What the Heck is a Haboob?

I sure never heard of a Haboob...until last night when I was sitting in my living room watching TV.  Suddenly a special alert came on the tube showing a large sandstorm had just entered the Gilbert/Chandler area.  I thought, oh no, we are right in it's path, and there's no way we are going to miss this.   It was HUGE!  It looked like a giant exploding vacuum sweeper bag!   Sure enough, within minutes it was here.  My daughter called and said, "Welcome to Phoenix!"  I'm used to thunderstorms, snowstorms and blizzards, from living in Iowa, not sandstorms.  I learned later that this was an exceptionally large sandstorm, called a Haboob, one that many valley residents have never seen the likes of.  It's more of a middle east type of storm.  This one was over a mile high and 100 miles long! It lasted about an hour, with sustained winds of 50 to 70 miles an hour, with a sprinkling of rain afterwards...just enough to put sand and mud spots on everything!  We are in monsoon season now and typically it means there can be rain and blowing dust.  Sometimes a lot of rain at once.  This is a Haboob... 

 My daughter took this picture from her second floor bedroom as the Haboob made it's way into her neighborhood.  It crawled over the mountain, which you can't even see here. I live only 7 blocks away, so I got hit virtually at the same time.  I wish I would have looked out the window to see it coming, but I certainly heard it once it arrived.  Boy, did I ever!  It sounded like a blizzard with sleet and ice coming down.

In this picture you can see the bottom of South Mountain.  I saw my neighbor driving in to their garage during the middle of the storm.  Unfortunately, they got caught in it.  So many cars today were covered in sand and dirt and the news reported that the car washes were crowded all day.  People's pools were full of sand, too.  However, my neighbor's pool looked pretty clean, considering.

This is what my windows looked like this morning.  And people who know me, know that I can't stand dirty windows!  The first thing I did when I got up was go outside and start cleaning up.  I even skipped my morning coffee!  It actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be out there.  I hosed down everything, washed the windows, and raked the seeds that finally fell from my cypress tree, thanks to the wind.  Everything was back in order 4 hours later.  Oh, and my cypress tree is actually standing up straighter than it was before. hehe

 

 My daughter and her husband kept laughing at the pronunciation of Haboob, so.... I had to laugh when I saw this photo in my daughter's facebook album after she posted pictures of the Haboob.  I commented that this is 'a little boobie'.  Shame on me.  Oh well, she thought the comment was funny, and we needed some humor after the experience we just had.

While I was outside working today I saw that the house that is being built behind me is going to be a two story, not a single story like I was hoping.  Now, not only is my mountain view gone, but so is my privacy.  I've got to figure out what to do about this.  I need some fast growing, super tall trees and bushes.  Or a cheaper way to go would be to annoy them somehow so THEY are forced to spend the money on some privacy plants.  I'm such a clean, quiet person who isn't home much, so how can I annoy them?  I was here first!