It's never to early to start worrying...
Posted on 05/08/2006 5:51:19 AM PDT by redfish53
As the season looms, it's becomming more and more apparent that the US is not ready for this upcomming season.
I was fortunate enough to travel down to Marathon Key (on behalf of Mark Sudduth and hurricanetrack.com) this weekend to help out at a Hurricane Seminar there. This was my first trip into the Keys in some 14 years or so.
The upper and middle Keys have really changed. Well, all of them have since my last visit, but, there is a ton of new construction there with perhaps billions of new residential developments down there. Surrounding these beautiful and vurnable estates are poorly constructed commercial store fronts of every type you can imagine. Many are built from metal or sheeting, there are billboards everywhere and in many places, residents down there have been allowed to build their own home over time with little regulation or oversight.
So as I stood there at the momument to the 1935 hurricane there in Islamorada, surrounded by all of these things on a 2 lane road out of the Keys, it is very obvious. They Keys are not ready for this season, and our country isn't either.
Every Keys resident I spoke with said really 2 things. They estimate only 15% (at most) of the residents evacuated for Wilma, and there have been too man false alarms in the last few years.
Since 2004, the keys have been cleared out for Ivan, Jeanne, Rita, Katrina and Wilma and I think I am missing one storm.
How many places must also think there have been too many false alarms? Just about every hurricane prone city has had one in this active phase:
Houston last year with Rita New Orleans countless times (now they have the opposite problem) Tampa with Charley Miami with Jeanne, Frances, and Ivan ...And so on...
So as we stand less than 4 weeks from the next season, there are more problems. Accuweather is out there predicting doom and gloom for the subscriber-heavy Northeast. An NHC false-alarm email has aleady sparked panic in New Orleans. Many places in SE Florida haven't recovered from cat 1 winds in Wilma, and there are countless blue-tarps in place in SW Florida from Charley 2 years ago. Perdido Key hasn't recovered from Ivan. Mississippi is still clearing debris from Katrina with many who were lost still yet to be recovered or identified in Lousiana. The levees around Lake Okechobee, protecting residents and water supplies and ecosystems, are given a 17% chance of failing in any season.
And littered all over the Gulf and Eastern seaboard are communities that haven't experenced a direct hit in generations.
The NWS meteorologist at the seminar, Matt Strahan, has a very good point which he shared with me after things wound down Saturday. Most people think they know what a hurricane can do. Many more people than not, even in areas with direct hits, have not experienced the inner core of a strong or intense hurricane, but they think they have. This may be the most dangerous thing of all, and many, including Max Mayfield, believe that this type of belief system may have caused Camille to kill more people in 2005 than Katrina did.
Finally, there is a sense of disbelief taking over with the new season closing in. 17 storms? That number in any other season before this one would have caused panic. This season, outside of New Orleans, that number is considered GOOD NEWS.
Chances are we are going to get hit hard somewhere this year. Some will tell you they know where, which is of course, BS, but we are probably going to get hit again.
If it's Houston, we'll be wishing for 3 dollar a gallon gas prices. If it's a hurricane in Miami like 1926, the death toll from surge and evacuees who didn't leave could rival Katrina. If it is the NE US, well, we will look back on 2005 like we look at 2004 now. Bad, but not as bad as it was a year ago. And if it is the Keys, well, I've seen it, it will be bad beyond any current standard.
And we know that FEMA has yet to demonstrate they can respond to anything.
So, really what can be done?
All anyone reading this post can do is this. If you're reading this, you likely follow the tropics closely. Start talking to everyone you know about hurricanes. Discuss what you know about surge, about the inner core where the most destructive winds are, about the outlook for this coming season. Ask them about their plan. Help them find a place to go if they need to evacuate. Sign up to help with rumor control hotlines or help lines, every community has these and they need all of the help they can get. Talk them out of bad ideas like "riding it out" or "hurricane parties".
At the same time, be a model of preparation. Get your shutters or plywood now. Get your supplies ready before June 1st. Know where you are going to go if you have to leave. Don't try to ride it out on your own...etc.
We know the media won't help. But even if you talk to 2 extra people, and change the way they think about hurricanes, you've made a huge impact.
This is a bigger problem than any one person or organization or city can solve. Years of run-away real estate, poor building regulation and poorly advised and unsafe costal development combined with a very unlikely lull in activity has built this monster. We all can affect our sphere of influence however, and help prepare and protect the people we know and care for.
And given everything we're up against, that's the best we can do. Even if the country isn't ready, we can be.
MW
It's never to early to start worrying...
Ditto,
5 Kw generator is ready to go, just have to fill the gas cans. Do that a few days before the hurricane (or ice storm) hits. If it goes elsewhere the gas goes in the cars for the next few days.
Same with food and water. Stock up a few days out on regular food stuffs, medicine, etc.
Our block is about 1/2 ex and active military so looting will not be a problem.
If more did for themselves the strain on local government would not be so bad and less from the federal government would be needed.
I wonder why we are not doing more research on hurricane modification? There has to be a technologically feasible method of artificially weakening hurricanes before they hit the coast. If China can make artifical rain to clear the air from dust storms then surely our country can at least make an effort to decrease the harmful effects of hurricanes upon coastal communities.
Yeah...after Rita they've set up pet friendly shelters as part of the evac plan and fuel trucks along the evac routes...we seem to be getting better
I have five 20 pound propane tanks, and make sure at least three are always filled....Mr. Weber may become the kitchen stove for quite awhile if we get 'the big one'...
He means that since Camille was predicted to be THE one, many people treated Katrina the same way, thinking that Camille was as bad as it could possibly get. The mentality he is describing is "well, I did just fine through Camille, and that one was as bad as it can possibly be, so I'm staying for Katrina", and that line of thought probably caused many of the fatal victims to try and ride out Katrina, which had a storm surge over three times the height of Camille.
I heard that in the future, in order to withstand hurricane-force winds, cities will be built entirely of chocolate.
(Or something like that.)
City O' Chocolate is the FEMA debit card of the future
Time to call in Brownie.
Sure we are!
Just because EVERY little 'misfortune' that weather will bring us WON'T be handled at zero cost and in instant time doesn't mean we're not ready!
All of the new construction where I live will weather windstorms much better than the old construction ie: Hip roofs vs. gables and mandatory rafter tie downs. Also the shingles are six nailed. Not to mention through pours with rebar. The sky is not falling with regard to the new construction.
I love hurricane season. But, I'm biased as I'm a Florida resident and a Catastrophe Insurance Adjuster. Hurricane's = $$$$.
Exactly! As if Bird Flu, Iranian Nukes, AL Queda tapes and Speaker Pelosi weren't enough to worry about!
Did this guy graduate the sixth grade? Note the overuse of commas and the blatant hyperbole.
It's pretty telling that a guy critiquing hurricane preparedness doesn't understand that basic fact - that by the time you are sure where a hurricane is going, it is too late to evacuate everyone.
The problem with running away from all but the biggest storms and close to the coast, is the government won't let you back till your place is well looted and you are broke.
"I'm not ready yet (11 miles inland at Va Beach). But I am building up some supplies... water, canned soups and veggies, spare peopane tank, and I'll be purchasing a handgun with a thousand rounds or so..."
A piece of advise, unless you are planning on becoming pretty good with that handgun and plan to carry it around with you, forget it and the 1000 rounds...buy a shotgun and 100 rounds and you are ready for about anything one can think you will ever see and be able to deal with.
Can someone translate "vurnable" into English for me? My dictionary won't even guess.
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