Let's shop during a tornado

[Peppergirl]

Last year, we had a tornado warning. I supervise in a call center and probably 5 of the 8 currently on staff were in the surrounding areas.

I told all my employees to take appropriate cover (myself included) and I changed the outgoing message to reflect that hold times may be longer since there was dangerous weather and that the employees were taking safety precautions.

Yeah, I'm sure you guys see where this is going. The 2 or 3 agents who were NOT in the immediate area, and therefore didn't seek cover, were bombarded with calls and people whining about the hold time. Yes, despite being told (verbally and via the hold message) about the tornados touching down where most of the agents were living/working.

In fact, I had to sit in my basement manning my damned Blackberry - answering panicked emails as I waited to learn my fate.

Assholes.

[Lace Neil Singer]

So glad that flood warnings is the most I have to deal with. O.o Oh yeah, and the occasional heavy snowfall in the winter that makes people go crazy stocking up.

[BeenThereDoneThat]

Here in Florida, especially in spring and summer, we have quite a lot of severe thunderstorms, many tornado watches and some tornado warnings/funnel clouds/touchdowns. It's a little bit hard to get anything done if you stay in your house all season but of course, if you don't HAVE to be out and you can see the storm clouds approaching, perhaps you should check the TV weather reports and the many, many websites that have time-lapse Doppler radar maps. Sometimes the storms do crop up rather quickly, and of course if you are in a building with few or no windows you might have no idea.

All that being said, I have two personal stories to relate:

Back in the 90s sometime I was at a supermarket by my house. I tend to take my time when food shopping, so it's possible I was in there a while but hard to say on that particular occasion. In any event, supermarkets are not known for having a lot of windows...when I got up to the register I could see a lot of wind and very dark clouds outside. I started hoping I'd get to my car (at least) before all hell broke loose. Didn't happen. A sudden, HUGE wind gust absolutely blew open the automatic doors to the parking lot (I think at the time they were the kind that swung in, not the sliding kind), sending said wind and some small pieces of debris flying into those of us up front. Cue lots of yelling and screaming. One person thought they saw a swirling pile of leaves go by, so it COULD have been a weak tornado. Fortunately I don't think anyone was hurt, but it sure was unsettling!

The second time was probably in the early 2000s. My husband and I were at the local warehouse store on a weekend day, and again, we tend to spend a lot of time in there when we go. When we came out it was raining hard and windy...so we sprinted to the car, loaded our stuff as fast as possible and drove straight home, only a couple of miles. Later that day I heard (not sure how) that that very same store was hit by a weak tornado only about 5 minutes after we left. FIVE MINUTES. It managed to do a good bit of damage, though it only hit a corner of the store. I can't remember if there were any injuries but fairly certain no one was killed. Even so, we couldn't believe how close we came to being there when it happened.

Epilogue: When my parents still lived in NJ and my then-roomie and I went up to visit, we all went to see the movie "Twister". My dad commented on the way out, "If I ever saw clouds that black I'd be down in the cellar ASAP!" My roomie and I laughed and said well...in Florida we see them several times a week...and there are no cellars! My parents ended up moving down here anyway...LOL.

[Food Lady]

Oh yeah--I forgot about Floridians not having cellars or basements. I don't get that, because you have as may or more bad storms as we do. Maybe it's something about the type of soil.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Oh yeah--I forgot about Floridians not having cellars or basements. I don't get that, because you have as may or more bad storms as we do. Maybe it's something about the type of soil.

I think the bigger threat in Florida is hurricanes, and for those you don't want to be underground due to flooding rains.

[Mike Taylor]

Oh yeah--I forgot about Floridians not having cellars or basements. I don't get that, because you have as may or more bad storms as we do. Maybe it's something about the type of soil.

It's the soil primarily. Not the sort of thing you put a basement in when the weather gets really wet unless you're willing to put down a LOT of concrete, a really elaborate sump pump system-- AND you live at the top of a hill. Then there's those of us whose altitude above sea level can be measured in inches.

[BeenThereDoneThat]

Yep. It's the water table. Unless you really build up underneath the facility first, a basement would basically be a (really nasty) indoor swimming pool.

[downforit2008]

That would be a nice scene to add to any movie on the end of the world! Preferably a scene in the movie "2012" where L.A. is going down. Add a scene where some soccer-mommy in a minivan pulls up in the middle of a crumbling parking lot to a Walmart. She adjusts her mirror and notices downtown Los Angeles and the surrounding areas either collapsing into a bottomless void or sinking into the Pacific.
She shrugs and thinks, "Nah, I came here to buy some SHOES and a purse to match, and this store better be open to give me some service because I pay their salary!"

[KatherineB]

^^

And then, just for all of us poor CSers, there is another scene of her car being dragged beneath the water right next to the 'evacuate now' sign...

[wolfie]

I moved to a region where blizzards and hurricanes were common.

You moved to a Dairy Queen in New Orleans?

[protege]

Yep. It's the water table. Unless you really build up underneath the facility first, a basement would basically be a (really nasty) indoor swimming pool.

Cape May (NJ) is like that too. Many of the buildings don't have basements. If they do, it's because the first floor is elevated a bit, and the 'basement' is maybe only a foot or two below ground. Any deeper, and keeping the water out is a problem. I have been in that town when hurricanes have come through, and when bad storms have hit. Usually, such things mean lots of lightning and wind...with no real damage. Still, I do know that you avoid the beach if the sky starts getting dark. Wide open spaces mean that you're a prime target for lightning otherwise!