You are not direct to this forum or anywhere in this World. It is like a phone call and except locally in which you may pass through several central office locations to call the person, across the Country or World you are going through perhaps many central offices to get there. In the case of the Internet, with Servers, it is the same way, and by the way, probably each Server you are going through to finally get to this forum or anywhere on the Internet, they are keeping a copy of what you are doing perhaps at that time and what was typed.
Not to make anyone paranoid but if you think you are direct anywhere you could not afford it and things just do not run that way, and never will.
So bad weather can change how fast the Internet is working, along with the traffic on the Internet from you to wherever you are going at the other end of the connection.
In other words, they own it, not you and if you had to own it, you probably could not even begin to afford it. They own it, and they run it like they want to.
And when equipment fails, it fails and all of that. The Environment!