During a recent storm, my wife and I lost our air conditioner. We live near the coast, and summer storms often cause damage. We lose tree limbs from the oak, cypress, and palm trees. There is always debris on the ground and in the streets. We’ve never had enough damage to cause harm to our home. We had a tree fall into the fence one year, but we only had to replace three fence panels. Several weeks ago, a major thunderstorm formed in our area. The storm was responsible for several tornadoes in the country, and one lightning bolt struck the transformer in town. The whole town was out of power for 36 hours, while crews repaired the lines. The thunderstorm kept dumping rain on our neighborhood for three consecutive days. We had a ton of debris in the yard. One of the tree branches fell very close to our home. It was close enough to hit the air conditioner. When the tree limb hit the living room air conditioner, it sounded like a bolt of lightning. The sound was loud and crashing. I thought the house was going to be split into two pieces. We were extremely lucky the window didn’t break. The air conditioner will need to be replaced. It sat in the rain for hours, because none of us wanted to venture out in the storm. We assumed the air conditioner was toast, due to the crash. Luckily, we’ve had the same air conditioner for almost 15 years. It was getting time to replace the old machine anyways. When the spring sales start, were going to head over to the hardware store and purchase something brand new.