Posted on 11/01/2012 6:24:55 AM PDT by blam
Tempers Flare: Residents Complain Government Is Too Slow Distributing Food And Supplies
Mac Slavo
October 31st, 2012
Hurricane Sandy made landfall just 36 hours ago and already we’ve received reports of looting in hard-hit areas with some people brazenly taking to Twitter to post pictures of their new found wealth.
Ahead of the storm panic buying left grocery and hardware store shelves empty as concerned residents stocked up on food, water, batteries, flashlights, and generators.
With the run on supplies over the weekend, tens of thousands of people were inevitably left without essential survival items due to shortages across the region, and now they are demanding action from government officials.
Officials in the city of Hoboken, N.J., are defending their response to severe flooding from superstorm Sandy.
Public Safety director Jon Tooke says at least 25 percent of the city on the Hudson River across from Manhattan remains under water. He estimates at least 20,000 people are stranded and says most are being encouraged to shelter in place until floodwaters recede.
Tempers flared Wednesday morning outside City Hall as some residents complained the city was slow to get food and other supplies out to the stranded.
Tooke says emergency personnel have been working 24/7. He says the “scope of this situation is enormous.”
Without any way to heat their homes due to power outages, no food in their pantries and water supplies potentially tainted with polluted flood waters, those who failed to prepare are now at the mercy of the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s crisis safety net.
But, as FEMA has advised in its emergency preparedness guidelines, despite millions of dollars in supplies having been purchased by the Federal government, if emergency responders and the transportation infrastructure is overwhelmed, help may not be coming for days or weeks.
While damage from Hurricane Sandy may not be as widespread or severe as earlier reports suggested it could be, what should be crystal clear is that any serious long-term emergency would be horrific for the non-prepper.
In New Jersey some 20,000 residents are affected and already there are not enough supplies to go around and sanity is rapidly destabilizing.
The government simply does not have the manpower to deal with an emergency requiring the delivery of food and water to hundreds of thousands of people. The saving grace for the east coast is that the damage was not as bad as it could have been, and residents were made aware of the coming storm days in advance, giving them ample time to stock up or evacuate.
Imagine the effects of an unforeseen, more widespread disaster such as coordinated dirty-bomb terror attacks, a natural disaster requiring permanent mass evacuations of entire cities, destruction of the national power grid, or the collapse of the currency systems necessary for the global exchange of key commodities.
Even those who set aside supplies for such disasters would be hard-pressed to survive; never mind those who have less than three days of food in their pantries.
YAWNnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn!!.
I could one person with stored water who lives on LI. Haven’t heard from them in a couple of days. Figure he’s OK though because he’s clueful. Even then he’s not ‘allowed’ to have personal protection. That, for me, is a deal breaker in a SHTF scenario. All your preps essentially amount to zero if you can’t protect yourself.
I think the problem is a lot of people didn’t KNOW they could flood. They were a mile from the north shore or 6 blocks from the east river. And, in yankeelandia, there isn’t a subliminal cultural memory of hurricane surges. Most of them still thought the floods came from rain (and this storm wasn’t predicted to drop a lot on the northern side) and wind. And since it was ONLY cat 1 winds they weren’t concerned. The NHC didn’t help with the drastic underprediction of flooding.
While there isn’t a vast coastal plain that goes on and on, there WERE *very* dense areas that even with 3ft extra flooding meant hundreds of thousands of people MORE that were affected that got a really ugly surprise. I’m sure if the people in Jersey city had known they’d flood they’d have parked their cars on boulevard east and kennedy boulevard at 5pm and paid the parking fine later...Ditto much of brooklyn and queens that flooded by surprise.
The idiots on the barrier islands? Not so much with the rescue sympathy. Although I DO blame some of their normalcy bias on the LACK of katrina surge coverage by the MSM. They thought hurricane surge was what happened in NO and was some gentle water they could just wade through to safety. As kids WE all had to watch ‘a lady called camille’ or whatever that movie name was. What happened in NO, bad as it was, had nothing on what happened on the MS coast in the morning of the landfall. I tried to argue this with a friend up there. I mentioned katrina slabbed 3 or 4 BLOCKS in from the ocean. SLABBED. WIPED THEM CLEAN. He argued that he had SEEN all the intact but flooded houses in NO, so clearly that was wrong. Again, I blame the MSM.
Maybe NOW they understand hurricane surge. Like shep (PBOM) said. the wind’ll scare you, the water’ll kill you.
It has to get below freezing inside before the pipes freeze. It’s unlikely that they will have temperatures that low in most of the area.
My sister and parents both flooded — badly — in NOLA. That cleanup and rebuild was no picnic. But what happened on the MS coast was just awful. The slab scrapes in Waveland and Pass Christian went back even more than you say. The diamonds that went into my wife’s wedding ring spent their Katrina in a jeweler’s safe under 30 feet of the GOM.
Perhaps some of the FReepers who to this day say crummy things about New Orleans in Katrina will ponder the fiendish complexity and logistical difficulty of planning for a major storm, and discover some regret for the shabby, shameful things they said.
I doubt it.
Yes, my feelings are still raw about the whole thing.
I saw many pictures of the destruction on the MS coast right here on FR, not widespread in the MSM. I knew the predictions for this storm w/the surge were going to result in similar situations.
I was less worried about the wind, but I do know that it caused a lot of down lines, damaged homes, etc.
My parent’s basement partially flooded a few years ago and that took a big effort to clean up. I can’t even imagine a whole city.
I’ve been quick to point out to all the horrified NJ-ites that Sandy’s surge was only cat 1.5/2 surge. And the 13.88ft at the battery? Not even close to worst case scenario. There was a storm in 1821 that came in a slightly different angle. Cat 4 at one point apparently. That put 13 feet on the battery at astronomical LOW tide. Imagine the damage to the area around that megalopolis with 6 or 7 MORE feet of surge than they got Monday night. That storm also put 25+ft of surge on the NJ shore.
So this wasn’t even the worst case historically, all global warming whining aside.
The problem with flooded out hoboken is twofold:
It’s never flooded here so it won’t flood here so I will stay.
Along with It’s not SUPPOSED to flood here and traffic sucks really bad already and where would I go and where would I park? And parking is PROHIBITIVE. I can’t emphasize this enough. People are KILLED up here over parking spaces. yes. really.
Ok, threefold.
Everyone watched shep smith stand on canal street with the water gently rising around his ankles after the levees broke. He was standing in sunlight. It was almost pastoral in comparison with what REALLY happens during a hurricane surge. Those who stayed on the barrier islands had a PRECONCIEVED if WRONG idea of what REALLY happens during a hurricane surge. Were they stupid for staying? yeah. Will they do it again? Doubtful. They made a situational judgement based on bad information. I blame the MSM for this bad information. The video of the surge shot from the hotel in atlantic city that faced perpendicular to the surge should be VERY instructive to those who think it’s gently rising water during the eye of the storm.
Not everyone has friends/family that can handle them like we do down here. What’s biting their behinds now is how to get out. A lot of those 25+ story high rises are islands. Surrounded by naaaaaasty sewage filled water. And toxic chemicals. *I* wouldn’t wade through that on a bet! There’d have to be a gun pointed at me. And have to be REALLLLY thirsty. Hunger alone wouldn’t do it. So there’s really no way for them to get out without help at this point. Most people can’t store a boat or dirigible in their apartments.
And I have seen buildings with regulations involving stored water. The *last* thing they want is someone’s gerry rigged water storage ‘device’ leaking 100+ gallons of water on the apartment below them. Waterbeds are verboten for the same reason (and the associated weight involved with them...). Most of these apartments don’t even allow individual units to have their own washers for this reason.
You haven’t seen overregulated nanny state until you’ve read the rules for some of these condo/apartment buildings. *laugh* But in that regard, they are VERY civilized places to live under NORMAL circumstances. You do NOT have to worry about that waterbed your upstairs neighbor has leaking in your apartment. He’s not allowed to have one of those. Your other neighbor starting a fire with his gas grill? nope, not allowed those either. 15 cats stinking up the hall from the little old lady across the hall? nope, 2 pets minimum under 40lbs. 1 pet if over that. No pigs. No chickens. Cats or dogs only. Etc. A lot of these buildings don’t allow anyone in if they have a mortgage. They don’t want foreclosed units that are bank owned and subject to allowing in ‘unscreened’ people. Which is good. You do NOT want to be living next door to a section 8 thug and all his/her little criminal friends. In your 2M apartment.
But the downside is: No water preps over a certain amount allowed. If they leak you are in big (read: actionable) trouble. No way to really keep warm if the lights/power goes out in the winter. No fresh eggs. Ever. etc.
In rural areas your neighbor is allowed (read: tolerated) a certain amount of dumb a@@. Because his actions, other than starting forest fires, don’t really affect you. In a 50 story apartment building with 5000+ inhabitants? Things get a little trickier. In that case, just a little dumb a@@ can have REALLY big consequences. My building was its own voting district. it was bigger than many towns in the rural plains and midwest. On about a 10 acre footprint.
we were just joking
people expect instant results from FEMA as if it was able to ramp up to full scale in a day, instead it takes time.
Sure before the storm the private sector kept your lights on, the grocery shelves filled and gas in the stations but did they expect really it back within a day of the storm?.
Sheeple have become spoiled.
The app reference was a joke about people wanting instant gratification
I wasn’t saying it wasn’t a big deal. It’s not as bad as Joplin where 150 died in floods. Not nearly as much MSM coverage on that, btw. I was talking abut the media coverage trying to tell us its worse than Pompeii getting hit by the volcano.
If the MSM coverage got any worse that Cat 1 storm would have been called an Extinction Level Event.
I’ll repeat it in its own post for posterity. I blame a lot of the people staying on fire island and the barrier islands in NJ on the MISREPRESENTATION of hurricane surge propagated by the MSM. MOST people with little hurricane experience think the surge looks like the gently rising waters on canal street post katrina after the NO levees broke. There were a few shots of the breaks themselves but mainly the shots were of already flooded portions of the city and the intact homes surrounded by 8ft of delightful, still, peaceful water.
VERY little coverage of the gulf coast. Especially discussions of the surge. MOST of my yankee coworkers thought the gulf coast didn’t get the ‘hurricane flood’, NO did. And that the damage they DID see of the gulf coast was from the wind damage. Yes. Really. Even the smart science-y geeky types. Misconceptions are hard to change. I just quit arguing with them. They’d seen it on the news. The flooding was in NO. Plain. Simple. Don’t contradict what they SAW on tv! 30+ft high walls of water notwithstanding.
Those people who stayed likely didn’t realize what a surge can do. The MSM actually spends little time talking about the surge prior to now. Most gulf coast cane coverage is full of discussions of number of people w/o power, pictures of trees down and houses with trees in/on them. And since this storm didn’t have those ‘scary high’ wind speeds they didn’t think it could do this type of damage.
I also blame bloomberg. ‘it’s not going to be as bad as irene’ caused a LOT of people to underestimate it. A lot of people tuned out any warnings after that.
Combine this with the fact that surge ratings need to be updated/changed/broadcast. This storm that hit as a weak cat 1 had a cat 2 or slightly better surge. Down south we survive Isaacs with little or no fanfare. Building codes are different, we don’t build as densely on BARRIER ISLANDS for heavens sake and people know to get out because infrastructure is going to SUCK for a while. But down here, everybody’s ‘done that before’ so things are generally fixed faster. Plus our trees have been ‘tested’ far more frequently than those in the NYC area. So cat 1 storms, regardless of their size do way less damage.
My mom grew up in Westwego. Also in a couple places in St. Bernard parish. The whole thing broke her heart.
Some people have to live there, or near there. Working in the industry that’s still located there. Or nearby.
I look for this particular disaster to foster some independent forays into prepperdom as it relates to a large urban area. Gennies are good for the burbs but definitely a no go for individuals in the city in a high rise. Ditto water storage or any sort of long term prepping. It’s fairly impossible for the average city dweller to have six months of food. Dry stuff needs water. If water is a problem they’re next to useless. Anything frozen is a problem. Canned stuff takes a LOT of space. etc.
People who’ve never lived in urban density just do not comprehend the microscopic threads that hold it all together. Some of those threads you entangle around yourself just by proximity to that many other people.
When I returned to my house a week after Katrina, I brought 20 gallons of fresh water, all the way from Florida. That weighed about 200 pounds. With supplies already on hand I figured I had enough water to see me through a week. Of course I lived alone at the time and am not afraid of a little discomfort and inconvenience. I know there are many people who simply refuse to adapt. They are, ‘ow you say, not survivors.
The first day I was back, the water came gurgling back into my pipes, so I was able to take cold showers. Finding a way to cool off is not a problem for the folks in NJ/NY, but the pleasant fall weather isn’t exactly life-threatening, either. If you live in an apartment and can’t make a fire, put on some warm clothes and a hat. Go to bed. Flush the toilet no more than absolutely necessary, and refill from your stored water (I assume most buildings will support the equivalent in weight of a visiting bridge party, which is way more than you need for your water supply. If you can’t cook, stock some emergency foods that don’t need cooking. If the elevators aren’t running, don’t go out. This is called vertical evacuation.
Vertical evacuation was my back-up plan this past August for Isaac (my MIL lives on the 3rd floor of a mid-rise building). That didn’t work out; neither did evacuation to my office (no power) or my pastor’s house (he put us up after Gustave, but had a guest this time). So we collected some clothes and an ample liquor supply, went to a downtown hotel, and ordered pizza. By next year, I plan to have a generator and four days’ worth of gas.
Systems should have backups, and backups to the backups. Things don’t always work out, but to have NO plan other than wishful thinking that someone else will have it covered is childish, selfish, and irresponsible.
>>I also blame bloomberg. ‘it’s not going to be as bad as irene’ caused a LOT of people to underestimate it.
Wow, he said that? Our Gov, ‘rat though he may be, made it sound like the worst storm ever, even worse than the 1938 hurricane. It wasn’t close to that bad here, but he probably saved some lives because by and large, people heeded the evac orders and left the shore, which they didn’t do the year before with Irene.
You fail to realize a major flaw in the Saffir-Simpson scale - its failure to forecast surge with 'weaker' storms. Katrina, Chaley, Ike and now Sandy had surge two levels higher than their Saffir-Simpson scale would otherwise indicate. Some meterologists have a new scale called IKE - Integrated Kinetic Energy - which figures out the total energy of the storm and is a bettery predictor of surge. And Sandy had the highest IKE ranking in history. Which is why its effects were felt as far away as the Midwest and its surge impacting from NC to Rhode Island.
So much for your notion that it was a weak storm. BTW, it's kinda hard to hype an approaching tornado, since you typically don't have more than 20 minutes of warning for such, and there was plenty of media coverage afterwards.
I really think you just don't like our neck of the woods up here. Please, if you are going to keep pretending this was not a significant event, just stay off the threads. You and a few others sniping about the media attention being overblown got this one wrong.
You have local connections, so you know the people in Braithwaite and Laplace had a terrible time. For them, Isaac might as well have been Katrina.
My mother grew up on the upper east side, so I have spent some time in NYC from earliest childhood and have a pretty good clue about the ways extreme urban density introduces unique challenges to disaster planning. Of course it makes no sense for such people to prep for a six month horizon, but if they had prepped for just one week, they would be so much better off.
Storm surge hydrology is a science with a long way to go: we discover new ways for people to get flooded every time. This is another reason people with potential exposure (and those presuming to advise them) need to remember to build a safety margin into their predictions. Don't lie to the people, but admit to them your predictive ability is not what you'd like it to be. Forecasters seem to have the concept down when discussing the "cone" and landfall predictions. Of course another thing that has to happen is people cultivating good risk avoidance habits of their own and not overburdening "experts" with more credibility than they can answer for.
Using your logic, Ike was over-hyped because it was ‘just’ a Category 2.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Ike
During the night of September 10, Ike exhibited a rapid drop in central pressure, falling from 963 mbar (28.44 inHg) to 944 mbar (27.88 inHg) as it passed over the Loop Current in the Gulf of Mexico. This drop was not reflected by wind speed, however, which only increased to 100 mph (160 km/h) from 85 mph (140 km/h). Multiple wind maxima were noted by the National Hurricane Center, indicating the structure was absorbing and distributing energy over a large area, rather than concentrating it near the center. The pressure was significantly lower than normal for a low-end Category 2 hurricane, as 944 mbar (27.88 inHg) is more typical of a strong Category 3 or a Category 4 hurricane.[2]
Over the next two days, Ike maintained a steady course towards Galveston and Houston. It increased only slightly in intensity to 110 mph (175 km/h) – the high end of Category 2 – but exhibited an unusually large wind field. This caused a projected storm surge of a Category 4 height though the windspeeds were that of a Category 2.
Deeper barometric pressure than the S-S category would indicate. Wide windfield. And surge two categories higher. Sounds a lot like Sandy.
The media attention is overblown.
I’m still waiting for the death toll to be as bad as Joplin
And you are comparing apples and oranges. Tornadoes give little warning. Hence the high death toll. With hurricanes, you can get out of the way if you are smart enough.
Oh, and BTW, Sandy killed a total of 160 people.
http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=2284
Death toll: 160 (88 in the U.S., 54 in Haiti, 11 in Cuba)
So I guess you’ll have to find yet another way to belittle what went down.
What kind of warning was the media giving? Besides naming it Frankenstorm, did they give any advice as to what to do? How to prepare for it? or did they just say "the big one's coming"?
I don't have a TV and the radio was not giving much warning up here. There was just a mention on Friday that the Gilboa dam was filled to capacity and something had to be done about that. This storm acted the same way as Irene. The difference being that the Gilboa dam had been emptied so we were not flooded by the creek.
Dead wrong. Irene was an inland flooding event. Sandy was largely a coastal flooding event.
And this is not about defending the media, it is about dispelling the notion that a Cat 1 is a relatively trivial event. It all depends upon the particulars of a storm, which those who follow hurricanes closely on FR know.
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