Whirling Wind ‘Eddy’ Whips Solon Flea Market Into Flying Frenzy

Weather is so weird. In Maine, we're mostly sheltered from the really bad stuff. We get some decent snow in the winter, but we rarely get tornadoes, or powerful hurricanes, or whatever. But even aside from that, sometimes mother Nature decides to just get a little nutty. If not a little scary.

I've been out on the lake before when the winds kicked up, in my little kayak, and felt little pangs of nervousness. More because I'm a terrible swimmer. Life jacket or not, if my little boat goes over, I'm going to have a pretty hard go of it, trying to get myself to safety and out of harm's way.

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But over the weekend, the weather was delightful, and some folks at a flea market in Solon, Maine probably felt like they had nothing particular to worry about. that is, until a "wind eddy" kicked up and started throwing things all over the place. Tipping tables, sending people's things flying into the air, and causing all sorts of chaos.

A wind eddy is a gust of wind that meets a solid object, and the air flow pushed around the side can create this little swirling wind spot. This is what caused things to go all asunder at the flea market. Thankfully no one was hurt, although some folks were struck by flying objects. It must've felt very wizard of Oz-ish.

Here's how Tess Laweryson described it to WABI...

Things were flying through the air so badly. I got smacked in the head with something, I don’t even know what it was. The lady that was across from me she said I watched it, I thought it was going to take my car up. But I really was shocked at how much stuff went flying over the tree line so we don’t even know where it all landed.

To be clear, despite how folks on the scene may have described it, it was definitely not a tornado. I imagine it was scary as all get-out, but thankfully, not an actual tornado. Maine only averages 2.3 tornadoes a year. Just the same, I hope everyone recovered all their pot holders, and scarves. They were the real victims....