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Obviously all cities can have natural disasters. However some natural disasters are different than others. What type of natural disaster would make you not want to move to a new city? I.E you really don't want to deal with hurricanes so you don't movie to New Orleans. Or you really don't want to deal with wildfires so you don't move to L.A. ETC.
I'm surprised hurricanes was number 1, I'd have thought tornadoes. I feel like hurricanes are not a problem if you live in a well built home.
I'm surprised hurricanes was number 1, I'd have thought tornadoes. I feel like hurricanes are not a problem if you live in a well built home.
The most well-built home can still get flood water, wind-driven rain and debris, loss of electricity for weeks at a time, trees and/or tree limbs landing on roof, landscaping and fencing destroyed, or crazy things like a shift in foundation can happen. Your vehicles can still get flooded or damaged. Your workplace can, or your storage units can also get severely damaged or destroyed. Your friends, family, and co-workers may not be as lucky as you. Schools may be damaged and closed for extended periods of time. If you are old, ill, or disabled, you must be evacuated and are at a risk to your life whether you stay or not, either due to the stress of the evacuation, impacts of the storm, or impacts after the storm such as greater disease, insufficient medical help, or loss of electricity. Your city's infrastructure, utilities, water, drainage, and sewage can be severely damaged. Your roads may be impassable. Your insurance rates will skyrocket if your area was hit. And once hit, even if your home is unaffected, your area will take years to fully recover, hopefully before the next storm hits.
If you do flood, you will never recover all of your repair costs with insurance alone. It will take years to fully recover, and it will be difficult to find good help. Mold and mildew will flourish, and your health will suffer. Your children will have nightmares for years afterwards.
Unlike tornadoes, in the worst affected areas hurricanes are predictable and will happen again some time in the future. When considering a new city, hurricane-prone areas are avoidable.
Last edited by RocketSci; 06-13-2019 at 06:46 PM..
Coming back to this, the whole evacuation part of hurricanes makes it pretty crazy. Seeing those videos and pictures of clogged up freeways before hurricane Irma of people trying to escape north out of southern Florida was pretty insane to me. You see this with wildfires and volcanoes too, but I feel like the alarm factor is the biggest with hurricanes. Volcanic eruptions normally have good warning and don't happen often (at least in the mainland U.S.)
I don't live very close to areas severely impacted by hurricanes (though we do often get days and days of rain associated with them), but I think that it's often the specter of days and days with no electricity that is part of the problem.
Tornadoes because they seem so frequent, random, and highly destructive where they strike. The death tolls for such a relatively small area of damage seems really high.
Wildfires because they have become so much more intense and fast moving over the years. You really don't have much warning now and a lot are spreading in the middle of the night when people are asleep. I definitely would avoid an area with higher wildfire danger when buying a home now. The smoke from them is really getting to be a drag in Northern Ca too with weeks being spent indoors because the air is so bad.
As far as earthquakes, they are just so rare, infrequent, and random it's really hard to worry about them.
I'm surprised hurricanes was number 1, I'd have thought tornadoes. I feel like hurricanes are not a problem if you live in a well built home.
They are still a problem. FL builds very strong homes to withstand winds of certain intensities yet they always seem to get wrecked after major hurricane events.
They are still a problem. FL builds very strong homes to withstand winds of certain intensities yet they always seem to get wrecked after major hurricane events.
But you still have time to prepare and evacuate usually. Not with tornadoes.
But you still have time to prepare and evacuate usually. Not with tornadoes.
OK can you be logical?
The actual odds of being hurt or having any significant property damage in a tornado, even in Tornado Alley, are so slim it's negligible.
I've lived in tornado prone areas nearly my whole life, and in Tornado Alley for twenty five years, and though I do occasionally seek shelter in a "small, windowless, interior room" (aka the powder room) I have never had any property damage, nor been injured - nor has anyone I've known personally. But the storms are often exciting!
The only time I've actually had real property damage was from Hurricane Ike, yes, five hours inland. I had to replace my roof, and not only that but we were also without power for about a week. Oh, and the flooding trapped us in so to speak - we couldn't get off our property due to flooding on the road for at least three days. Weird and expensive and definitely no bueno.
I remember sitting in my living room looking out the window helplessly as pieces of my roof flew off. Oh well.
They are still a problem. FL builds very strong homes to withstand winds of certain intensities yet they always seem to get wrecked after major hurricane events.
The fragile electric grid is the biggest problem from hurricanes and even tropical and ice storms where I live.
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