Severe storms yesterday afternoon

A severe thunderstorm passed through the area from northwest to southeast yesterday just as I was driving home.  WXYZ reports on what the storm did to the area to the north of me in Storms sock Oakland County.

Parts of Oakland County are cleaning up after a series of powerful storms slammed the area.

I left work hoping to drive in front of the storm.  That didn't work, as I was assuming that it woulld pass from west to east or southwest to northeast, as weather usually does around here.  Instead, I drove right into the teeth of the storm.

Over a distance of a quarter of a mile, I drove from dry to driving rain.  Another quarter mile and the rain was coming down in buckets.   A half mile after that, the streets were beginning to flood.  At that time, WDET broke in with a severe thunderstorm warning for Detroit because of the storm I was driving through.  The report included penny-sized hail, wind gusts up to 70 miles per hour, flash floods, and continuous air-to-ground lightning.  The winds didn't blow that hard and the hail never got bigger than tiny pellets, but the flooding and lightning were all around me.  I felt fortunate to come home safely.  After viewing the video above, I feel even more lucky that my power stayed on and that I didn't have to clean up any storm damage.

As for the weather right now, it's gorgeous.  I plan on walking downtown to run my errands, including getting my dogs licensed.  Here's to performing some of my civic responsibilities sustainably.