Mother Nature Always Wins

Fortunately no one was home when the storm hit. In New Jersey, we always think we are safe from just about every kind of natural disaster - no earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, mud slides but every once in a while even we can't escape Mother Nature's wrath.

I guess we aren't the only ones getting the strange weather considering that just two weeks ago tornadoes hit Brooklyn. It took us awhile but finally we have pictures from Friday's hail storm.

I've been wondering, how fast does a piece of ice have to be traveling to put a hole completely through a barely ripe pepper. I've been tempted to take a pepper out of my fridge and start throwing things at it except for 1) I am smart enough to know I have bad aim and I can't throw more than 45 mph and 2) I am pretty sure Christina (my wife) will start to really worry if I am crazy. Seriously, the pepper in the bottom corner of the picture isn't more than four or five inches long and it has a golf ball-sized hole through it - how does that happen?

The power of Mother Nature is pretty unbelievable until you see it firsthand. I remember a few years ago when I was working as a reporter at the Hunterdon County Democrat, my very sceptical assignment editor sent me to check out a guy who swore his property got hit by a tornado. We both rolled our eyes and off I went to what I thought would be a fruitless drive through Clinton Twp.

When I got to the house there must have been a dozen trees laying on the ground. Each tree had trunks that were at least 2-3 ft. around. Some were snapped like match sticks, others were uprooted. It looked like Paul Bunyan had just walked through the backyard in a really bad mood. The storm touched down in a roughly 20 ft. track and then disappeared. The neighbors' properties were untouched and no one else around the country reported anything strange.

The whole things reminds me of the pictures you see of straw stuck in the side of trees during huge tornadoes. Even though the hail storm seems incredible strangers things happen - and apparently happen often (they even have a hotline to report objects that have been carried long distances - not kidding).

Damage report: we won't get to enjoy that many more peppers or tomatoes, we won't get to see our beautiful water lotus bloom this year, the irises will need to be cut back but considering everything, it really isn't a big deal. We were upset to hear our neighbor's who have a hundred acre farm had much more severe damage; they lost almost all their vegetables, watermelon, and orchard crops. Below are some more pictures.

Poor Irises Need a Haircut

Oh No Tomatoes