"The storm has no eye, and its powerful winds come across in a line. That can cause widespread overall damage and smaller pockets of severe damage.
To be classified as a derecho by the National Weather Service, the storms must have wind gusts of 57 mph or greater and wind damage from the storm must span at least 400 miles."
There was a nasty one that went through Ottawa in May 2022. Devastated the power grid, trees, widespread roof damage. A big house near me lost a 30x60 piece of roof.
No power at my house for 2 weeks.
Do not anger the derecho spirits…repent!
It’s been over a year already? Goodness.
The storm ended up being the 6th most expensive natural desater in Canadian history https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/mobile/may-21-storm-ranked-6th-most-expensive-natural-disaster-in-canadian-history-ibc-1.5948666?referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fottawa.ctvnews.ca%2Fone-year-since-derecho-in-ottawa-an-east-end-councillor-reflects-1.6408070
@ickplant Fun fact: derecho has many meanings in spanish. One of them is “straight”. Not in the sense of sexual preference.
More like in the sense of follow directions.
Example: “Si usted camina derecho encontrará los baños”.
Which translates as “If you walk straight, you’ll see the restrooms”.Source: I’m a native spanish speaker.
That’s probably why they call those storms derecho, because they go straight. Also it gives a justification to learn a new language.I was guessing that was the case, thank you for confirming!
One of them knocked over my beehive tree and crushed our truck when I was little
Yikes, I’m sorry. I assume a “beehive tree” is a tree with a beehive on it? Do you get honey from that?
There was in fact honey inside but it was a wild beehive in a hollow maple tree next to the driveway.
That’s cool, I like bees. Sad that the derecho took them out.
Yea, I like honeybees. The next door neighbor noted there was thousands of dead bees on his deck, it seems they left the tree when it fell and got splattered against the side of the house.
Oh noooo, poor bees. I’m seriously going to plant a flowering plant in their honor this weekend. I was going to do it anyway, but now it’s to memorialize your bees.
Thanks!
The Midwest US had a big derecho that blew through a couple years ago and knocked over probably half the trees in my part of the state. Some communities were without power for weeks, it was a mess.
Damn, that’s wild. I’m in CO, and apparently we’ve only ever had one. It’s too dry here and the mountains break them up.
