"Severe Weather Threat: Forecast, Warnings "
"Typically at the northern edge of excessive heat in the summer months, you'll find severe thunderstorms. The current setup is no exception. A powerful derecho developed Friday over Indiana and marched eastward across Ohio, the Virginias and into Maryland and Delaware, causing widespread wind damage with gusts over 90 miles per hour in some cases. To view photos of Friday evening's storm damage, click here.
Saturday brings a continued threat of severe weather at the northern edge of the heat wave, stretching from Iowa to the Mid-Atlantic. Another round of widespread damaging winds may materialize in these hard-hit areas. A second area of severe weather is possible for the central and northern Plains, but those storms may be more isolated in nature. "
I've lived in Ohio or New York all my life. I know about tornado weather. My two oldest, born in Ohio, automatically keep one eye on the sky under certain conditions. But this thing called a derecho is something else. A line of thunderstorms that reaches across an entire state, traveling at 65MPH with winds of 60-95MPH that hits out of a clear blue sky! Oh, and for the piece de resistance, spins off tornadoes randomly?
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for sure if I was in that thing! Wow!
You can't imagine how powerless you feel watching through your window while the trees all around you are being bent parallel to the ground by the wind, and there's no place to go to get away from it. (my tiny cabin doesn't have a basement)
The aftermath left acres and acres of forest land with trees all snapped off at the same height, like some giant hand had simply swept across and knocked them all over. I've lived in a tornado zone almost all my life, but a derecho is way more scary.
Everywhere you go around here, you can still see broken and uprooted trees from last year. Some landscapes will never look the same. I'd never heard of a derecho until last year - now I'm wondering how many more will come through as the weather patterns continue to change. 
Hector International Airport in Fargo clocked winds of over 100mph. 
except for sometimes in the mountains. No tornados, either. Although I wonder if that will change as our climate changes...
I don't remember what the winds in last year's derecho in my area were clocked at. The shock of seeing all the devastation around me kinda froze my brain when it came to registering and remembering the actual statistics. I'll have to look it up.
