One of the many hurricanes of this Atlantic 2020 hurricane season is headed our way here in late September.
Some days ago Hurricane TEDDY took form out in the exceptionally warm sub-tropical waters of the North Atlantic somewhere east and north of the Lesser Antilles of the Caribbean. Hot winds that blow in from Africa get most of these storms triggered. Curiously the South Atlantic very rarely sees such circular storms, almost never, in fact. Then TEDDY got all wound up and started marching NNW up the Atlantic. TEDDY gave Bermuda a glancing blow as it passed by, through some big waves up on its coral shores, and is now making itself felt along the Atlantic Coast of Nova Scotia. VERY, very big seas out there and plenty wind. From all forecasts we can see it looks as if the eye will come ashore east of Halifax. As these storms whirl about in an anti-clockwise fashion (for those of you grown up with digital watches this means that the top spins to the left and the bottom spins to the right) we are looking at very strong northerly winds in and around Lunenburg. While we can expect some consternation, this also means we should be spared the worst effects of this storm. The Eastern Shore will not be so fortunate. Calls for evacuation are out.
Sunny tropical Nova Scotia (just kidding about the ‘tropical’ part) is a peninsula, “une presque-isle”, or ‘almost an island’. The axis of Nova Scotia is tilted off from East/West about twenty five or thirty degrees with the western end a bit further south and the eastern end a bit further north. This means that the southern coast is a wall against South Easterly weather. As most harbours open up to the sea in the normal way, and we have many fine harbours along this coast, this means that we are pretty well exposed to the SE. So, a big storm packing strong SE winds and big SE swell can do some damage around here. From time to time we get a big storm that clears out the debris so to speak. Knocks down mature trees and tears up the shore to various degrees. The price of living in one of the most wonderful places in the world.
Here in Lunenburg we are geared up for the arrival of this here pesky hurricane. Swell making up a little here now in the late afternoon. Not much to see on the water yet but you can observe it in the moored vessels. They have an odd motion now. The rain is getting thick and steady too. We need the rain. The land is dry and so are many wells. The swells are supposed to be big. Tides are extreme right now, too. Not what you want at the same time as a big storm surge. We are as tied up as well as can be, with a big 1,500 pound storm hook out in the harbour. Plenty hawsers everywhere and across the dock too. All boats apart from one designated rescue boat pulled up on shore. Some folks are living aboard their schooners at anchor or on moorings. Yesterday the gang lent a hand getting other vessels in the harbour secured. Not much more we can do now. Looks like a long night coming. And by tomorrow afternoon, clearing skies.
Hunkered down here. Candles and lanterns at the ready. Like everyone else we have been to the store so we have anything we might actually need and some things we don’t! Around here the joke is “do you have your storm chips and beer?”. We can expect power to give out sometime so we have candles, oil lanterns, flashlights at the ready and the wood stove standing by for cooking too. A big pot of stew is already bubbling.
We will see how it goes.