Tornado!

Last night the sirens went off at about 7:30PM.  Funnel clouds were sighted a few miles from us, but I'm not sure if they actually touched down.  Still, we had wind speeds of 60-70 mph.   And, sadly, a woman died in her car a few miles north of us.  A tree fell and crushed her.

The part of town featured in this video clip is less than three blocks from our house:
http://www.fox11online.com/weather/tour-of-neighborhood-storm-damage-in-shawano

We didn't have any damage to our property--just a few small branches littering the yard--but our next-door-neighbor lost part of his fence, his flagpole, and almost his motorcycle.

This HUGE tree limb came crashing down last night.

It tore away from the tree at a hollow spot.

This is how it looks this morning, after some clean-up.

The flag pole is horizontal--right above the garbage can.
(The garbage can had been righted by a neighbor already.)

Amazingly, the tree branches fell around the motorcycle.  

Not a scratch on it!

Since the tree branches were covering half of the street in front of Chuck's house, the guys from the city came to clear the road.  It was almost 10PM by that time, so Lydia and Samuel got out of bed to watch from the upstairs window.  The chainsaws were roaring, the truck was beeping and flashing, and the skid-steer loader was shoving the cut branches out of the way.  (I wish I'd had my video camera for that.)  So, the kiddos got to bed kind of late, but they wouldn't have been able to fall asleep with all of that racket anyway.  Needless to say, it was an eventful night!

This morning, Dave helped Chuck cut up the rest of the tree limb and haul it to the dump.  I'm not sure how many trips they made.  The went around and collected some other limbs and branches from our neighbors, too.

How much wood could a (wood) Chuck chuck?

Dave and Chuck chucked a LOT of wood!

Meanwhile, Lydia and Samuel made the best of it!

The kids are in front of our house.
Chuck's house is that way >>>.