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or, how I spent a Mardi Gras evening... we've had some big thunderstorms here this week, had a tornado watch tonight.
All of a sudden I heard this loud banging and thought my washer was off balance, but no... two friends of my son were at a window, in the thunderstorm, just to scare my kid by banging on the window. they had walked a mile in a storm to get here.
but wait... it starts before that with two huge dogs who were out in the rain and who decided to be my best friends and come into the house when I picked up my other son maybe ten minutes earlier. they were circling my car and my son (with aspergers) was freaked out, so I got out of the car and got the dogs over on my side of the car and told him to go inside... which he did. then I did. Then the dogs tried but didn't.
the dogs were still hanging out at my front door when my son's friends arrived, one of whom was carrying a flashlight that he used to try to see if the dogs had tags. Oh yeah, these were HUGE dogs. Like St. Bernard/German Shepherd mix. I thought one of them had a piece of meat in his mouth, but it turns out it was just his tongue. bleech. back to the tags - no tags, but collars. they belong to someone.
my son's friends were leaving when I walked into my dining room and saw what I thought was the one guy's flashlight. Thought he was shining it into the window -another joke banging on the window. There was a sound, too, like when spaceships hover in b-movies.
so I went to the kitchen to see where the kid was... instead there were flames in my back yard! big ones, like if you built a campfire to last for the night. so I went outside to see what I could see, which was nothing. it's dark and raining. hard. There was a metallic smell in the air. I told my kids to get on shoes and clothes to leave if needed because the fire was right next to my neighbor's wooden fence. The fire just kept going and occasionally it would flare up. The spaceship hover hum was always there. That's when I knew it was a fire from a live electrical wire.
I called 911 then heard the girl next door screaming "fire!" so I ran over to her house, thinking the fire might be in her yard too.I didn't know if her parents were home or not. But she was just standing on her porch yelling "fire! someone help us!" (she's in middle school.) The dogs followed me to her place and, as far as I know, they are still hanging out on her front porch.
Immediately after I called 911 the fire stopped. I thought maybe the fire dept or electrical co. had disabled the line.
I heard the firetruck on its way so I just stood outside in the rain until they arrived. While I was waiting, I saw that a wire was hanging off a utility pole that stands between my house and the neighbors.... and looked back further and saw a pine tree in their yard had fallen and taken the electrical line with it. I thought it was a line before, but I thought it was coming from the other end of the yard where a transformer regularly assists squirrels and chipmunks in acts of hari kari that also take out all the lights on two streets, at least.
oh yeah, the tree that hit my house was resting against the exterior wall. Right up at my bedroom window. (I looked and so far, don't see any interior damage...)
so the firefighters got out with their big flashlights... ahem.. anyway, they immediately saw the line and kept telling each other, careful, don't step on the live wire... and this was right where I had gone between my house and my neighbor's to make sure their daughter was okay. The firefighters said the fire went out because it finally blew a fuse or circuit or something. They said electricity was out all over town. (mine was still on.) So I told my oldest son to go find all the flashlights and make sure the batteries were good. I knew we would have plenty of candlelight, if nothing else.
The firefighers with their big flashlights said the fire might come back and I should watch for it. If it came back I should call for them again. I guess that means I'll stay up till the sun does? The wire is REALLY close to that wooden fence, and there is a line of jack pines along the fence too. They put up yellow crime scene tape, tying it to my plum and peach trees and a lilac.
so far no fire. The firefighter with... you know... called the electrical co. and said they would be here as soon as possible to cut down the tree TRUNK and get it off my house. And get the wire off the wet grass in the still pouring rain. ... But they also said it would be awhile because there are messes all over.
Now we have another tornado warning. I just heard a boom. -- just looked outside it don't know if it's firefighters or electrical repair people.
....back to this thread I started earlier.
When I wrote "I just heard a boom," I heard the hovercraft again and checked the backyard and the fire was worse. So I called 911 again. Then the electrical company truck pulled up and then all my electricity went off. In the dark, I watched a guy go after the wire on a cherry picker. just sat here because it was too dark to do much of anything.
and now the electricity is back and the wire fire is out. this was one strange night.
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