Holy Sh*t, I think I just witnessed my first tornado
 

was getting warnings on the tv all night but didn't pay much attention to it as I live in downtown austin. went to bed around 12:00 tonight. around 12:30 I hear pretty heavy hail dropping. Next thing I hear is a freight train sound. so I ran over to the window (I live on the top floor of an apartment complex that has a view of downtown). Within the span of 15 seconds my view of downtown was blotted out by an insane combination of wind/rain/hail - I'm mean completely blotted out. the roof of the apartment across the way started lifting up and rattled for the next 10 minutes. And then as quickly as it came, it was gone.

texas weather is freakin nuts !!

It's God's way of warning you, Doc.

Can you post a pic of the view from your apartment, mate? Can you see the University of Texas Tower?

Holy shit, Doc!

My cousing used to live at the intersection of Garden and Waller, right across from the Holiday Inn off I-35.

How close do you live to that intersection?

Glad you're OK, Bro!

-Alex

thanks dude. yeah, I'm fine, but have to admit that last night was the very first time I was ever really frightened. I mean I've been through some nasty hurricanes in new england, but I have never seen the weather change as quickly and as violently as it did last night. The crazy thing is that it was localized to the downtown area. Most of my coworkers who live outside the city were like "it wasn't too bad!" Today I drove around and saw some good size damage around town. A lot of large trees down. I saw many, many cars with their windshields smashed in because of the hail. I heard it was estimated that some wind gust were up around 90mph.

I can only imagine what the folks in oklahoma must go through when those freakin F2+ twisters touch down :(

this guy has got some neat photos of the lightening from last night.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8898332@N07/

Doc, I downloaded so many of those photos to use as desktop wallapaper, they are awesome! It will be my reminder that hurricane season (storm season) starts on the first of June.

How may peopled died out there from that storm, Doc? How was the area downtown affected?

that's right, being a floridian, you get some pretty nasty weather yourself!
luckily no deaths that I know up. just a whole lot of uprooted trees and smashed windshields.