My 30 minutes as a Refugee

The DC area has been hit pretty hard by a set of nasty thunderstorm recently. And I mean NASTY. Trees uprooted, buildings flooded, power out for days. Don't believe me? Click here

Anyway, this morning it was not raining when I left my apartment, though the sky was tinged with grey. I ride the bus from across the street from my apartment to the Pentagon where I hop on board the Metro. The bus was stuck in traffic for a while, an accident apparently, but as the Pentagon came into sight the sky above it (and us) suddenly turned pitch black. It had gone from a hazy summer morning to midnight in a matter of moments. "great" I thought. "I'm wearing flip-flops and didn't bring an umbrella. I'm going to get soaked"

Made it into the Metro station in only the first light drizzle of the storm. Water was pouring off the train, but on I got.

Fast forward 3 metro stops to Foggy Bottom, my stop. I was already running late for work because of the accident, so I knew I wouldn't catch the work shuttle. Meaning a half mile walk in what I was sure had become a screaming gale. Seriously considered a cab.

Got off the train to hear a strange sound. Well, strange for underground in a major city. The sound of running water. Ok, maybe not running. Sprinting. Leaping. Gushing. I looked up and about 10 feet from me and about 30 feet up one of the ceiling tiles in the station had cracked and was pouring water. It looked like at least 3 fire hoses were pouring their combined water and force through the tile and into the station. I was lucky. Some people had no choice but to try to go through it. The lucky ones managed to stay standing. That was the force of the water. I would have just gone home if that had been me. Anyway, water everywhere, me in flip-flops, picking my way through the rapidly spreading standing water to get to the fare kiosks to leave.

Got through the kiosk fine. BUT. about 3 train loads of people were crowded around the escalator bank, no one moving. Curious, I tried to see what was causing the back up. You guys, out of 3 escalators out of the station, 1 was open. ONE! and it wasn't even moving, it was stairs. So people getting out and people coming in were sharing ONE escalator and it was pouring. Rivers of water were coming down the railings of all three escalators, down the medians, off the roof. 150 people looking up these escalators and an equal amount at the top looking down.

Slowly but surely I made my way with the crowd and onto the escalator. About halfway up I heard an anguished cry and a crash. Fearing that a mob had broken out I looked down. Someone could clearly not take it anymore and had torn away the metal barrier blocking one of the other escalators and started running up the stairs. And I must say, he had quite a few followers.

When I finally tasted fresh air, I realized that the rain had stopped. The sun was coming out. I had missed the whole storm while trapped underground. Though I did still have to walk to work, and was about 15 minutes late, the only part of me that got wet were my feet, having to walk through some of the puddles.

Others at my office had similar stories, one lady's car doors started to leak, ruining her lunch because the water on Rhode Island Ave was flowing above the bottom of her doors. So much water was dumped out of the sky, it had nowhere to go. Rock Creek has surpassed its banks. Cleveland Park metro station is closed because there is more than 3 feet of water rushing to the bottom steps. It looks like a scene from Titanic.

That shower this morning was the hugest waste of time.