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OK, I know, there's no such thing as a little hurricane.
But Katrina was a Category 4, wasn't it, with winds topping 150mph? Sandy is maybe a Cat 1, max winds around 80mph and gusts to 90?
If Sandy had hit New Orleans dead on like Katrina did, people there would mostly brush it off, "just another hurricane, no big deal", they get them fairly frequently down there. They board up the windows, stock up on batteries and Coleman fuel, and either visit their aunt in Denver or just ride it out.
What's different about Sandy isn't the hurricane itself. It's that it hit 60 million people, not 15 million like Katrina did... and it was 60 million who aren't used to hurricanes in an area far less prepared for one. 80mph winds, huge rain, and storm surges along the shore are still nothing to sneeze at.
And Sandy is hitting *newspapermen* right where they live: Manhattan and Washington DC. That's the real reason for all the consternation and screaming. "Journalists" who went to NO to cover Katrina, felt like they were visiting a foreign land (well, for them, maybe they were: The United States of America), not seeing something that was happening to THEM. But Sandy is hitting them right between the eyes: They CAN'T get away from it.
Katrina was huge and unusually powerful; Sandy is only average as hurricanes go. But Sandy is hitting journalists where they live... and that makes it news.
Well, look at the earthquake that hit the Northeast. The media were all up in a frenzy about it, but those same earthquakes shake your neck of the woods about once a month or so and they only get a paragraph mention on page 5
OK, I know, there's no such thing as a little hurricane.
But Katrina was a Category 4, wasn't it, with winds topping 150mph? Sandy is maybe a Cat 1, max winds around 80mph and gusts to 90?
If Sandy had hit New Orleans dead on like Katrina did, people there would mostly brush it off, "just another hurricane, no big deal", they get them fairly frequently down there. They board up the windows, stock up on batteries and Coleman fuel, and either visit their aunt in Denver or just ride it out.
What's different about Sandy isn't the hurricane itself. It's that it hit 60 million people, not 15 million like Katrina did... and it was 60 million who aren't used to hurricanes in an area far less prepared for one. 80mph winds, huge rain, and storm surges along the shore are still nothing to sneeze at.
And Sandy is hitting *newspapermen* right where they live: Manhattan and Washington DC. That's the real reason for all the consternation and screaming. "Journalists" who went to NO to cover Katrina, felt like they were visiting a foreign land (well, for them, maybe they were: The United States of America), not seeing something that was happening to THEM. But Sandy is hitting them right between the eyes: They CAN'T get away from it.
Katrina was huge and unusually powerful; Sandy is only average as hurricanes go. But Sandy is hitting journalists where they live... and that makes it news.
What makes this storm "big" is the fact that there are 36 people dead and 20 billion in property damage. That is almost twice the FEMA budget.
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