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Post by cybrunette on Apr 1, 2023 10:58:30 GMT -6
With the outbreak of tornados yesterday, it got me thinking about how natural disasters have affected competitions, travel, practice, etc. in the past. I know some of you have a long history of knowledge or memories yourself you're holding on to, so let's hear some stories? Maybe articles or other sources would be an interesting read as well. I mean do we know if a significant enough event to have been a season ender for certain marching bands, winter seasons, concert seasons, ruined a band camp, etc.?
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Post by jmike16 on Apr 1, 2023 17:57:26 GMT -6
I think one Severe weather incident that most people know about is Hurricane Harvey 2017. With me being in Southeast Texas, I am very familiar with hurricanes so normally they arent too big of an issue.
However, with how crazy the path Harvey took, that left many cities/towns devastated. Lumberton was no exception. Over half of the town was underwater, the town of Lumberton was a legit island for over 2 weeks with no way to get in/out of except by air. To which then the high school parking lot became a parking pad for military helicopters. Since we were an island, we had no school for a little over 2 weeks. No practice either, however that did not stop us. With a show called "Above & Beyond", we made it to 5A State for the first time in 37 years later on in the season.
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Post by itsjustband on Apr 3, 2023 12:22:58 GMT -6
Newnan HS in Georgia had the school take a direct hit from an EF4 tornado in April of 2021 I think? It was devastating  |
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Post by cybrunette on Apr 3, 2023 15:29:32 GMT -6
I think one Severe weather incident that most people know about is Hurricane Harvey 2017. With me being in Southeast Texas, I am very familiar with hurricanes so normally they arent too big of an issue. However, with how crazy the path Harvey took, that left many cities/towns devastated. Lumberton was no exception. Over half of the town was underwater, the town of Lumberton was a legit island for over 2 weeks with no way to get in/out of except by air. To which then the high school parking lot became a parking pad for military helicopters. Since we were an island, we had no school for a little over 2 weeks. No practice either, however that did not stop us. With a show called "Above & Beyond", we made it to 5A State for the first time in 37 years later on in the season. I can't imagine how stressful Hurricane Season can be. Seeing a monster coming your way & already leaning on the decision to cancel everything until fate decides to change its direction within a single day of its landfall. I guess we can think of 2022 Hurricane Ian too, wasn't that supposed to slam directly into Tarpon Springs / Tampa cities in the initial track a day or 2 before? Of course not to look over the schools & cities it affected in it's actual path, but just speaking on how unknown their direction can be. |
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Post by cybrunette on Apr 3, 2023 15:35:35 GMT -6
Newnan HS in Georgia had the school take a direct hit from an EF4 tornado in April of 2021 I think? It was devastating What sparked my interest to start this thread was seeing Wynne HS completely destroyed a couple days ago. I was looking at the inside of the performing arts building from those news ariel views wondering what the long term affects would be in a situation like that |
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Post by bigtrombone on Apr 3, 2023 17:24:35 GMT -6
Back in October 2015, Wando, fresh off a strong appearance at Grand Nationals, had their season impacted by historic flooding in South Carolina. Mt. Pleasant, SC saw nearly 27 inches of rain in a 4 day period. Wando lost a lot of rehearsal time because of it which led to their lowest placement at the Atlanta Super Regional that year. They were thankfully able to bounce back stronger in 2016.
Later that month, a Tornado/Flooding Severe Weather Event in Texas led to Leander, Hendrickson, & Dripping Springs to miss their original performance slots at the San Antonio Super Regional and led them to take exhibition performances.
In 2018, the Waco Regional was outright cancelled after a few performances, due to Severe Weather.
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Post by es203 on Apr 5, 2023 11:29:22 GMT -6
Powder Springs in 2019 was definitely an interesting story. I remember watching all the bands on Flo as we were driving to Atlanta and seeing how crazy the wind was, with the forecast saying rain all afternoon. Everyone thought prelims would at least be delayed, but we made it through prelims without any huge hiccups. And then prelims awards happened, and it started pouring. And we couldn't leave, we HAD to hear our prelims placement. The 4 hour bus ride back was very soggy. Thanks weather
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Post by boahistorybuff on Apr 5, 2023 19:58:10 GMT -6
Many regional finals have been cancelled due to thunderstorms and flooding rain. We had a Texas regional finals cancelled due to heat. Over the years a couple of the mid Atlantic regionals were completely cancelled due to flooding rain. High winds and rain have cancelled a couple Pacific northwest regionals. Poor air quality due to forest fires have even cancelled the WBA championships.
I do know of high schools which were destroyed by violent tornadoes in past decades. In each case, their marching band was either not competitive or not in a circuit that I have been familiar with.
The Wando example from 2015 is the best example I can think of when weather events really hurt a bands competitive season.
A non weather issue that has affected programs is long duration teacher strikes. Norwin PA had to deal with that at the start of the 1981 season. They still managed to finish 2nd at Grand Nationals.
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Post by crowncrawler on Apr 7, 2023 19:58:19 GMT -6
Not super exciting but NightBEAT 2022 (DCI comp) got rained out, Devils and Crown didn't get to perform which was sad
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Post by bigtrombone on Apr 7, 2023 20:41:57 GMT -6
Not super exciting but NightBEAT 2022 (DCI comp) got rained out, Devils and Crown didn't get to perform which was sad Can confirm since I was there, but from what I've heard, rain during NightBeat is a pretty common occurence. |
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Post by Subito Fortissimo on Apr 7, 2023 20:57:58 GMT -6
Not super exciting but NightBEAT 2022 (DCI comp) got rained out, Devils and Crown didn't get to perform which was sad Can confirm since I was there, but from what I've heard, rain during NightBeat is a pretty common occurence. It is commonly referred to as RainBEAT around these parts. |
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Post by kvgdc on Apr 15, 2023 8:43:32 GMT -6
Twice in the 80s my band in Ft. Wayne was on the parking lot and had a 'leave everything and run to the building' moment when the tornado sirens went off. My sister had one before me too. For those that don't know, the sirens go off for a warning meaning a tornado has been spotted.
I marched a BOA regional a Terre Haute that was done in a 'non storm' deluge of pouring rain. We beat Lake Park and came within inches of Marian Catholic in prelims. But fell back at the night show for finals a spot. For the prelims in the rain we simply didn't have the plumes but otherwise were out there in our full uniforms. They were put on hangers and then we were instructed to hang them on the insides of the partially cracked windows of the school busses were rain came in those partially cracked windows anyway.
For the night show, the temps had dropped like 20 degrees after the front passed through and with wind. So there are putting on soggy wool/acrylic uniforms. Our parents group (usually boisterous and up front) had taken a block under the overhang and their sound was swallowed. Which was sort of deflating for us as well. That was the operating narrative after the night show. Parent's group actually did an apology to the band for having moved afterwards.
We got to hear the Prelims M/M judge tape though and he was raving for us. "This is the only band I've seen all day where they're out there like it's not raining!" We were the last of the finalists to have gone on in prelims too.
So we took that with us.
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Post by boahistorybuff on Apr 18, 2023 8:48:39 GMT -6
Twice in the 80s my band in Ft. Wayne was on the parking lot and had a 'leave everything and run to the building' moment when the tornado sirens went off. My sister had one before me too. For those that don't know, the sirens go off for a warning meaning a tornado has been spotted. I marched a BOA regional a Terre Haute that was done in a 'non storm' deluge of pouring rain. We beat Lake Park and came within inches of Marian Catholic in prelims. But fell back at the night show for finals a spot. For the prelims in the rain we simply didn't have the plumes but otherwise were out there in our full uniforms. They were put on hangers and then we were instructed to hang them on the insides of the partially cracked windows of the school busses were rain came in those partially cracked windows anyway. For the night show, the temps had dropped like 20 degrees after the front passed through and with wind. So there are putting on soggy wool/acrylic uniforms. Our parents group (usually boisterous and up front) had taken a block under the overhang and their sound was swallowed. Which was sort of deflating for us as well. That was the operating narrative after the night show. Parent's group actually did an apology to the band for having moved afterwards. We got to hear the Prelims M/M judge tape though and he was raving for us. "This is the only band I've seen all day where they're out there like it's not raining!" We were the last of the finalists to have gone on in prelims too. So we took that with us. That was the infamous 1987 BOA Terre Haute Regional. The stories of that regional carried into 1988. Plymouth-Canton missed finals at that regional which they blamed on the rain. Later that season, a rain soaked and muddy field at the Michigan State Championships proved to be another stumbling block for PCEP. By the time the Flight 1 bands performed, the yard lines had disappeared within the mud. PCEP struggled with this and finished an uncharacteristic third. Flushing, we were very used to practicing on a muddy field, rose to the occasion and took the state title. That all happened before I was in the band but the stories carried right through the 1988 season (my freshman year). Those disappointments in 1987 lit a fire under PCEP and in 1988 they went undefeated in the state and made GN Finals for the first time. |
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Post by kvgdc on Apr 18, 2023 19:14:55 GMT -6
Yup.
I think i can still smell my damp uniform from 1987.
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Post by floridaman on Apr 24, 2023 11:48:18 GMT -6
Starting with Charlie in 2004, there were 4 hurricanes & a tropical storm that hit here in Florida. After the weekend it hit, band staff was somehow able to contact everyone after finding out school cancellations were extended through the entirety of the following week. Power was out at least in my area for almost an entire week, but we still managed to get together for practice! I remember practice was longer than normal too. When the other 2 hurricanes (Frances and Jeanne) were approaching, school cancellations were taken a little more seriously because of the damage and flooding Charlie caused, so all together it was about another weeks worth of us not having class. Although Ivan’s path changed towards northern Florida, it still caused panic since all these storms hit every weekend consecutively from the end of August towards the end of September. At least my band was lucky enough for these storms to not affect our schedule for the season, so we competed as normal that year! Not sure how every one else’s bands faired, but I know all the very competitive groups down here were at all the competitions we went to!
Since we’re in the year of 2004, our state finals got rained out which was unfortunate because it would’ve been the tightest competition we had in the 00’s (a lot of school splits, director changes, and up and coming new schools were changing the marching band dynamic back then). The following year in 2005 they changed the format to having class champions instead of having a grand champion. Finals was also moved to the Tropicana Dome so we wouldn’t have to worry about weather issues. I know the location has changed in recent years as it was a wet retreat and finals for 2a /3a in 2022. But as for 2004 you could tell there was a fire lit because of hurricane season being so active & everyone being so unsure all the time of how marching season was going to play out.
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