# East Coast Derecho **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 5, 2020, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/east-coast-derecho/855087 "2020-06-05T04:02:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/east-coast-derecho/855087/1 "2020-06-05T04:02:16Z")
I’d never even heard the word “derecho” before; then yesterday one cut off my power for 28 hours. > **[Rare derecho kills 4, cuts power to more than half of a million people in...](https://www.accuweather.com/en/severe-weather/derecho-kills-3-cuts-power-across-mid-atlantic/752596)** > > A weather phenomenon known as an "inland hurricane" swept across the mid-Atlantic on Wednesday, causing widespread damage and leaving hundreds of thousands in the dark. ---
**Author:** ![aurora\_maire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aurora_maire/32/328_2.png) [@aurora\_maire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aurora_maire)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/east-coast-derecho/855087/2 "2020-06-05T05:52:15Z")
I learned what a derecho was on July 22, 2003 when one hit Memphis. Fortunately, I slept through it because a neighbor told me later that the huge oak tree in my front yard was swaying. The winds were over 100 miles an hour. 70% of Memphis lost power. Hundreds of trees were knocked down. I’ll never forget looking out the window and thinking Godzilla had stomped through my neighborhood. I thought “that’s going to be a pain in the ass for someone to clean up” only to realize “oh, shit, that’s me!”, having just bought my house 6 weeks earlier. I didn’t have power for a week and I was one of the lucky ones. The event is referred to locally as [Hurricane Elvis](https://https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memphis_Summer_Storm_of_2003). ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/east-coast-derecho/855087/3 "2020-06-05T12:15:39Z")
I haven’t heard of the term “derecho”, but apparently the Canadian term is “plough wind” (which I have heard of). ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/east-coast-derecho/855087/4 "2020-06-05T13:07:16Z")
A derecho did a lot of damage (and knocked out power for a lot of people) in the mid-Atlantic area in 2012 [June 2012 North American derecho - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_2012_North_American_derecho) ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/east-coast-derecho/855087/5 "2020-06-05T14:32:48Z")
Some friends of mine were camping on a tiny island in the middle of Indian Lake in the Adirondacks in the 1990s when a derecho came though and caused all kinds of destruction. I can’t remember the exact year, but it might be one of the [ones in 1995](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_wave_of_1995_derecho_series#The_Ontario-Adirondacks_Derecho_of_July_14_and_15) ---
**Author:** ![Hermitian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hermitian/32/470_2.png) [@Hermitian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermitian)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/east-coast-derecho/855087/6 "2020-06-05T14:39:57Z")
> [@Andy\_L](#): > > A derecho did a lot of damage (and knocked out power for a lot of people) in the mid-Atlantic area in 2012 [June 2012 North American derecho - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_2012_North_American_derecho) > [@](#): > > It resulted in a total of 22 deaths, millions of power outages across the entire affected region, and a damage total of US$2.9 billion which exceeded that of all but the top 25 Atlantic tropical cyclones. Yep, that was the one that put the word on the map for me. And it was so hot afterward with no AC! That made me wish I had a basement to retreat to. ---
**Author:** ![VOW](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/vow/32/3043_2.png) [@VOW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VOW)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/east-coast-derecho/855087/7 "2020-06-05T14:40:36Z")
Good Scrabble word! ~VOW ---
**Author:** ![P-man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/p-man/32/3606_2.png) [@P-man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/P-man)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/east-coast-derecho/855087/8 "2020-06-05T15:00:08Z")
> [@Hermitian](#): > > Yep, that was the one that put the word on the map for me. And it was so hot afterward with no AC! That made me wish I had a basement to retreat to. I remember that one well. I was with some friends in the upstairs part of a local bar. No one thought to look out the window. My wife called and said, “have you looked out the window?” I hadn’t, and had no idea anything was going on. It had been sunny last time I looked. One by one, everyone else’s wife called. By the time we settled up and left (we had to pay cash, because the credit card system was knocked out) it wasn’t even raining. During the short drive home I saw a car that had been hit by a falling tree, 3 blocks from our house. We lost power for several days, and the temps were close to 100. Our house is in the shade, so it does take a while for it to get really hot. Ms. P had already planned a trip to visit friends, so she left soon after the power went out. She was in, of all places, Seattle. The temperatures were in the seventies. She’s the one who actually enjoys the heat! A friend who lives a few blocks away eventually got their power back and invited us to stay with them. I took the boys over, but elected to stay home with the dog and cats. That evening, while I was getting the cats’ food ready, everything came back on. We’d been without power so long that at first I didn’t realize what was happening. One other thing I remember was that the boys and I had already planned to go to all three games of the Nationals-Giants series. The Nats swept the eventual World Series champs.