Alabama folks

[RED that's ME]

Huntsville is a good size town compared with most AL cities but it not like a lot large metro cities of the North. There is a good deal of jobs with the Space industry. You will find a good mix of cultures and ppl from many different places living here. Weather is not bad. We get several snow dustings every winter. We haven't had a good snow in several years so some ppl predict this might be the year to get one which usually happen in Jan-Feb months.
Have you been here to visit yet? I don't live in Huntsville but one of the nearby cities but I go to Huntsville a lot. You could contact the Huntsville Chamber of Commerce http://www.hsvchamber.org/ and get them to send you info on the city for free. Also that is a good way to find living places whether house or apartment. There are also a lot of good churches here too.

 

[oncewaslost]

i know in the atlanta area there are scorpions but not dangerous ones. if you happen to get stung by one (and don't have an allergic reation) it's like a bee sting. you can smash them pretty easily. they only get about the size of a quarter when their tails are up. one laying flat is... umm... where's my ruler? the largest one i've seen laying flat is a little less than two inches. those are like HUGE though. mostly they're about maybe an inch and a half.

whack them real good with a shoe and they die easily.

 

[Debbi]

I live in Cullman county. We have some mountains in this area. We have snow here too. Sometimes we get a good inch of snow or more. I've seen snow as early as Nov. and as late as April and as much as 18 inches. We live in tornado alley, though.

 

[AlabamaMan]

Yes we do live in tornado alley here in North Alabama, probably the more common weather phenomenon. We have awesome weatherpeople though, Almost every major network has great coverage of the weather and keeping and eye on the sky.

I like northeast alabama a whole lot more than northwest alabama. I love Huntsville, it's a great place to go IMO.

 

[oncewaslost]

a couple tuesdays ago i was late to class because of a tornado.

 

[KittenKrazy]

I also am from Walker county.

 

[mbuc]

New member here from Limestone county, just a few miles west of Huntsville. Nice to see a few local folks on this board.

 

[KittenKrazy]

New member here from Limestone county, just a few miles west of Huntsville. Nice to see a few local folks on this board.

AMEN ! to that !

 

[Sunbeam]

In North Alabama, it does snow fairly frequently (yearly at least) unlike in central & southern Alabama where it is a rarity. Huntsville isn't exactly a huge city, so even if you were going to live there its not like you'd have big traffic problems, etc. Yes, there are a lot of poisonous animals in Alabama: snakes, spiders & scorpions. However, after 27 years of living here, I've only known two people that have ever been bitten by a poisonous animal, they were both bitten by spiders (brown recluse). Neither was ever in any danger of death. I have killed poisonous snakes in my backyard and I live in Birmingham, so they're around, but its not like there's dangerous animals at every turn. Don't mean to scare you, but you asked It isn't super common for them to be around.

So it does snow then in northern Alabama? Well that's just peachy-keen! lol We have snakes and poisonous spiders here too. I'm not that scared of them. It would be a change though. What did you kill the snakes in the backyard with?

 

[Sunbeam]

Yes we do live in tornado alley here in North Alabama, probably the more common weather phenomenon. We have awesome weatherpeople though, Almost every major network has great coverage of the weather and keeping and eye on the sky.

I like northeast alabama a whole lot more than northwest alabama. I love Huntsville, it's a great place to go IMO.

Oh wow. You have tornadoes there? In Huntsville.. there would be tornadoes? Have you ever been in one? seen one up close? Anyone want to share their experiences and what you do?

 

[Sunbeam]

i know in the atlanta area there are scorpions but not dangerous ones. if you happen to get stung by one (and don't have an allergic reation) it's like a bee sting. you can smash them pretty easily. they only get about the size of a quarter when their tails are up. one laying flat is... umm... where's my ruler? the largest one i've seen laying flat is a little less than two inches. those are like HUGE though. mostly they're about maybe an inch and a half.

whack them real good with a shoe and they die easily.

I've seen scorpions in a bottle, preserved. I can kill spiders without a problem here. I can kill wasps and bees with a cool head. It's just the initial shock of seeing them I think. One time I was on the side yard with a small portable trampoline and started bouncing and had a vision that one the five or six legs of the rebounder was on something S shaped. I thought it was a mole hole because that had happened before and the rebounder sinks and then I have to stop the workout and pull it out of the ground and move it somewhere else. Not a hard workout, a little trampoline, but still its an interruption. Well the S thing I saw was that i recently crushed the head of a snake with one of the legs, it wasn't on a mole hole or about to sink. I just stared at it but I wasn't afraid, and that's because it was dead. The last time I saw a snake was in the lake when I was swimming in the summer. This one drew a big crowd. It looked like it was possessed. It was looking up at everyone the whole time. I don't like them at all. If there dead, they aren't that scary though.

 

[mbuc]

Oh wow. You have tornadoes there? In Huntsville.. there would be tornadoes? Have you ever been in one? seen one up close? Anyone want to share their experiences and what you do?

IIRC, the north AL area is second only to eastern OK and TX in number of tornadoes reported annually. I've lived here my whole life and seen the results of a couple of major tornadoes and several smaller ones. A few years ago there was a very small tornado that passed less than 100 yds from my house, and I live in an urban area. I helped a friend clear a tree off her house the next day, and the house next door to her was totalled.

For about a year now, I've been a trained storm spotter. When severe weather is reported in the area, I communicate with a network of other licensed amateur radio operators and report conditions in my area. It's rare to see a tornado in this area because they are almost always wrapped in rain on the trailing edge of the storm, but there are some spectacular photographs hanging in the local Emergency Management Agency office taken by people who were in the right place at the right time.

 

[RED that's ME]

Oh wow. You have tornadoes there? In Huntsville.. there would be tornadoes? Have you ever been in one? seen one up close? Anyone want to share their experiences and what you do?

1st Trust God and pray. Keep alert with the weather channels many houses have storm shelters underground or go to a basement. I have heard one going overhead at school when I was little. All the cars in the parking lot had hail damage some worse than others. There has been a few incidents of homes/business destroyed. When we don't have a basement or storm shelter so we just go into the main bathroom and bring radios, flashlights heavy covers etc... with us and continue praying.

 

[nicodemus]

What did you kill the snakes in the backyard with?

A flathead shovel. I might add, if you ever try to strike a snake, do it from behind where they can't see you, those jokers are fast if you go from the front (mistake I made the first time.) It wasn't a big snake, only about a foot long, maybe half an inch around. I had about 5 pairs of socks on and my ankles all taped up in case it struck me.

 

[AlabamaMan]

Speak of snow, we had sleet and snow today where I live but nothing stuck, it was still to warm!

 

[Debbi]

A few tornados? We can get a tornado any month of the year, here. One of the main paths is from Tuscaloosa Co., then Walker Co., then they pick up strength over Smith Lake and head toward Cullman Co. Cullman County has had its share of bad tornados. My husband was in a military building a few years back when a tornado ripped the roof off the building and did alot of damage. He only had time to hide under a desk. He's been scared of storms ever since. I saw a tornado in the air a few months back. I was on the interstate heading toward Montgomery. There was alot of heavy rain, lightning, and I looked out and saw a tornado in the air. It touched down down the road. It was going south and I was going north and I was about 20 miles from Mont. We didn't get tornado damage but in 1996, we had a severe ice storm in the southeast. Trees fell on our trailer and came into roof. we had to send a week in a shelter.

 

[Debbi]

We also got sleet and snow today. It still is cold too.

 

[nicodemus]

I'm so not into this whole "below freezing temperatures thing." I've got to move somewhere where it is always warm. I can't stand cold weather!

 

[Ittle Bit]

I live close to Birmingham.

 

[Miss Mayberry]

Originally, Huntsville. (well, really a teeny vicinity called "Ryland" by locals, but it isn't on a map, or anything). Now I live in N.C.