In spite of the fact that we don't see a lot of severe weather here, my weather radio is on 24/7 (in no small part because I'm a weather geek, too...). In addition, I have my fire pager set up to alert on the county fire dispatch weather alert, too, so if I'm out and about I get alerted, too.
Some scanners are S.A.M.E. capable - they will remain in alert mode until a weather alert is received. Almost all currently available weather radios are S.A.M.E. capable, which means you can set them up to alert only for specific areas, a lot less noisy since most weather radio transmitters cover numerous counties, and very often one weather office controls several weather radio transmit sites. My daughter doesn't have hers locked down to her home county, so she hears when I get an alert three counties away. S.A.M.E. codes are available on-line, and often come with the radios.
My weather radio displays the type of alert and the duration remaining, so I know there's a severe thunderstorm warning for the next hour and a half, even if I missed the initial alert. A valuable feature.
An added benefit of a weather radio is almost instant forecasts. Leave it in alert mode most of the time, but if you want the current forecast or conditions, just listen in for a bit. If you listen for a little while, you'll get the rythm of the broadcasts so you'll have a better idea what to expect when you do turn it on.
As CW says - a valuable asset, especially if you live in an area subject to nasty weather.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
// Staggers back in.
Mooks: Already burnt to a crisp (no roasting needed)...dontcha just love fying asparagus in yer teef?. Our western Nebrasky job just got stopped for two weeks. BNSF way too busy to spare a flagman. P8-11 tracklayer on the loose out here.
Jay: For openers, (1) contractor almost jacking pipe under wrong railroad, (2) High-Wide-Heavy load striking bottom of new lightrail overpass (dumb trucker stunt),(3) RTD forgetting to abandon a freight line before sticking in dedicated light rail here in Denver.
Dan: if you put corn down out here yesterday, it's somewhere east of Omaha by now. 60-100 MPH winds most of yesterday. Lotsa broken trees. Dorothy and Toto en-route to St. Louis from Land of Ahs.... I have a sandblasted dirt tan too!
CW: Lurch is named for the "You rang?" Adams Family gag and also that is what the truck does when you put it into gear. The linkage on this thing cannot be right. It goes back to Ford to fix.
LM: Hope your fire company can fight a fire on the fly. (cute card!, can they pitch a bar of soap my way before the engineer hits the water please?)
Tree: Worked in ME and Baltimore in past years. Who knows?
Randy, Chad, carl, Unihead, willy, joe, tinshoes & Co. - Thanx
German food for delayed birfday dins to-nite, Jaegerschnitzel,spatzle, dumplings, red cabbage and cucumber salad - Ja! (and then a beer sedative)
//Back to da salt mines...
Frazzled Feathers
mudchicken wrote:// Staggers back in.Mooks: Already burnt to a crisp (no roasting needed)...dontcha just love fying asparagus in yer teef?. Our western Nebrasky job just got stopped for two weeks. BNSF way too busy to spare a flagman. P8-11 tracklayer on the loose out here.Jay: For openers, (1) contractor almost jacking pipe under wrong railroad, (2) High-Wide-Heavy load striking bottom of new lightrail overpass (dumb trucker stunt),(3) RTD forgetting to abandon a freight line before sticking in dedicated light rail here in Denver.Dan: if you put corn down out here yesterday, it's somewhere east of Omaha by now. 60-100 MPH winds most of yesterday. Lotsa broken trees. Dorothy and Toto en-route to St. Louis from Land of Ahs.... I have a sandblasted dirt tan too!CW: Lurch is named for the "You rang?" Adams Family gag and also that is what the truck does when you put it into gear. The linkage on this thing cannot be right. It goes back to Ford to fix.LM: Hope your fire company can fight a fire on the fly. (cute card!, can they pitch a bar of soap my way before the engineer hits the water please?)Tree: Worked in ME and Baltimore in past years. Who knows?Randy, Chad, carl, Unihead, willy, joe, tinshoes & Co. - ThanxGerman food for delayed birfday dins to-nite, Jaegerschnitzel,spatzle, dumplings, red cabbage and cucumber salad - Ja! (and then a beer sedative)//Back to da salt mines... Frazzled Feathers
You maybe "Frazzled" but very glad you did make it in!!!!!!!
We can DEFINITELY toss in a bar of soap if it will help!
There have been several times that we would have liked to toss the engineer in, along with the bar of soap!!
Uh, not sure about fighting fires on the "fly", all our pumpers had PTO'S and had to be parked
when using the pump.
Being Crazy,keeps you from going "INSANE" !! "The light at the end of the tunnel,has been turned off due to budget cuts" NOT AFRAID A Vet., and PROUD OF IT!!
mudchicken wrote:German food for delayed birfday dins to-nite, Jaegerschnitzel,spatzle, dumplings, red cabbage and cucumber salad - Ja! (and then a beer sedative)
MC made a special request.
And maybe the fish aren't biting?
Brian (IA) http://blhanel.rrpicturearchives.net.
Brian, Lance and everyone else: Looks like I forgot what day this was!! Please accept my apologies. I was out this evening, and just got home a little bit ago. I will make it up to everyone tomorrow. Along with it being our SATURDAY NIGHT PIZZA FEST, we will also make it a SATURDAY FISH FRY also. So everyone can have a little bit of fish and pizza tomorrow night. (I'll include extra anchovies on the anchovie pizza: Jay will love that!!) And I'll also put extra toppings on the other pizzas (not fish related).
I am so very sorry, guys and gals!! PLEASE FORGIVE ME.
The Storm Prediction Center storm reports page shows that there were about 300 reports of severe weather today and many of those were in the northeast, including around Larry's area. Hopefully we'll here from him soon and make sure everything is okay up there. Out of all those reports, there weren't any tornado reports, so that's a good thing.
We've got nice weather here. Storm chances will come back on Sunday afternoon and last off and on through Wednesday. Typical summer weather for Nebraska.
Spent the day in Fremont today and saw 13 trains. There wasn't really anything out of the ordinary except that one train had a green signal go red right in his face. I was expecting an emergency brake application, but he was still far enough away from the signal that it looked/sounded like he just braked hard.
Union Pacific really needs to fix some of the track up in Fremont. There are some pretty big bumps and dips. What concerns me is that they don't have a slow order for this or anything. They just go zipping right on by like it's as smooth as can be. It seems like a recipe for disaster to me.
Yesterday I did my first interstate driving. It was for Driver's Ed so I had a good instructor next to me to make sure I did everything right. It was on Interstate 80 right in the middle of Omaha and during rush hour. I did fine and he says that once I've finished the classroom work (which will be on Wednesday), I'll be ready to get my license. That means I'll finally be able to train watch without dragging my mom or dad along! I'm sure they'll be happy about that!
Ok, I kind of got carried away with the typing there. Sorry if I put anyone to sleep with that exciting tale of the past couple of days.
Willy
MC -
Happy Birthday!!
Hey, I figgered that out...will wonders never cease?
Hope all is well. Carry an industrial size chapstick I guess. Weather has been strange here in the east too. Been going crazy. All sorts of things flying at me since Balto.
Drop me a note.
LC
howdy
sorry haven't been in today. had a good time at our campout. matt is really tired.the storms blew through here today but we didnt get too much rain out of it but its alot cooler now.we need to get stuff for matts ballgame around tommorow then off to bed.
stay safe
joe
Deshler Ohio-crossroads of the B&O Matt eats your fries.YUM! Clinton st viaduct undefeated against too tall trucks!!!(voted to be called the "Clinton St. can opener").
Willy2 wrote: many of those were in the northeast, including around Larry's area. Hopefully we'll here from him soon and make sure everything is okay up there.
It looked really nasty coming across the lake, but didn't amount to much here, although many did lose power.
I was standing on our pumper when it came through, filling tankers for a bad fire. Just got home. It'll make for a long day on the railroad tomorrow....
Night, all!
Good Saturday morning, everyone! Sure does look like it's going to be a beautiful, cooler day around here. Our current temp is in the low 60s, and I even had to pull the covers up over myself last night!
Coffee is ready, and there's fresh juice and hot water for cocoa and tea, and if anyone wants hot chocolate, I'll heat some milk for you.
On the warmer bar this morning: sausage patties and links, buttermilk pancakes, whole wheat pancakes, plenty of syrup, and we've got fresh strawberries you can put on your pancakes, if you wish. There's also scrambled eggs this morning, and turkey bacon.
Joe, glad you and Matt had a great time on your "camp-out"!!
Everyone have a great day, and hope to see everyone back in here tonight for our combined SATURDAY NIGHT PIZZA FEST AND FISH FRY.
....Willy, I've noticed locations on RR's various times spotting "bad spots" and allowing one to wonder how they {M/W}, folks let conditions like that for some time before anything is done to overcome it....Makes one wonder how trains with some speed pass over those areas without causing trouble.
Especially, when one witnessess a rail "pumping" up and down in the mud, etc....{low ballast}, I'd think that would be a pretty good danger spot to create a broken rail. But, for the most part, they seem to get along without trouble most of the time.....I sure wonder how.
Quentin
My guess is partly luck!
Good job on the driving Willy. The more practice, structured practice, you get the easier (somewhat!) you're road test should be. Always be on the lookout for the other guy-he usually looks like me! LOL!
CW I wonder how the perch/pepperoni pizza will taste today...and don't worry about the fox paws the other day, fox is good with ketchup!
Larry I'm glad that it was much ado about nothing for the most part by you. I had some friends up near where the F2/3 twister was Thursday. It's pretty bad up there. Super slow day at work today...maybe I'll take an extended lunch!
Dan
Morning all.......
At my parents in Burlington today, getting ready for one final week of training before they let us loose with a trainer for a month or two. One of my classmates hopefully still has a house up in Wisconsin Rapids, he figured that where the tornado went through was about where his house was........
CW, it's okay about last night, found a very good fish fry at a restaurant in Germantown, one of the best fish frys I've had in a long time. Will be in later for the fish fry here, though, this one's just as good......
Randy Vos
"Ever have one of those days where you couldn't hit the ground with your hat??" - Waylon Jennings
"May the Lord take a liking to you and blow you up, real good" - SCTV
Since I forgot the fish menu last night, I came back in early, to post tonight's combined menu, so here goes:
anchovie/"t"rainbow trout
cheese/"caboose" cod
pepperoni/"brakeman's" perch
sausage/"conductor's" "just for the" hallibut
supreme/"switchman's" salmon
goetta/"NS/GE" catfish
special/all the above listed PLUS mounds of cheese
(pepperoni, Canadian bacon, onions, peppers, etc. are optional)
This morning one of the Milwaukee TV stations was doing a remote live coverage of the devastation caused by the storms in Oconto County which is a bit north of the city of Green Bay. Incredably, there were no deaths or life threatening injuries. I wasn't watching too closely, but part of the report was on a small resort. The lodge and out cabins were totaled. The report stated that one couple survived even though the cabin where they were located was lifted and blown completely off the slab foundation. I suspect the remains of the cabin are somewhere on the east side of Oz.
Willy-I'm sure we all can agree that you will become a good safe driver. Just a reminder. When you are thinking about or expressing your gratitude for all the fine things your parents have done for you, don't forget to include that they will also be seeing the cost of their auto insurance just about double.
A story and not a lesson in case you wonder about insurance rates on young drivers. Once a year or so, we have a report of a local teenager in a fatal accident who probably would have survived unharmed wearing the seatbelt. Yesterday, I think I saw the next potential victim. I was on an errand on a rural highway just out of town when I noticed that an approaching car had what first appeared to be a bicycle upright on a trunk rack. When the car got closer, I could see that it was actually a young man standing on the floor of the back seat of the car with his body extending upright through the rear driver side window. He waved as we passed. I had the thought that on my return I might find the rescue squad retrieving his remains from the highway. Not that brain damage would be an issue as, of course, that requires a brain in the first place. Nothing happened this time.
Clear sky and cool temperatures here today. June in Wisconsin can be wonderful. Tomorrow I'm shooting trains in Rochelle.
"We have met the enemy and he is us." Pogo Possum "We have met the anemone... and he is Russ." Bucky Katt "Prediction is very difficult, especially if it's about the future." Niels Bohr, Nobel laureate in physics
Good morning everyone.
How about a Supreme topping pizza with salmon meat as part of the topping?
Sacto, you can have it on your half of the supreme. I'll stick to conventional please.
Got to do alittle train watching this morning down near Beverly Yard- not much happening, though, thanks to M/W folks working on a new crossover/interlocking with the Cedar Rapids spur line east of the yard.
Off to one last graduation party, where I have agreed to help the father cook.
blhanel wrote: Sacto, you can have it on your half of the supreme. I'll stick to conventional please.Got to do alittle train watching this morning down near Beverly Yard- not much happening, though, thanks to M/W folks working on a new crossover/interlocking with the Cedar Rapids spur line east of the yard. Off to one last graduation party, where I have agreed to help the father cook.
Those M/W crews always mess things up for us railfans, don't they?
Have fun at the party.
I just got back from the movies. I saw "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End". It was excellent and full of action, so if anyone hasn't seen it yet, I highly recommend seeing it. Also, sit through the credits, because there is one last scene at the very end, after all of the credits have ended.
Time for bed. Tomorrow looks warm, muggy, and possibly stormy by afternoon. A perfect summer day.
That is a good flick. The fiancee and I saw it a while back and we liked it. A bit longish tho...but still worth it. The best part is when LOL just kidding!
Good pizza tonite CW, like always! Thanks for everything you do! Time for bed and then tomorrow it's roto tiller duty again! WOO HOO!
A good Sunday morning to one and all. Sunday Brunch of your choice on the warmer bar - it'll be there all morning for those with Sunday plans.
I'm about to hit the shower and head back down for the railroad. Got there yesterday and was informed that, due to a shortage of crew, I was to sign on as a trainman. Official First Day on the Job - I think I did OK. I did all of the runarounds - the most demanding part of the job. I know the mistakes I made (none critical - mostly procedural stuff) and will be striving to get better.
The railroad also did a railfan run yesterday. I wasn't on it, but did stick around for their return. There are even pictures in some people's collections now of me flagging the crossing (although I'm pretty sure they were shooting the station.
That's a sidelight of the runarounds - the roar of the shutters as the locomotive passes the train almost drowns out the engine....
Have a great day!
Good Sunday morning, everyone! Larry, thanks so much for fixing breakfast this morning. Larry, I'm sure you'll have another great day on the railroad.
I'm not going to be around this afternoon, but I have SUNDAY DINNER started in the Crock Pots: roast, taters, carrots, onion. In another Crock Pot, you will find green beans w/diced tomatos Italian. In the fridge are cole slaw, potato salad, garden salad, Caesar salad. And in the cooler, you will find dessert: cherry, chocolate, and strawberry cheesecakes, along with chocolate cake under the cake cover on the counter.
Everyone have a great day, and be careful, whatever your plans are today.
Larry and Cw thanks for breakfast and supper.we got back late from dayton last night.hey carl we did see a up/sp patched combo taking a powder river train east but a little late to call you.
....The start of a perfect weather day here in central Indiana....That is, if one doesn't care if we don't get any rain....Seems we're not going to for at least 4 or 5 days when it just "might".....
So dry. Humidity is low {for Indiana}, and bright sunshine and temps to get to about 80 today. My yard is nice and smooth as I mowed again yesterday but it is getting it's brown areas....
I'm grabbin' me a plate and headin' to the patio if anyone wants to join me.
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.