It certainly was a wild and windy night last night. Pretty much everyone awoke between 3:00 & 3:30 AM from the sound of the rain and the wind. There were power failures, fallen trees, fallen telephone polls, roofs blowing off and/or damaged, roads completely closed, rain and lots and lots of wind. In some places the wind was said to be hurricane strength and for some there was more damage from this storm than from our past two hurricanes. There are parts of the island that may not get their power back until Thursday or Friday and places where roads are still closed. On Oahu, the North Shore and the Leeward side were hit the hardest with the Windward side also suffering a lot of damage.

After the storm began, I was not able to go back to sleep. About 5 am, the local news came on. The first thing announced was “stay home” and “do not go out on the roads unless you have to”. Now wouldn’t that suggest that all the public schools would be closed?

At 5:30 the school closures began to be announced and then a few minutes later the cable went out. I got out my mini radio and tuned in. I had flashes of my childhood days when my family would all gather around the radio and wait to hear if our school would be closed when we had a big snowstorm. No, I am not too old what we did not have TV, but the school closures were always announced on the radio. All the schools nearby were always closed but rarely was our school closed. I think I learned my alphabetizing skills from listening to the list of schools as they were announced. If our school was not announced as closed the first time around, we would refuse to get dressed, hoping that it would be announced the second or third time around. My brother and sister and I were always so bummed once they passed over the letter “N”. My mom was always thrilled!

This morning 83 public schools and tons more private schools were closed, but not my school. I guess I should count my lucky blessings. Although I spent 40 minutes moving one mile in traffic, my school was not damaged and my part of the island only suffered minor damage.

The storm that hit us last night is now headed for the Big Island. There is even a blizzard watch posted for Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa! A flash flood watch also remains in effect through Thursday for the entire state.

The link I posted for The Daily Dish blog with a pretty good description of the storm and pictures and comments from many around the island no longer works. The photo below of a huge tree uprooted in Kapiolani Park is from the Honolulu Advertiser site (link also no longer works).

I feel for all those in Washington State and Oregon right now. At least we didn’t have the flooding they are dealing with.