PHX Haboob

moxiepilot

Well-Known Member
http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-818051?hpt=hp_bn1

Great picture:

Haboob1jpg-2162841_p9.jpg
 
They've been happening more and more lately. One last year was causal to a 30 car pileup with 2 killed and 20+ serious injuries. I was passing through right at that moment headed to PHX from a contract, and was going 5mph through the dust when I came upon carnage and wreckage. Stuck there as only fire vehicle and firefighter for 30 minutes until first additional fire units could arrive. Accident scene was 1/3 mile long. Was a pain triaging that.

Couldn't land helicopters due to the blowing dust, all transports had to be from ground. Luckily, no vehicles caught fire.

In the vid below, at :15, my firetruck is in the foreground in front of the black car, and at :27, you see the car that had the initial fatal, as well as the woman who later became a fatal. This extrication was being done by the north-sector extrication team, and you can see me in the yellow turnout coat going under the back end of the tractor-trailer, as that was where the surviving woman was trapped in the mangled wreckage and it was the only place I could reach into the wreckage and communicate with her.

 
Growing up, these storms never happened. They were full blown monsoon storms. Downpouring rain, and amazing lightning shows. Now, they're massive walls of sand and dirt that turn everything into sugar cookies. Sucks.
 
Growing up, these storms never happened. They were full blown monsoon storms. Downpouring rain, and amazing lightning shows. Now, they're massive walls of sand and dirt that turn everything into sugar cookies. Sucks.

Which side of town did you grow up on? I grew up in Chandler and these dust storms (I will NOT call them that other name) usually happened once a year or so.
 
I grew up in Central Phx, around Central/Camelback. Lived in Scottsdale for a while, then ended up in Arcadia for a few years. Now out on the west side.

I have a hard time calling them them anything other than a dust storm, too.
 
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