# what natural disaster(s) have you lived through?



## nubly (Nov 2, 2006)

what natural disaster(s) have you lived through?

i've only been in earthquakes when i lived in california and a monsoon when i lived in south korea.


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## Lonelyguy (Nov 8, 2003)

Tornado when I was 18. It was never confirmed but given the amount of damage on our property and in the surrounding area I have no doubt that's what it was. It looked like a bomb had went off, trees torn to shreds and buildings literally exploded. Fortunately there was only minor damage on my house.

Also many blizzards. I can remember lots of times over the years where there was zero visibility and my home was completely sealed off from civilization for days at a time because the road was plugged with snow drifts over five feet deep. The only way in and out is by snowmobile so all you can do is sit and wait until they get the road open, hoping there's not an emergency.


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## Duke of Prunes (Jul 20, 2009)

Never been in any of those. Good old English weather, might be cold and wet but at least it's predictable. There have been some floods quite near me though, but I don't live near any rivers myself and we have good drains so it'd take some freak heavy rain to cause a flood here.


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## Banzai (Jun 4, 2009)

Duke of Prunes said:


> Never been in any of those. Good old English weather, might be cold and wet but at least it's predictable. There have been some floods quite near me though, but I don't live near any rivers myself and we have good drains so it'd take some freak heavy rain to cause a flood here.


Ditto this. I live right by the River Thames but never been through a flood or anything...I think the Thames Barrier protects my area. Not sure though.

When I went to Vietnam, it was during Monsoon season...no flooding or anything like that though but there were a couple of small cyclones. Again, nothing major.


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## coldmorning (Jul 4, 2007)

I've been through hurricanes, blizzards and earthquakes. 

And fog probably doesn't count as a natural disaster but when I lived in San Diego, they had a 100 car pile-up due to fog.


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## shyvr6 (Feb 18, 2008)

Been in several hurricanes. I even surfed in a couple, lol. I also been in a few blizzards. I can't really count tornados, but the closest one that came by my house was about half a mile away.


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## Jnmcda0 (Nov 28, 2003)

The closest I've come to being in a natural disaster is when the remnants of a hurricane came through last year with hurricane-force winds (keep in mind that I live about 600 miles from the ocean) and knocked power out to 90% of the Cincinnati area. 

This is a pretty safe area as far as natural disasters go. Not that many tornados, not a ton of snow, not close to the ocean, occasional flooding in lower-lying areas (though most of the area is on higher ground), and few wildfires or earthquakes (although we are somewhat close to the New Madrid fault, which produced the strongest earthquake in US history in the early 1800s).


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## SilentLoner (Jan 30, 2006)

I lived through the 2001 El Salvador earthquakes. Two major ones plus thousands of smaller aftershocks in two months. Not fun.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2001_El_Salvador_earthquakes

And in 2002 in Connecticut I had to walk home in the early stages of a blizzard.http://www.socialanxietysupport.com/forum/newreply.php?do=postreply&t=75548


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## Keith (Aug 30, 2008)

2 hurricanes the first i don't remember and a blizzard


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## Meli24R (Dec 9, 2008)

Nothing major really..I've been in blizzards and tornadoes have come pretty close to my area.


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## duskyy (Oct 23, 2009)

Tornado here in MS when I was younger. And in 1994 there was this really bad freeze in MS and I almost got killed by a falling limb with like an inch of ice on it, if that counts, lol. 

Tornado in AL a few years ago (was on national news cause it took out the high school ;/). Quite a few hurricanes in south AL too.


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## Meee (Oct 24, 2005)

None. England is boring. Unless crappy random depressing weather counts as a disaster. Or minor 'earthquakes' that might slightly adjust the hanging angle of a wall picture at worst.


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## anonymid (Oct 16, 2005)

Just blizzards, I suppose. I've lived in New England most of my life, which is pretty much one of the safest places you can be on the planet, as far as natural disasters are concerned.

I do remember feeling a very, very mild earthquake in Vermont seven or eight years ago. And there was Hurricane Gloria way back in '85 or '86 or whenever. But neither of those were anywhere close to being serious enough to count as "disasters."


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## copper (Nov 10, 2003)

When I was 16 a F4 tornado now known as an EF5 tornado almost hit our house, but luckily it followed a small creek and missed us. We were all in the basement ready for it to hit. I thought for sure when the lights went out we were in for it, but it never came. It did hit a few houses NE of town. Now where I live tornadoes are very rare. The only thing we have to live with here is the huge amount of snow we get thanks to Lake Superior.


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## Scrub-Zero (Feb 9, 2004)

My Alcoholic father.

Oh and the Montreal ice storm in 1998.

http://windupradio.com/icestorm.htm


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## Meee (Oct 24, 2005)

Logan X said:


> My Alcoholic father.


I've been through that too :/


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## pita (Jan 17, 2004)

Does SARS count?


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## Annie K (Sep 24, 2008)

I've been through one earthquake, several hurricanes, and three or four blizzards/ice storms.


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## Just Lurking (Feb 8, 2007)

I haven't experienced what I'd call a "natural disaster". Not much happens here. We get blizzards, tornadoes, and hurricane leftovers.

For blizzards, I don't remember getting anything that's crippled us for any more than 12-24 hours... We're pretty resilient when it comes to snow.

We also get tornadoes in the city once in a while. I haven't experienced one or seen one first hand though. So far, we haven't been hit by anything other than a couple weak F1s (maybe an F2?). Well, call them "weak" but don't tell that to the people who get hit directly because they do cause a decent amount of damage.

Then there are hurricane leftovers which we get here occasionally, but the storms are usually pretty soft by the time they make it here. The exception would be Hurricane Hazel in 1954 which was still a full fledged hurricane when it rolled over us. THAT caused a lot of flooding and would fall under 'natural disaster' I think. That was, uh, a few years before my time though so that doesn't count for me.

We're pretty far inland (Southern Ontario here), so a hurricane's gotta have a looootta steam to hit us at full strength. Hazel's been the only one so far.


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## steelmyhead (May 31, 2009)

I've survived a few earthquakes. I'm in California. There are wildfires here once in a while too, but they don't impact my life too much.


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## moxosis (Aug 26, 2009)

Blizzards, snow storms, we where without electrition for about 7 days, and our house was heated with electric heating. I also got stuck in a blizzard on a mountain road, with other people. Had to wait for the rescue squad to get us off the mountain.


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## EagerMinnow84 (Sep 1, 2007)

A tornado touched down a few miles from where I was vacationing in Wisconsin about 10 years ago. It knocked the power out for a few days, uprooted trees and downed power lines. There was dents on all of the cars because of the large sized hail. It was pretty much the worst storm I have ever been in. It was kind of cool.


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## Neptunus (Oct 29, 2007)

Well, I live in New England, so the typical nor'easters... but, lately, we've been having a problem with tornados. A couple of summers ago, we had a an F2 that blasted the town a couple of miles from my house. Killed this poor elderly woman and totally annihilated her home. Just so happened that I was home that day and taking a nap, with ear plugs in, enjoying the breeze from my really loud, industrial fan, completely oblivious to all the chaos that was going on outside. Fortunately, my mother called and warned me to get to the basement. Talk about the flight of my life! Lightening everywhere ... and the trees seemed like they were going to crash down onto the house!!! I risked it, and ran upstairs to fetch my pet cockatiel, then hid out in the basement - the most frightening half hour of my life! Even though it was a relatively small tornado, the path of destruction it left was unbelievable! :afr


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## mind_games (Nov 30, 2008)

Still living through the natural disaster that is my mum.


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## Neptunus (Oct 29, 2007)

And let us not forget the ice-storm that hit the Northeast last December. I didn't have power for 6 days- which meant no water too! Many people and businesses went without for much longer... some up to 2 weeks. Gawd awful!


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## Iced Soul (Jan 28, 2009)

A few very mild earthquakes and one very mild tornado. There were wildfires, but they weren't really close to me. I'm very lucky.


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## Neptunus (Oct 29, 2007)

moxosis said:


> Blizzards, snow storms, we where without electrition for about 7 days, and our house was heated with electric heating. I also got stuck in a blizzard on a mountain road, with other people. Had to wait for the rescue squad to get us off the mountain.


:no As far as I'm concerned, snow might as well be a four letter word!


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## leonardess (Jun 30, 2009)

Besides myself? a few earthquakes.


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## UltraShy (Nov 8, 2003)

Personally only a blizzard.

My brother's farm got blown away in a 1984 by an F-5 tornado. The barn was left as a pile of scrap wood. The house remained, except for the entire back wall was removed making it look like a gigantic doll house. He got rid of that 100 acre farm several years ago, netting $465K for what he never imagined to be worth much of anything. I think the buyer must have been suffering from a case of temporary insanity to pay $5,000 an acre for what sure failed to impress me.


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## lyssado707 (Oct 29, 2004)

Just a few dinky earthquakes.


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## Your Crazy (Feb 17, 2009)

mind_games said:


> Still living through the natural disaster that is my mum.


This.


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## millenniumman75 (Feb 4, 2005)

Remnants of Hurricane Ike - tropical storm/hurricane gust winds in western Ohio for 6+ hours. I had 45-65mph sustained winds with gusts to 80-85mph. I lost power for three and a half days in September, 2008.


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## nightrain (Nov 17, 2008)

somethinginthewind said:


> A few serious blizzards/ice storms, growing up in Northern Ontario.


Same here.


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## Hank Scorpio (Oct 28, 2008)

A tornado in a trailer park. That was fun. And I felt a tiny earthquake once but it definitely wan't a disaster, I thought it was pretty cool.


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## millenniumman75 (Feb 4, 2005)

I think I have also been through about half a dozen blizzards. Also in March, 2008 - I got 15 inches of snow....that was the most I had ever seen in one storm - I have lived in my house for 29 years.

I have also had a couple of minor earthquakes here, too.


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## anomalous (Jun 12, 2004)

Blizzards, earthquakes, tornadoes, floods... I've lived too many places. All within the U.S., though. One of our nation's finest qualities, I must say: there's a state for fans of just about every natural disaster imaginable!


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## Paul (Sep 26, 2005)

Nothing, unless you count watching the pool slosh a little in the '89 quake or wading through ankle-deep water walking home from school in a minor flood.


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## ecotec83 (Sep 7, 2009)

Being Canadian i have lived through some pretty big blizzards over the years. When i was younger our family vacation to Florida turned scary when the "storm of the century" tore through the eastern seaboard. It was a great vacation, one day of sun then a night of terror as tornadoes, intense lightening and strong winds shook the whole parkhome for several hours. The next day palm trees were bent over and debris was everywhere. Worst vacation ever.


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## toffee (Oct 5, 2009)

English weather.... rain, sun, wind, and more rain.. never experienced any of the above, apart from a very mild earthquake last yr.. very mild.. it lasted for about 5 seconds and i only felt it because i was awake at the time.. it was confirmed on the radio the next morning, but no one seemed to notice it.


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## cakesniffer (Nov 11, 2003)

A few New England Hurricanes, with Bob being the most serious that I can recall.

And, of course, some blizzards. Which are always fun.


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## James of Maine (Sep 8, 2005)

Here in southern Maine, among other things, I've been through a couple of (weakened) hurricanes in the '80s/early '90's (including Bob as mentioned above), and couple of floods ('96 and '07). I was an infant when our area was hit by the Blizzard of '78.

The worst natural disaster I ever experienced firsthand (and remember) was also the worst natural disaster my state ever experienced... The Great Ice Storm of '98. The map of the area affected shown in the article is misleading... the southern interior parts of Maine got it full-bore as well. The lead picture is essentially what it looked like all around my house. We lost power for 9 days, and lost hundreds of trees on our property, including 90' white pines.


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## kkluv20 (Nov 17, 2008)

1992 Hurricane in Hawaii (perhaps Hurricane Iniki: the most powerful to strike Hawaii). I was 4 and don't remember much, but I do remember my Mom freaking out and we were hiding in the laundry room. 

Then when we moved to Tennessee we had a lot of Tornado warnings and watches. My mom was paranoid, so we hid in closets a lot. We never got hit, but there was a close call. The weather was really bad, and our garbage and pool went tumbling down the street. It was super windy and raining really hard. We could actually see the tornado forming, so this time we went into a Neighbor's basement and waited for the storm to pass. It eventually did, and nothing in our neighborhood was damaged. However, the neighborhood just up the road was hit and there were broken windows and whatnot. 

We moved to Vermont in the summer of '98, so we just missed the really bad ice storm. From stories I've heard, some people were without power for weeks, schools were closed, and it was pretty severe.


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## quietgal (Oct 18, 2007)

I grew up in east Texas so there have been hurricanes and flooding, but I lived relatively far inland so usually we were spared the worst parts of them.

Then I moved to Boston and there were blizzards and windstorms. I live in New Jersey now, and I have yet to experience a New Jersey winter, though I can't imagine it will be worse than Boston's.


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## Lovesick Loner (Oct 19, 2009)

Been stuck in a library at ground zero during a really awesome Microburst. Seen some blizzards in PA. That's about it.


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## bezoomny (Feb 10, 2007)

Tornado, hurricane, flood, and surprisingly a blizzard.


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## Happ2beme (Jul 13, 2009)

Does my neighbor count? She's a natural disaster. Oh wait, Natural. Nevermind.


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## JMX (Feb 26, 2008)

My mother told me we went through several small earthquakes when I was a baby growing up in Japan. I've felt two earthquakes while living in the midwest, but they were only about a 3.0.

Experienced a typhoon while visiting Tokyo for a couple weeks back in 2004.

Been through some blizzards, nothing catastrophic, but I can remember some of them.


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## Toad Licker (Nov 2, 2007)

A few earthquakes (they were all minor), Mount St. Helens back in '80, we live 50+ miles away but it hit us with ash big time a week after it's first major eruption on May 18th, 1980.


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## amarie (Oct 31, 2009)

I'm down in Georgia, USA, so we just dealt with record breaking floods less than a month ago. (<<< bad scarey stuff) We're also close enough to the coastline that we deal with hurricanes and tropical storms almost yearly, and had a bunch of bad tornado's hit all over last year that tore the place up. as for earthquakes, we had like one bigger one when I was in.... middle school???


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## huh (Mar 19, 2007)

Just the natural disaster that is my life...hah. Really though, only a tornado or two. We get some pretty heavy/rough snow seasons here...dunno if I'd consider anything that would kill me though.


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## nubly (Nov 2, 2006)

amarie said:


> I'm down in Georgia, USA, so we just dealt with record breaking floods less than a month ago. (<<< bad scarey stuff) We're also close enough to the coastline that we deal with hurricanes and tropical storms almost yearly, and had a bunch of bad tornado's hit all over last year that tore the place up. as for earthquakes, we had like one bigger one when I was in.... middle school???


Yea, I'd hate to go through a flood. Besides fires and tsunamis, those look like the worst natural disasters.


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## Memories of Silence (May 15, 2015)

Little earthquakes that were too small to do much damage, and I don't think I felt any of them. They caused a crack in the ceiling and it got worse and fell down.

The house got struck by lightning in 2009, and I felt it. It made my arm ache and I could taste metal.

I have been near bushfires and seen floods, but they weren't near my house.


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## Canadian Brotha (Jan 23, 2009)

When I was a baby there was a tornado here.

Other than that I've been in a number of blizzards that have lasted up to 4 days in a row but they weren't nature disasters, just extreme weather


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## SD92 (Nov 9, 2013)

Nothing serious. Hurricane Bawbag came pretty close but didn't hit us. There was floods nearby last year but again they just missed us too.


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## Fangirl96 (Apr 13, 2015)

We get a lot of storms during winter where i live, and there was a category 1 hurricane when i was 8. It was one of the countrys biggest environmental disasters in history. I don't remember much of it, but i remember it was a very big deal and you could see the aftermath for yeeears. Piles of trees and trucks with trees everywhere. 
There's probably been plenty of blizzards. I can't even tell. Swedish winter means snow, so probably blizzards.

Not very cool compared to yall americans earthquakes, but oh well.


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## JohnB (Oct 14, 2015)

Category 1 is the lowest category maybe you have that backwards. 4 is pretty bad but there is 5 also.


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## Fangirl96 (Apr 13, 2015)

JohnB said:


> Category 1 is the lowest category maybe you have that backwards. 4 is pretty bad but there is 5 also.


Well it's what wikipedia says. For our extremely boring country, i guess that counts as a lot.


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## greentea33 (Mar 4, 2014)

many tornadoes, a blizzard, a flood and 1 small earthquake.


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## JohnB (Oct 14, 2015)

Sorry not trying to downplay it. I have been thorough a couple cat 3 so was thinking 1 would not be to bad. Where do you live? If u dont mind me asking.


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## Nunuc (Jul 9, 2013)

Not many. Our anti-hurricane shield blocks/slows down all the category 1 hurricanes.


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## LydeaCharlotteGirl (Aug 27, 2013)

Only the great storm of 1987 really, it brought down quite a few trees round here. I wonder (with climate change), how long the Thames Barrier will still be effective against flooding. There were some small earthquakes at my grandparents' then house in Scotland (IIRC in the early 80s), which caused nothing more than some cracked tiles.


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

I was born in this but I don't remember it (lol obviously):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_of_1990–91_in_Western_Europe

it caused a lot of hassle for my parents  then I turned 18 during that 2009 snow event mentioned hahah. I am the Snow Wizard™ (actually I get cold really easily and like warm weather so I'm pretty bad at the job.)

It floods a lot in some areas of the UK, but not anywhere I've lived luckily. Some people have to remodel their house regularly because of flood damage.


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## Ominous Indeed (Sep 6, 2015)

Considering I am still alive, all of them.

What's a monsoon?


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## clarkekent (Dec 2, 2015)

I've lived through a few nights without air-conditioning.


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## acidicwithpanic (May 14, 2014)

I'm originally from California, so I have experienced a minor earthquake as a small child. I'm currently situated in Florida, so floods, hurricanes, and tornadoes can get severe. The most disastrous hurricane I've been in was Hurricane Ivan back in 2004. Oh, and I can confirm that those rumors about us having hurricane parties is true.


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## sarafinanickelbocker (May 16, 2010)

There have been tornadoes, floods, and wildfires near me, but I have been fortunate enough not to experience them firsthand. I've experienced several blizzards however. The best part is when you get to drive in them.


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## Aribeth (Jan 14, 2012)

The social media era. Still enduring. Stay strong!


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## TheInvisibleHand (Sep 5, 2015)

Aribeth said:


> The social media era. Still enduring. Stay strong!


Amen


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## SplendidBob (May 28, 2014)

Got struck by lightning repeatedly back in '97. It just made me more powerful.


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## nubly (Nov 2, 2006)

Demon Soul said:


> Considering I am still alive, all of them.
> 
> What's a monsoon?


I don't know. Heavy rain I guess? The floods were so bad that the fishes were on the streets. Some Korean civilians that were with us were outside the following day grabbing the fish so they could cook them. I didn't see too much of the damage because I had special duty so they moved us out of the flooded areas into Seoul until the duty was over. This was the town that was right ouside the base I was stationed at.


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## KILOBRAVO (Sep 17, 2011)

the UK winters every year. hellish strong winds and relentless rain. then 10 feet of snow and Ice and hours of miserable darkness. its a natural abomination


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## cybernaut (Jul 30, 2010)

Hurricane Katrina

Then my house struck by lightening when I was like 11 or 12. Also,there was a bad snow storm in Washington DC last February,which had me stuck in the house for 4 days.They even closed the entirety of Washington DC down for 2 days.


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## flyingMint (Aug 31, 2015)

Tropical Storm Allison in 2001 (though I was only like 3/4 so I don't remember it well) 
Hurricane Rita (2005) 
Hurricane Humberto (2007) 
Hurricane Ike (2008 )
Flash flooding in 2015 and 2016


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## The Library of Emma (Mar 3, 2016)

Tornado, major hurricane, and...i forgot to click on earthquake in the poll.  Been through two of those, both minor ones, though.


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## Virgo (Jun 27, 2016)

Almost my whole town is a flood zone, so I live through that once every 2-3 years. And I've lived through Hurricane Sandy.


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## andretti (Jan 2, 2016)

87 whittier narrows earthquake and the northridge earthquake in 94


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## Bbpuff (Sep 1, 2010)

None. I'm pretty fortunate to live in an area where none of these things really occur.


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## copper (Nov 10, 2003)

January 1987 caught standard I35 south of Mason City, Iowa due to severe ground blizzard. We were coming back riding snowmobiles in southern Minnesota. Luckily, we had an old school bus that dad used to haul the snowmobiles in the back. We picked up three people that went into the ditch. The one guy reached up and touched my dads hand through the side window. My dad had open it to see where the road was. Scared the crap out of my dad. The guy was lucky to find us or otherwise he would have died to the exposure. It took two hours just to drive 20 miles. Usually we would have made it home in that time. Ended up stopping at a truck stop and kept the engine running all night. The other people left and took shelter in the greasy spoon. The exhaust pipe kept freezing shut and dad had to keep it clear hitting the ice with a rubber mallet he always carried around. Luckily, the weather settled down the next day allowing us to travel home.


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## WillYouStopDave (Jul 14, 2013)

Life - 1973 - Present


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## Paul (Sep 26, 2005)

Paul said:


> Nothing, unless you count watching the pool slosh a little in the '89 quake or wading through ankle-deep water walking home from school in a minor flood.


13 years later, I can add the trauma of just barely feeling a distant earthquake vibrate my chair, and a 7 acre fire across the street that I didn't realize happened until I found an article about it later.

Oh, and there was that time a meteorite came within 10 miles of hitting me.


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## Socialmisfits (May 14, 2021)

Unfortunately, my birth


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## Cletis (Oct 10, 2011)

I guess the worst one was a 5.7 earthquake. The epicenter was only 10 miles away so we got shook up really bad. No damage, fortunately. 

Been through several bad windstorms. One blew down our patio wall and many trees in the area. Another knocked out the power for 3 days.

Many big snowstorms. A few were so deep we needed to shovel the roof off to keep it from collapsing.

Lots of thunderstorms that brought brief flooding and high winds.

Been uncomfortably close to several wildfires. Roads were closed and people evacuated.


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## coeur_brise (Oct 7, 2004)

I experienced a flash flood exactly once in my life around age 12 but and me and my best friend just waded through the waist-deep water for a good while. Others have been blizzards, but no blinding ones and only one tornado that hit close to where I lived and knocked out the power. I wouldn't want to ever experience a hurricane though, those cause such a massive amount of damage.


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## Blue Dino (Aug 17, 2013)

Seasonal typhoons/baby hurricanes, growing up.


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## caelle (Sep 9, 2008)

Nothing yet even though I'm born and raised in SoCal. I've experienced earthquakes but none even close enough to knocking something off a wall or shelf. There's been wildfires but luckily not too close to me. #luckyasheck #knockonwood


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