75 Degrees In St. Louis On Nov 16Th

[ColdWaterFshr]

Gavin, Hoff and I fished the Big yesterday. Wind at our backs the first mile or so, then we went around a bend and it was the opposite. Got a good work-out, but the fishing was lousy, though Gavin caught a few dinks on the Ned rig. I think I only caught 2 fish total.

Big thunder head rolled over us and pelted us for about 10 minutes, but it was beautiful. Never seen sheets of rain whip so fast across the water, and then a few minutes later all the tree limbs were glistening like they were ice when the sun hit them. Spectacular. Gavin's bloody mary mix might've helped a little too.

[Mitch f]

Gavin's bloody mary mix might've helped a little too.

Awesome, Sounds like a good time! I don't like mine too spicy though....gives me too much heartburn!

[ColdWaterFshr]

It was a fun time. Floated a section of the Big i hadn't in many years and fell in love with it all over again.

The problem with Gavin's bloody mary's isn't the spice . . . . no, the problem is he goes a little heavy on the "active" ingredient. Pow!

[Mitch f]

It was a fun time. Floated a section of the Big i hadn't in many years and fell in love with it all over again.

The problem with Gavin's bloody mary's isn't the spice . . . . no, the problem is he goes a little heavy on the "active" ingredient. Pow!

Paul Dallas used to bring a gallon jug full and never missed a cast!

[moguy1973]

Amazing photo of one of the tornado tracks across a farm and field in northern IL

[Gavin]

It was a good time. Tree limbs flying everywhere.

[Old plug]

GOOD TIME????? Those things are never a good time. We have had 4 small ones close by in the 25 yrs we been here. Even the small ones can lift a 2 stall dock boats and all and throw it in your yard. I have seen that on several occasions. Few years ago we set here one evening with 3 tornados on the ground SW of us. I did not think we had a chance of avoiding one. I died one hit Camdenton. The third turned into a F-3 and went up near Hwy 5. It came in Wrench's back door and wiped him out like somebody had come in there with a truck and carried everything away. Maybe he could get on here and describe that thing. He watched his house rise up right around him and just disappear.

[gramps50]

Your right. Moguy that is an amazing picture. Sent from my GT-N5110 using Tapatalk

[Gavin]

It is a trade off...Enjoy the amazing power of nature or sit on the couch and watch football. I know which one I like better.

[Al Agnew]

A tornado went down my street in Desloge when I was 5 years old, damaged our house, totally removed and disappeared an unattached garage full of tools and stuff behind the house, nothing left but a concrete slab. I'm sure people looted all the automotive tools (my dad was a mechanic), but the only thing he ever found from the garage was his vice, still bolted to a long splinter of wood that came from his workbench, a half block away. It killed several people on our street and demolished the grade school two blocks away, fortunately it was after school hours and the kids weren't there.

That tornado is one of the first memories that I can still recall. Mom realized it was coming, and not wanting to be by herself with my big sister and me, she grabbed us and ran to the next door neighbors' house, where we headed to the basement just in time. The sounds were indescribable, and I remember a big goldfish bowl that was on a shelf next to the basement door leading to the outside suddenly lifting up (the door was a screen door) and crashing to the floor. The other thing I really remember was emerging from their basement afterwards and looking toward our house and seeing a tree rammed into the screened in back porch.

My dad was at work five miles away, and watched it go by, knowing it had come close to our house. He took off for home, and could only drive within ten blocks of the house because of downed trees, powerlines, and debris in the streets. He parked and ran the rest of the way, leaping live wires and clambering over trees, and reached us in what seemed like minutes after it was over. My aunt got there no more than ten minutes later, from a little farther away.

Since that tornado, I've ALWAYS had frequent tornado dreams.

I've had two close calls since, both coming home from fishing trips. The first time, a tornado went across Hwy. 67 south of Farmington as I was driving north coming back from Wappapello Lake, passing right in front of me no more than two miles away, but it was raining so hard I wasn't sure it was a tornado until I got to its path, a swath through the woods of broken off trees (funny how tornados seem to be more likely to snap tree trunks than to uproot the trees). The second time, I was on Big River near Desloge, fishing from an inner tube boat I'd made by putting two big inner tubes under a 4X8 sheet of marine plywood, with a hole in the plywood corresponding the the center of one inner tube, where you stuck your feet down with swim fins on to propel yourself. I had an old '63 Ford Fairlane, and the inner tube boat fit in the trunk with about half of it hanging out. I'd shove it in the trunk as far as it would go, then lash the trunk lid down on top of it with clothesline rope.

The fishing was spectacular before the storm hit, so I stayed longer than I probably should have. Thunder and lightning were getting really close as I finally loaded up the inner tube boat and took off for home, but I couldn't resist stopping on a high spot and watching the storm come. It seemed to hang just to the west, with spectacular lightning, but then it came on and I drove on toward home. I stopped in downtown Desloge, where some people I knew were out in the street watching the storm, and then it was really close and looked really bad, and I still had ten blocks to drive for home. I got no more than a block when it hit, and there were limbs flying and rain so hard I couldn't see, so I pulled in under the awning of a gas station. As soon as I parked beneath the awning, it blew away. The rope holding the trunk lid snapped, the lid flew open, and my inner tube boat blew out to crash flat against the gas pumps. I was debating whether to get out of the car and look for a ditch (which I knew you were supposed to do in a tornado if you're in a vehicle), when the wind slackened. As it turned out, the tornado itself barely missed me but wiped out a trailer court a half mile away, killing several people.