I finally got a few days off from work last week only to have Ike blow through... I live in southern Indiana and never had a hurricane blow this far north. The wind gusts were unbelievable knocking down tree limbs and in some cases uprooting trees.. My house even shook with a few of them...
The news people only reported gusts up to 45 miles per hour but I say some of them were more like 100. We were luckier than some in the area that lost parts of their roofs. We only had two small branches from our huge old cottonwood tree come down which was amazing as huge as it is. It takes three people to hug this old tree.
But I still spend most of my two days off lugging around tree branches since my father and mother in-law lost a bradford pear in their front yard that landed across the neighbors driveway..
There is still almost week later huge branchs lining the sides of the roads and blocking alleys in town. The city is picking up all the limbs that are being dragged to the streets..
When you see something like this so far from where the hurricane was at its worst you really have to think about all the devastation it left in the area where it hit and feel for the people in that area... not that you wouldn't already but the reality of it hits home