Earlier this week, there was a wind storm in Utah. At one point, the wind reached around 70 miles per hour (~113km per hour) at home. In some parts of the state, people experienced winds over 90mph (~145km/hr). Of course, that's about the speed of a category 1 hurricane. I was at work when the impending wind blew through the area. So, I had the family move loose items inside and secure whatever else they could.
By the time I left work in the morning, the weather was chilly. Lo and behold, the temperature was in the 40's in overnight. The day before, we were still experiencing hot summer weather.
The aftermath varied from house to house. For the most part, we had a lot of debris. Nothing got uprooted and we didn't have neighbors' stuff flying into our space.
On the plus side, the smog that has been blocking the view of the mountains was gone. A few weeks ago, I've posted pictures of the orange sun. Part of that was due to the smog. The wild fires might have also contributed, but there was no scenic view for a while thanks to them.
Our power was in and out with some flickers in between, but there was no significant outage. The internet, however, was down for us for a day and half. Even the 4G wasn't working in my part of the city. I couldn't even get signal on my phone until I went outside of the main Salt Lake City area. Others in the neighborhood weren't as lucky. Some of them had power and internet outages for more than a day. Imagine trying to work from home under those conditions.
Heading into town, I saw the Comcast brigade and their vans about. I could see linemen as well fixing things up in the older parts of the city. It was definitely a busy day for those tradesmen.
Some of my coworkers couldn't make it into work for the rest of my 7 on because their homes suffered damages. Lucky for me, the volume of work was much lower around Labor Day. So, being "understaffed" was not a huge deal. The days before were horrendous as we were drowning in work. I actually had to go in early, and some of my coworkers stay late, to try to catch up. The overtime and holiday premium didn't seem worth it.
Utah weather tends to be temperamental when it comes to spring and fall. I remember my first year here back in '07 where it snowed in September. Then, the weather was in the 80's again until late October. Looks like the same pattern might hold up for this year too.
The temperature is already back on the warm side. Though, the chill is noticeable in the evenings now. So, it's not a bad idea to keep yourself covered so you don't wake up freezing in desert mornings.
