Posted on 10/29/2012 10:21:35 AM PDT by NautiNurse
Late season Hurricane Sandy approaching the Eastern U.S. coast.
Sea Surface Temps
Local Radar & Weather: Wunderground Severe Wx Northeast
Philadelphia/New Jersey Current Wx
Delaware: Dover Air Force Base Current Wx
New York: Long Island Current Wx
Buoy Data: Current Observations
Mt. Holly NJ NWS Briefing Package for Hurricane Sandy (pdf file)
The motto with power lines seems to be, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
Seriously, there seems to be some kind of union mind set at work in the power industry. I’m told that technology exists to actually jump a downed section of wire, if you have a box pre-installed. A neighbor of mine worked for the company that made them. They couldn’t get the electric company to buy them.
The man lived on a street that had old electric lines that went out in every storm and put one of the units across the street from his house. We never had a problem with the power going out again. Then the property sold and they made him remove the power jump station. It kind of looked like one of those Comcast green units that you see along the road, except that we don’t have cable tv or high speed internet in the area.
Hey Gabz!
Good to hear you survived!
Today I was told they have 3 feet of snow in the hills of Virgina. Is that true?
I have seen this effect with vortices in liquids: water, oil, and after I viewed the wiki page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fujiwhara_effect I realized that I had seen this in the Pacific. However, I have traditionally paid very little attention to Pacific cyclones, and I have NEVER seen this effect in the Atlantic basin, so it never occurred to me. I kept relying on some type of energy transfer mechanism in my thoughts of the reason for this track, instead of a more physical influence mechanism.
This season will definitely help these programming teams tune some parameters of their models in a way that nothing else can. It seems possible that they have close to sufficient code built in to them. I consider that quite commendable.
Not to divert the thread (which is probably impossible) but this also illustrates how very small disagreements of models with reality can drastically affect model predictions, and only after comparison with reality can models be properly programmed. It motivates objections regarding how we are decades away from completing the process of program, tune, observe, tune, observe, tune... necessary for the global warming GCMs, since accurate prediction of climate decades or centuries out relies on many cycles of pertinent tuning done after a decade or more of observation.
If you ever find yourself playing games around POE/AEX, PM me and we’ll try to find something cajun you enjoy. Maybe see if you can make a decent pattern. Later... :)
Report from the Upper West Side:
Did a reconnaissance of the grocery situation and found no evidence of panic buying. The shelves were partly depleted but not nearly bare—even the water shelf. Manager said delivery coming tomorrow and the bridges were open. Seeming to confirm what he said, a couple of huge semis were chugging down Broadway as I went home.
Broadway seems funny without the constant hum of the subways.
Buses will start running soon but I did not see any.
Trash cans were overflowing on my way out, making me wonder why people could not adjust to the situation and hold on to their trash a bit longer. But then on the way back, a very small van was seen depositing an empty trash can on the corner. Did they empty the full one into the van, or just replace a full one with an empty one? Don’t know. Wondered if they were volunteers. In any case, Sanitation is on it.
Two friends supposed to show up for work tomorrow. One can walk there but the other one can’t. The supermarket checkout woman got a cab from 60-something street and will be reimbursed. I think employee transportation is the main reason the businesses that are closed had to close. The restaurants that are open are packed to the doors and windows.
I’ll sleep a bit better tonight!
Has anyone heard if there was another flood surge at 9 pm?
Glad to hear all is well on the UWS, firebrand. Feeling bad for so many friends still without power...we were very lucky on the UES. Sleep tight!
It’s good that it’s not as bad as it certainly could be.
I’m glad to hear that there are services and things are still moving.
Many thanks for your local update. Very relieved to learn supply and sanitation vehicles are back in action. Haven’t heard about another surge tonight. Prediction for NY-MA was 1-2ft above normal tide.
Lost my power 24 hours ago, got it now back.
Got it back a little after 11PM.
Great news! Thanks for checking in and welcome back!
Most newer areas have buried electrical lines. But in WA State, the power companies are resistant to burying the lines in older areas. It would put the linemen out of work.
Glad to hear your local watering hole is back in business!
We just got back home after losing power at 9 PM on Monday.Woke up to trees down all over.One block away there are at least 5 trees through houses.Down the shore it looks like we did OK but no-one is permitted on the Island.The Mayor said there are some gas leaks.The first time we got to see any video was last night when my daughter got her electric back.Winds must have been strong here cause the branches that came off were like missiles and are standing up strait on the lawn.Took the day off from work.
Aerial video this morning of NJ beachfront fires erupting through the sand (presumably from ruptured gas lines). Glad you took the day off. It will surely take a while to absorb the magnitude of the storm's wrath and cleanup. {{{hugs}}}
Godspeed during the days ahead. My God grant you strength and perseverance during the post-storm recovery. You are in our thoughts and prayers.
I have to disagree on two points. I think the surge will cause very significant damage along much of the Jersey Shore and Western Long Island. With NYC, the wild card is whether the subways get flooded. If that happens, it becomes a major disaster for NYC.
The most far-reaching impact will be power outages - upwards of ten million people if not more, along with all the associated economic losses from such. And there will be social unrest in some areas as well when the potable water and food runs out.
Regarding wind damage, I agree. Not significant structural wind damage except spotty tree and limb falls.
OK, let's compare notes. I think I got it pretty close to what happened. I underestimated the wind damage. Slightly overestimated the power outages, but not by much. And we are starting to see some unrest in flooded areas such as Hoboken.
Sandy points out some of the inherent problems with the Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale, especially in the Northeast. Sandy hit as a Cat 1 post-tropical system. Irene hit as a tropical storm. Agnes hit as a tropical storm. All three caused massive damage, but I think Sandy will end up dwarfing the other two. And Sandy's damage was of a very different pattern than Agnes and Irene - those two were inland flooding events. Sandy's main impact was surge.
I just got sent this link to a time lapse video of Hurricane Sandy as it hit NYC. The camera is located on the 51st floor of the New Your Times building.
It’s about 4 minutes long and covers 3-4 days of the storm. An interesting thing to watch is the direction of the clouds over time. The other thing is, watch to the right at about 9 PM on Monday night.
Hurricane Sandy: View From Above
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtLdzkf8x4o
You just can't make this stuff up.
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