Best of fortune to those in the Mid Atlantic and North East (raise, travel)
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unless you were here in the 1930's nothing compared to the devastation here in the last 100 years.
i have been here in nyc for every weather event for the last 60 years and i have never witnessed anything like this in my time.
yeah we had long beach and rockaway and fire island have their usual wash over from time to time but certainly nothing like the damage in other areas or in the 5 boroghs of nyc. the amount of homeless is staggering.
even zone b areas which were considered not at evacuation risk were washed away. we are a zone c where i live . the water missed us by two ave blocks.
those used to hurricanes cant understand how new york wasnt better prepared. well i can say the same things when these freak snow storms hit down south and daily life stops .
the answer is we all base our lives on the highest bar we see practical for our areas and anything over the norm can be quite a shock.
Last edited by mathjak107; 11-04-2012 at 03:33 PM..
unless you were here in the 1930's nothing compared to the devastation here in the last 100 years.
i have been here in nyc for every weather event for the last 60 years and i have never witnessed anything like this in my time.
yeah we had long beach and rockaway and fire island have their usual wash over from time to time but certainly nothing like the damage in other areas or in the 5 boroghs of nyc. the amount of homeless is staggering.
even zone b areas which were considered not at evacuation risk were washed away. we are a zone c where i live . the water missed us by two ave blocks.
those used to hurricanes cant understand how new york wasnt better prepared. well i can say the same things when these freak snow storms hit down south and daily life stops .
the answer is we all base our lives on the highest bar we see practical for our areas and anything over the norm can be quite a shock.
The issue is how you define the area. If you define it very narrowly - you're missing the picture. It's like someone in Florida saying that because X (perhaps Sarasota) hasn't had a direct hit since I moved here 40 years ago - I shouldn't worry. That's the way people where I live are (since the last hurricane to hit this area was in 1964). It's a very myopic way to look at things.
Now I happened to live in Philadelphia when Agnes hit in 1972. Here are some pictures:
And - of course - Irene was no slouch in terms of damage last year. But perhaps people where you live took the wrong message from it. Not that there was lots of damage pretty close to them - but that they weren't damaged at all.
I guess if you've lived close to the water for a long time - you know that a little zig or zag here or there can mean the difference between lots of damage/destruction and a couple of downed tree branches. At least with a very destructive intense windstorm. Windstorms are like figure skaters doing spins. The higher the winds - the faster they go - the tighter they are. Sandy was an absolutely huge high level tropical storm/low intensity hurricane. I don't know if it set a record in terms of size - but it sure looked impressive in terms of size. And it was scheduled to collide with the other fronts - and hit at the full moon high tide. You're very lucky the storm intensified a bit as it approached land - which caused it to move forward faster. As a result of which it made landfall quite a few hours before high tide. Also - maybe your local newscasters don't know that the NE side of a storm is the "dirty" side. It's not unusual for people in the NE quadrant to get hit worse than people directly in the middle.
Anyway - I think if people near any water up north think they're not at risk - they're just fooling themselves. And - IIRC - you're only a few blocks from the water. In a zone C????? Perhaps you need to redraw your evacuation zones. Note that the ones where I live are pretty stupid too. Our house is in a zone B - evacuation in a cat 2 hurricane - although we live on a barrier island . A cat 1 and we're out of here (we stay during tropical storms - sustained wind speeds < 74 mph - and we've had about 3 bad ones since we moved here about 15 years ago).
Finally - what do you think ought to be done with all those people whose places are wrecked? People who don't have power - heat - etc. After Andrew - the military put up I don't know how many thousands of tents for people to live in (we had over 150,000 homes totally destroyed/uninhabitable). But tents obviously don't cut it up north in the winter. Robyn
here we hae no problem with cat1 like Humnberto with noraml surge upto 8 ft. only immediate coatal areas are evacuated. Now Rita with 130 sustained was a different story really. that one cause major wind damage not seen before i alot of storms here.Not sure after seeig Hpuiton evacuate for Rita that such a poulaitn can be evacuate really. lukily that one was near misss with lower winds there. Large coties really needed to look at palces like Tokyo i dealig wioth majot hurricane above cat2 as they deal with them often.
It would appear that it could get worse for some East Coast. A very cold storm seems to be moving and that should get about midweek and drop temperatures in some areas down into the 20s. New York City is already contemplating having to house 30,000 to 40,000 people if this thing hits. Let's keep our fingers crossed for all that it doesn't happen or at least is far less severe.
unless you were here in the 1930's nothing compared to the devastation here in the last 100 years.
i have been here in nyc for every weather event for the last 60 years and i have never witnessed anything like this in my time.
yeah we had long beach and rockaway and fire island have their usual wash over from time to time but certainly nothing like the damage in other areas or in the 5 boroghs of nyc. the amount of homeless is staggering.
even zone b areas which were considered not at evacuation risk were washed away. we are a zone c where i live . the water missed us by two ave blocks.
those used to hurricanes cant understand how new york wasnt better prepared. well i can say the same things when these freak snow storms hit down south and daily life stops .
the answer is we all base our lives on the highest bar we see practical for our areas and anything over the norm can be quite a shock.
Well I kind of find it both laughable and deplorable that people spend hours per week on their financial doings and virtually nothing on emergency preparation, and then cry out for help when it is their own fault. We all know what kinds of areas we live in, whether hurricane/flood-prone, earthquake-prone, or tornado-prone. Not what you would call wealthy, I always managed to have myself and my family and dog prepared to evacuate. It takes all of an afternoon to get an emergency car trunk prepared, and in Sandy anyone had ample time to gas up. Mandatory evacuations were ignored. There was plenty of time for crews of volunteers and city employees to make sure everyone who was to evacuate did so. You could see Christie's frustration that his orders, given in plenty of time, were being ignored. Sure there are plenty of exceptions (the old and infirm, but still what kind of city emergency plan does not take those people into prime consideration in a disaster??), but many people brought havoc on themselves. Having created small city disaster plans for the Red Cross, I shake my head at the ineptness that led a good segment of victims to unnecessary misery.
Does everyone in these areas have a map of where their very nearest shelters are? If not, why not? Shelters are typically open before a disaster strikes, if there is ample warning to open them, and to my knowledge there was for Sandy.
For the most part folks did what they had to do and thats why there were only around 50 deaths in a city of millions.
Folks stocked up on food ,water and fueled up way before the storm and thats why we had nothing left after the storm ended.
There will always be a bunch everywhere that test the elements.
The shelters are not known prior as they are set up on the fly where best allocated.
Unlike other areas nyc has a huge amount of homeless to house even before these disasters.
Unlike throwing up a tent in florida the winter in nyc is alot harder to deal with.
For the most part the city is fine except for the gas deliveries.
Other areas that got hit will take a while to recover but one thing new yorkers are getting used to is disasters.
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. A cat 1 and we're out of here (we stay during tropical storms - sustained wind speeds < 74 mph - and we've had about 3 bad ones since we moved here about 15 years ago).
