Beautiful pictures! Poor old Buf. Such a face on that dog. Priceless! I am sorry you lost that tree. It is a horrible thing to lose a tree like that.
Stunning pics, AKM! Typing from my phone in OR – this makes me homesick (yeah – until I get home & it’s dark dark dark). Hi to Buff! Dogs love the snow. They don’t have to shovel!
Buf. Bufff. Brrrrr Bufffffff.
Orange evenings and magenta nights.
I’m glad the flight was cancelled that would have gottten my 92 year friend home to Anchorage in the midst of all that!