What a day....

Yesterday was a regular school day for sons number one and two, but arriving at school, we found a fire engine, two sheriff's patrol cars and some municipal trucks -- along with a very long Semi tractor trailer truck looking awfully suspicious.

The school itself is quite organized & had folk out to help parents park & get the the actual school grounds, as the road was closed off. So we parked & hiked. There wasn't much to see -- the parked Semi had officers swarming around it, but no guns drawn. Getting to the classrooms, we noticed that the lights were NOT on in the building.

So -- here's the story.

Semi truck (probably got lost as the road the school is on is a dead-end that stops at a just plowed field....

Somehow the truck got down to the end of the road ... how it managed to turn around, we'll probably never know (there's literally NO room for a large truck to turn), in turning, it managed to snag one or more high voltage live wires overhead ... didn't NOTICE and barreled on down the road, pulling the live wire (one or more) with it.

Now, from what I can piece together, this happened about 7:45AM (school starts at 8:15, so there were children playing outside on the blacktop).

Transformers blew -- one or more, depending on which person you talk to, but the children thought it was COOL.

There was fireball eruption from the top of at least one pole and then the school went dark.

The sheriffs' patrol got there right quick & blocked the road, but DID not send children home instantly.

The teachers were told that school would go on it's normal schedule, just in dark rooms. (and the consensus was that the power would be out for an hour or so... no big deal). Luckily, there is a fence by the road, so no students were given the opportunity to go check out the dancing live wires (and of course, by the time WE got there... being just a bit too late for the dramatic portion of this story... the wire was dark and blended with the road, invisible unless you were right by it).

I admit it -- I LEFT MY SONS THERE -- yup. Bad parent, you're thinking -- well, there was no actual threat to the school & the power was only supposed to be off for an hour or so... I had a full schedule planned for the day, so merrily I went (and I have to say that in my defense, 90% of the parents did the same).

BUT --- (and there's ALWAYS a but to this sort of story)

The power company decided that no way was it going to take an hour. Four hours (promise!)

So the Sheriffs, being good cops, informed the school that it was illegal to keep children in a place that had no electricity...

Which meant that all the teachers had to CALL all the parents back and evacuate the school. I was merrily (remember, merrily off to do a full schedule...) driving home after my second errand when I got the call.

Turn around, pick up the kids, forget the schedule (and oh, by the way, add boy number three to the mix because his mom wasn't able to get off work for the day and since I'm working for myself, I can do that).

That part of the day was exciting.

The rest of the day was just a big mess.

Hopefully today is going to be less exciting.