hey everyone, looks like were in for a nasty day, take care & be safe, I hope for the best for everyone

Me too. I hope nobody is gonna have TOO bad of weather. The wind here has already picked up quite a bit, gusting. I was watching the hurricane news late last night, and it doesn't look too good. Houston skyscrapers have windows blown out all over. It is a mess! I hope all who lived on the coast from TFF have evacuated and that all are okay! If you live in these areas, and are reading this, please let us know you are okay!

Yeah, DFW is not getting as much as thought which is good. Good luck you guys and just think how good the tailrace fishing is going to be after all this stuff blows over

Man, where is everyone today? I know you aren't out there FISHING, are YOU??? It is extremely quiet on this board. Just about the whole eastern side of Texas is completely covered by this storm...that is one massive storm alright! No way I would be out at the lake today. It is just toooo windy.

We lost electricity for about an hour. It just came back on. I am glad, cause it was getting awful hot in here with no air on...I think there is over 4 million without power now in Tx.

Though my family and I are new to TX we have many friends around the Houston area. Thankfully they all left town. Out here in Plano about twenty minutes ago the wind started picking up noticeably. We're far from any damaging weather here but certainly our thoughts are with our friends elsewhere. Hope you're okay out there in the Tyler-Longview metroplex (!) Kelly.

Tough day for fishing, that's for sure!

AAAARRRRRGGGGG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Almost no rain to speak of I needed a 4+" rain and I'll be lucky to get .4".

We are having very gusty wind, and rain. We almost lost power again, but luckily it is going again...Glad you both are okay! Also glad your family left the Houston area, wise move!

It is gusting 56 mph right now, and my kids are out in it. They are making me a little nervous. If it gets worse they are gonna have to come in. They are teenagers... at least maybe they will get the dog to relax a little. She is afraid of storms something terrible. So it is good for her to see them out having a good time. I live near woods, and a creek...and the trees are definitely swaying out here!

Nothing but wind and drizzle here in Dallas.

I was watching the non-stop himmicane Ike coverage. I was amazed when Fox4 went to every half hour coverage to show an infomercial. I wasn't too suprized a few hours later when the other guys put football on.

My house has lost power now 3 times. It just came back on again, was off this time only a couple of minutes. But they are blinking again. I was typing a post when I just lost it. Tyler through Shreveport I think is getting pounded. Mike, it will be at your place before ya know it. I don't plan on leaving the house until tomorrow, if it stops raining. They are calling for bad weather for at least a few more hours here. I am surprised Dallas hasn't gotten worse weather. Last I checked it seemed to be heading straight for Ft. Worth...and then NE.

Looks like the "dirty" right side is out east of D/FW and flying right over Marshall and that whole area of East Texas. Strap your hats on folks and best to you

the wind has been picking up in the last few minutes and we have had a bunch of rain although not as much or as hard as I expected. It looks like we are about halfway thru, they are saying that tommorrow it will be a nice day...hey today I hit a buzzard coming home from work, it never occured to me to get any feathers while I was cussing its low flying a$$.

besides being illegal as hell they also probably stank to high heaven!

Thanks Robin. Mike I cannot believe that y'all aren't getting hit harder than that...well, it has been hitting us hard for a while..I lost track of time, but I know it has been rough...the wind now is as bad as ever, and maybe worse here and there. Lost power and back on again. We are gonna eat an early supper...hope the electricity stays on at least for supper. We have trees just bowing down. The wind is almost as bad as Katrina was...but then the wind howled. The wind must be close to 65 or so. Local weather says Tyler at 63mph.

The storm is over Gilmer now. Heading up near my brother outside Atlanta.

Now the wind howled. Here is power outage report from kltv.com

Latest Power Outages below.

3:00 pm:

Gregg County: 9,100

Rusk County: 6,000

Cherokee: 600

Smith County: 13,000

Upshur: 132

Van Zandt: 1,973

Lufkin: more than 30,000

we might be getting hit hard, i opened a bottle of James Beams finest liquid happiness and don't care right now.

Goodness to you all. We are getting the somewhat easier left side of the storm. The right side is out east of us, over y'all guys. The rotation being counter-clockwise it's the last bits that are finally coming round pointing at this area.

Well, I hope this stirs up all the fish!

It seems to be a bit better out there now for us. We keep losing power, and getting it back. I heard trees falling in the woods behind my house. I also heard a transformer blowing up. Then we lost power, and got it back again. Guess I am gonna forget the net for a while, and watch a movie with my teens. I just may pop the top on a wine cooler here in a while myself! Thanks Robin for the well wishes. Hope all goes well for everyone!!

Just as I was replying to this a couple hours ago the power went out...so I went to the lake, not really suitable for fishing today, came home & power was back on so here is what I saw at Lone Star Lake

What I recorded in my backyard about 9:30 this AM.



It was a long night.

Kirk

wow, hope you and your family are okay, i bet it was a long night

thanks for the vid. I have to admit I love the look of east texas with all the tall trees and such.

Yeah, we're fine. Got the generator and AC going. Gonna have a Cold Beer later.

Kirk

Krik, the important question is: "when are you going fishing?"

As soon as I get this mess cleaned up.

PB Slideshow

Looks like I'm gonna be off work for a few days.

I was in Montana catching trout when I realized Ike was heading for my house. 31 hrs. and 1978 miles later, the wife and I drove into our driveway and started tieing everything down. Had a incredible wind, but no damage. Might sleep for a week.

Glad it was only minor damage. Trees fences and shingles are easy to fix. BTW I know that town. My dad grew up in Buna. Did the stinky paper mill survive

Pray for my brother, and many others. We're afraid that his (soon to be)retirement home is probably gone. It was in Gilchrist.

Well right after my last message here we lost power again..this time till last night at 8pm. (24 hours or so) They got it going, then the phone line was out...so no internet. They had the phone line up when I got up at 9am this morn. Trees down around here, knocking down lines, poles,...transformers knocked down...even last night we had traffic lights out all over...what a mess. They just put in stop signs and made everything a four way stop. It was a mess, and still is. I sure did a bunch of praying before, during, and after that storm. It did worse damage here, than Katrina did. (which I was amazed at that)

I lost power for 30 minutes yesterday. I thought it odd that it was out for 30 minutes (not 25 or 35) and wondered if they were doing rolling blackouts.

30 minutes is not so bad. I am gonna have to replace food that was ruined. At least we have power now. Lots of people still do not in my area. The good thing is the cold nights ...which beats sweating like the first night of this. Tonight the low is 55 or so. It was about 83 deg in the house when the power went out the first day, and I hate sleeping in that heat. I cannot tell you how happy to see the electricity come back on I was. I saw more damage out there today, while driving around some. Trees down in almost every neighborhood. This was much worse then Katrina was. (to my area anyway) I hope Meadowlark is okay and gets power back, and that all is well. It may be some time before those who live closer to the coast get power. I know the electric company is working hard to get things going again.

Brother posted today that all he has left is a slab and some oleander bushes that he's tried to get rid of for years. Guess I need to brush up on my house building skills.

Brother is someone from this forum? I don't recall that name. What forum does he hang out on in TFF? This is very sad news. Poor guy.

He's my brother. He posts occasionally on here as PREACHER. He is Hambone911's dad. He was supposed to retire around Jan 1st and move down there. We'll get him going again. The major concern is the folks who lost their primary homes and all of their belongings. We really need to pray for them.

Agreed TCF. I do remember the name Preacher. I have already been praying for people like him, I will add him to my list. Poor guy. It is good he has a brother like you, to help him out. I cannot remember which forum I read messages from, that he wrote, but I do remember his name...it is kind of hard to forget that one isn't it?

In Longview, workers faced 113 downed wires, 50 blown transformers and 82 broken poles, according to SWEPCO. In addition, repairs were necessary for 13 main lines that carry electricity from the power stations to the community. (taken from Longview's website News-Journal.com)

KLTV article said this, "For some, it could be days, maybe even weeks before their power is back". (speaking of power in East Tx)

It may be some time before we hear from Meadowlark...hope he is okay!! Anyone else unaccounted for on the forum?