DALLAS, TX ICE STORM 2013

[Rat Rod]

So last week we had a high of almost 80 degrees and within a matter of 24 hours, we went from bike riding weather to temps in the teens and twenties along with a big ice storm. The majority of the precip. occured on Thursday night and today we are sitting in the 20s with no chance of melting for a day or two.

I know people up north see worse, but down here all they do to treat the roads is throw some sand on overpasses and bridges. Last night there was a 12 mile stretch of I-35 between Sanger and the OK border that they had to shut down and the National Guard spent the night rescuing people and taking them to shelters.

So here are a few shots of my street. Three of my neighbors had trees fall over...mostly those stupid Bradford Pear trees. The street is covered by a 1/2 inch thick sheet of solid ice and I'm pretty sure you could skate on it.

 

[Rockit!]

Time to go pull some sweeeet skids on your bike!

 

[CCR]

10" of snow out my front door dropped Thursday night, played in it yesterday with the boy... getting the Beast out later today

 

[kingfish254]

Looking forward to some Beast snow and ice pics.

 

[kentercanyon]

When the north wind blows, there's nothing between the north pole and Texas but a barbed wire fence.

 

[Rat Rod]

Here's a shot of that stretch of 1-35 that got shut down last night.

 

[aka_locojoe]

Makes for pretty pictures but that's abut it.

 

[patman73]

i hate the ice makes it hard for me to ride to the store , i live in texas !

 

[jerrykr]

You guys in Dallas and east of there got way more freezing rain than we did.
That's the worst possible.
You had the most trees down and most power outages.
Here, just west of the airport, we got about 2-3 inches of sleet.
Not good, but at least it did not hang up in the power lines to bring them down!

I tried out a POV GoPro video (first one for me) yesterday.
This walk was on the second day of the ice, and was a whole lot slicker to walk on than on Friday.



I'd do a few things differently next time.

.

 

[Rat Rod]

Cool video Jerry.

You're making me want a GoPro now.

 

[jerrykr]

Cool video Jerry.

You're making me want a GoPro now.

Thanks, been fun trying out new things with it, and learning the video edit process.

Santa might bring you one ... if you were Good all year!

 

[jerrykr]

Would you believe, I just sold a bike from a CL adv.
I stayed home from work because our street still looks like in the video!
I guess I priced it way too low!

 

[Rat Rod]

What are using to edit your videos?

Glad to see that you are using Vimeo...I prefer it over any other video host.

 

[ifitsfreeitsforme]

wow that's Texas? You got more ice than we did.

 

[Rat Rod]

Shot this photo of a hawk on our front bushes eating his lunch today. Probably not much to eat the past four days down here.

 

[jerrykr]

What are using to edit your videos?

Glad to see that you are using Vimeo...I prefer it over any other video host.

Yeah, I think the quality is slightly better than utube. $10 month does not seem like too much to pay. I also like their lessons.

I'm using Cyberlink Photodirector 11. (12 is out now).
Bit of a learning curve, but it has a lot of capability for under $100.
Would love to have started on Sony or Adobe, but $600 is a bit steep for my hobby level.

I also use www.vReveal.com ($49) to pre-process my clips prior to building the video.
trim, excellent image stabilization, and other enhancement features. Free trial download.
edit: whoa, did not realize vReveal is no longer.

I also like the free MS Windows Movie Maker Live.
Easy to figure out, and gets the first timer familiar with the basics of timelines, fades, etc.
It has quite a few good features, is quick and easy.

www.goproforums.com

and

www.goprofanatics.com

both have areas where they discuss video editing software.
kind of GoPro specific, but also good general knowledge.

I'm always looking to improve.
.

 

[jerrykr]

Shot this photo of a hawk on our front bushes eating his lunch today. Probably not much to eat the past four days down here.

View attachment 106

Wow. Very nice and sharp. Crop out the car and most of the background and you have a real winner!
.

 

[aka_locojoe]

Great video Jerry. Nice pic of the hawk Steve.

 

[user 135]

Cool pics of the ice. I will take cold cold like we have over ice storms.

 

[Rat Rod]

As far as I can tell, unless you have metal spikes on your tires and shoes, it's nearly impossible to get around in this stuff no matter where you live. I learned to drive in Michigan and driving in the snow is nowhere near what it's like driving on ice. You could be sitting at a stoplight totally stopped and all of a sudden the car just starts sliding to the left or right....ha ha.

I think the worst part is all of the broken trees and branches messing up all of the electricity for everyone. Thankfully we managed to avoid any power outages at my place, but we have friends just down the road who were without power for 24 hours. Some around the area have been without for four days!

We should be back in the 50s by the end of the week so there is relief in sight!