By Wade Bourne

October 26, 2010, was the day "the bomb" dropped on Devils Lake, North Dakota. 

The temperature plunged into the 20s. Rain showers turned into curtains of snow. Straight-line winds blew upwards of 50 mph for most of the day and night. The barometric pressure was the lowest ever recorded in the U.S. interior—lower even than on that fateful day in 1975 when the ore hauler Edmund Fitzgerald broke apart and sank in Lake Superior. This was one of the most violent storms ever to sweep across the northern plains.

Bob Meek and I greeted this tempestuous morning sitting in his truck watching a county road disappear beneath a froth of angry water. My Go-Devil boat was hitched behind us and my Lab Andy was tucked into his dog crate in the pickup's bed. We were anxious to go duck hunting, but the conditions were just too severe. Instead, we decided to head back to town to wait out the storm. A chili omelet and a late-morning nap seemed more appealing than battling the elements for a few greenheads. Besides, we had already enjoyed two days of spectacular hunting.