Typhoon Sepat
Typhoon Sepat, previously known as Super Typhoon Sepat, aka the Biggest Storm This Year Yet, took its time making its presence felt here in Xindian. Though the satellite showed it lumbering on shore on Friday, the weather didn’t really change aside from a bit of rain. My boss was nice enough to let me work from home, so I avoided a soaking. The sunset was brilliant, the light streaming through holes in the interesting clouds flying across the sky and turning everything an eerie shade of orange.
That night the wind and rain picked up, and by Saturday morning the storm had begun. My windows and doors shook as they were pummeled by the wind. I took out the false ceiling light panels in the kitchen and bathrooms before the vent pressure did it for me. The water in the toilets jumped up and down.
The wind was shrieking by outside, tossing plastic signs and tree limbs through the air. Our on my balcony, the air smelled of wet, freshly broken wood. Water began to push through the gaps in my bedroom windows, and I had to stuff tissue in them and line the sill with old washcloths to keep the water at bay. I stayed inside all day while I sifted through old photographs to scan, watching the storm sweep over the island via satellite, but just before sundown I decided to go get some dinner at the 7-Eleven downstairs. Before that, however, I decided to visit the suspension bridge, which was banging and straining against its moorings. The bridge itself was bucking up and down, and the unhindered wind tossed anyone brave enough to venture upon it up against the railing. Tree branches littered the ground, and a white egret hopped away from me without attempting flight in the gale.
I rode the bridge for a while, holding the railing to keep from being blown away. I posted a vidlet I took with my little Canon on Youtube last night. The waters of Bitan were high, but I’d seen them higher. The wind was the fiercest thing about this storm. When I left the garage door open and tried to use the elevator, the pressure wouldn’t allow it to rise in its shaft, and it would only run after I’d closed the big metal door, which then groaned beneath the weight of the wind but let me take the elevator back up to my apartment.
All in all, it was a good typhoon, big enough to entertain, clean out the air and resupply the water tables but not big enough to cause massive islandwide destruction. We neeed it, psychologically, I think. It’s gone on to China now, but we’re still getting some rain from the tail end.
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I’d love to inhale some of that air.
Comment by zhara — August 20, 2007 @ 10:18 pm