Dallas Tornado Tonight
Just got a message from son's school that classes are canceled while they assess the tornado damage to his high school. Crazy. Thank god it was during the weekend and there were no classes. Don't have any info on whether there was anyone in there or not yet.
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The worst flying experience I ever had was on a 3 row regional flight from the giant airport in Dallas to Nogales Arizona - a rushed takeoff lineup attempting to get out ahead of one of those Texas tornado and lightning monsoon style storms...
The smaller local transfer planes were stacked up and taking off with short separation in an attempt to clear jet airliners out before weather closed us in...
When we finally cleared for takeoff the lighting and shear force driving lines of heavy sheet rain were rolling into the airport like an artillery barrage - the pilot must have been military cause he pushed the throttles to Max power and we did a short distance high angle emergency power take off - the plane jumping up and climbing through the damp heavy air clawing it's way out in the path of the storm front...
The plane was at a noticeable up angle and it felt like we were pulling G's pushing is back into the seats...
We were hit by lightning no less than 3 times during initial VSTOL - including ball lightning that stood your hair up and glowed pink inside the plane - dropping the emergency air masks and tripping the interior lights off - one hit on a wing that made a loud bang like a flak tower AA round bursting just outside.
People were vomiting and screaming - one lady floated out of her seat and hit the overhead - dropping her back I to the narrow seat at a hard bad angle...
Small loose objects went astray - we went up and down 3 times like hitting the mother of all potholes...
We diverted to AL alternate airport for landing.
The storm really tore the town and airport up.
One of the worst weather events I have ever bore witness to.
Mike0 -
That's a hell of an experience. Must have been a while ago cause now if there is lightning within 1 mile of the airport, everything gets shut down for 20 minutes. 0
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