Have you ever heard of a derecho?

[pondgardener]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/weather/ ... li=BBnb7Kz

Colorado has had some high winds to go along with the high heat. I'm looking forward to Tuesday when snow is forecast above 7000 feet.

[worth1]

We had something like this in Alaska and for the life of me cant remember what it was called.
It would be 30 below zero F one day and the next it would be way above 40F for a day or two.
All the snow would melt and ice would start sliding off the roof tops, very dangerous.
I would be outside in flip flops Tee shirt and shorts at 30 and 40 degrees F.

[EdieJ]

Derechos are ultra-strong straight line winds. The kind that bring down trees, shut down electricity and blow barn roofs off (thankfully the next-door neighbor's not ours. His was just for hay, ours had a horse!) They are maybe not as bad as a twisting tornado but still very dangerous. If they're predicting that for your area, tie down everything you can!

[pepperhead212]

I heard that term before, but not recently. It's probably something that has happened in a lot of these areas where a lot of damage is caused, but by straight line wind, as no tornado occurs.

[ddsack]

Have not heard that term, but have lived through several instances of straight line winds during severe thunderstorms that took down many large trees. The last time was about five years ago around the 3rd of July, took down over 1/3 of our 15 acres of mixed hardwoods and pines, the electric power was out for at least three days during hot weather. Expecting storms in a few hours here, hope the winds stay within a more normal range.

[karstopography]

Looked up the word and meaning. We do have storm events that fit the criteria. Around here, these big, self perpetuating storms often find their genesis in Central or North Texas and then grow to covering hundreds or even thousands of square miles generally rolling towards the coast. A solid, bow shaped arc of damaging winds and rough weather. These aren’t really associated with a weather front, just sort of a weird spontaneous, self sustaining monster of bad weather. Late April, May and June is prime time for them here. We’ve mostly had near misses on these this year.

[bower]

I have never seen but only read about these, wow! That is fierce, pondgardner! Hope you (and your garden) are staying safe.

[brownrexx]

I heard this term for the first time last week. Before that I only ever heard about straight line winds. Sometimes I wonder how weather people keep using new words that I have never heard of before. I am sure that these words existed but were just never used.

Do you know what grauples are? Another new word for me in the last few years. It is snow pellets or soft sleet. Weird.

[Cole_Robbie]

My area had one in 2009. It is also called an inland hurricane. Power out for several days. I remember little pieces of torn tree leaves splattered everywhere from the wind.

[KathyDC]

Oh yes. We had one here maybe 2-3 years ago, along with delightful things called "microbursts" -- in my case, it created crazy amounts of hail and one of these "microbursts" stripped a bunch of tomatoes off of a few of my plants. Grrrrr!

However, the hail storm was something else to watch...

[pondgardener]

I have never seen but only read about these, wow! That is fierce, pondgardner! Hope you (and your garden) are staying safe.

I am about 100 miles south of Denver, so we missed the worst of it, although the wind blew a few things around.

[Cole_Robbie]

When I was in high school, a storm ripped the roof off the gym. It also picked up a few cars and dropped them a hundred or so yards away. That was a "microburst" and not a tornado, according to the national weather service.

[worth1]

We had a tornado go right by the school when I was in 11th grade.
Everyone ran out to see it.
It was a crazy curly long haired blonde girl (no joke) that ran out first and the rest of the school including teachers followed.
So much for shelter in place.

[pondgardener]

I cringed a little when I watched this news clip of a man impaled by a tree limb during the Denver area's wild wind storm last week.

https://kdvr.com/news/local/littleton-m ... d-by-tree/

[bower]

Trees are one good reason to stay indoors when it's stormy.

[PhilaGardener]

We've been experiencing these in SE PA, most recent round about two weeks ago. Lots of damage in local pockets - mostly trees down but they take the power lines down when they go! I don't remember hearing this term before a few years ago.