Posted on 08/28/2011 6:28:09 AM PDT by kelsiejackson
> But c’mon. A TS/Cat 1 blows into FL, AL, MS, LA or TX and
> we’re going to yawn, roll over, and go back to sleep until
> it clears up and then we’ll go clean up our yards and get
> on with it.
Nope, but nobody’s gonna blame you for waiting for the worst to be over before putting life and limb at risk. As you said, losing power is not the end of the world, so there’s no need to risk any more lives over it.
When my kids were younger, I was reading stories to them by oil lamp during a snowstorm that put out the power. The lights came back on while I was reading the story, and they all asked to have the lights put back out so I could read by lamplight again. It became a bit of a tradition for a while.
What-ifs are only ridiculous after the fact. It hit Cat 3 status and was expected to stay at least Cat 2 throughout. It was a sheer turn of good fortune that it dropped to Cat 1/TS status before reaching them. It still caused a lot of damage and killed some folks - IF it hadn't reduce in strength first, it would have been horrendous.
How many hurricanes have you sat through and how powerful were they? If the answer is "none", you have no basis to form an useful opinion.
Absolutely I am not at all diminishing the possibilities of the storm because we’ve been through too many and they are very unpredictable. But there are some sure things that careful weather watchers will notice.
The media scaring people to death does not sit well with me. We need calm, rational, measured reporting. I have no problem with evacs in “A” zones, pre-emergency declarations, getting your kit ready, etc....but then they need to take a “wait and see” attitude. They cry wolf too many times and real loss of life will ensue.
I’m glad this turned out to be only a water event and I hope the flood damage isn’t too great. But piers and trees are always going to be lost in even a strong thunderstorm. I hope the rest of the season is very quiet for us all.
That’s exactly what I said even before it hit land. This storm wasn’t ever going to be what they were in snits over.
I lived on board my yacht for years before Ike. We watched Ike grow and move. I told others in our marina that Ike was coming to buy my boat and that it would hit hard and deadly. Many laughed at me but I have watched hurricanes for years. I knew Ike was going to be huge and hard. The marina I was in was in Seabrook, Tx just off Galveston bay. Nobody laughed after Ike had gone through. I got back there the next morning to see the marina under about 13 feet of water (that’s 13ft above the highest tide). Twelve hours later when the water level had gone down there was virtually nothing left of the marina. My yacht was on the bottom along with a fishing boat I owned. Ninety Eight percent of the boats in that marina were totally destroyed as was most of a large area around Seabrook.
> We need calm, rational, measured reporting.
Sadly, Walter Winchel and his breed died more than a generation ago.
All we have now for reporters are metrosexual pantiwaists and drooling ideologues.
I know. Boats don’t fare well and there’s usually not enough time to move small vessels out of the way. Long lines are only so useful when the vessel is swamped.
GatorGuy is in the Navy and they have to move all their ships off piers and out to sea but you can certainly ride out a hurricane in one, although you probably don’t want to!
A little news August weekend — an event like this minor storm is milked for all it’s worth.
I have never in my life seen anything like this. I keep watching until I can’t laugh anymore and have to take break.
600,000+ “military” deaths alone are recorded for the North’s war of aggression against the South.
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INDEED! Now that.... is a catastrophe of monumental proportions. Irene, sorry, not so much.
OK, I’ve read most of the comments and they are interesting, and some are even humorous.
I think the article is trying to convey a concenpt that this storm, while being a serious event, was very much over hyped. I have to agree. It’s one thing for the news media to warn the population about the coming storm and all possible hazzards, while it is another thing to have wall-to-wall coverage of a storm without any other news.
I can tell you that when there are tornadoes in Minnesota, the news media including the weather channel does not break in with news about serious storms taking place. Last summer we had a lot of tornadoes in Minnesota, the highest count in the country (which is unheard of), and the weather channel did not report most of them - they simply mentioned them in their “news on the eights” segments.
The high density of population is a logical reason for some of the extensive coverage of the East Coast storms - but wall-to-wall coverage when other parts of the country get much less coverage - is easy to interpret. Folks in fly-over country do not matter much to the news media.
I can see the writing on the wall. High unemployment numbers and sinking economy due to the catastrophic storm, Irene.
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I said the same thing last night. That is a given and know what, the dumb lib sheep will believe it.
I wonder if there were fewer deaths in the effected areas due a decrease in crime as all the baddies are huddled in front of their plasma TVs watching the Fox Hype?
Up here in the Harrisburg, Pa area people lost electric. And it was pretty durn windy. I’m thankful that’s all we got of it.
Many of us did head out when Rita and Katrina were heading our way. Ike covered most of the gulf so there was no where to go without heading into it.
Where can I find this cartoon? The one you posted is too small to copy.
Yikes that must have been a wild ride! I bet you have some stories to tell.
I’m sorry you lost your home in Ike. I hope you were able to replace her.
I think the hurricane that weakened was Lili and she did hit more west than the Panhandle. She was a 4 mid-Gulf and miraculously became a 1 before landfall.
It was exciting at first, then the power went out. In Florida, in the summer. Hot muggy and dark. Listening to the wind howl, debating whether my little generator would be feasible while its raining and blowing.
I don’t live on the beach because I didn’t want to worry about it. So I’m about 2 miles inland. Anything under a cat 4 is a stay at home event. Cat 4s and 5s would be exciting.
Quite a few hurricanes have hit Florida over the last 13 years since we moved here. Have had some cat 5’s aimed at us but they turned. Had several cat 3’s aimed elsewhere which then hit us.
2004 was especially exciting when 4 storms hit us in under 2 months. Got a great deal on a car after they were over though, the car dealers were desperate.
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