f13.net

Here comes a hurricane right up the East Coast and probably straight into NYC. This is a scenario that forecasters have been fretting about for years: worst-case has significant portions of NYC under water. Philly, Washington DC, Maryland, and NJ are going to see some significant winds and heavy rain unless the cone veers out to sea today or tomorrow morning--the current tracks have the eye staying just off-shore as Irene moves up the coast, which is pretty much the "that never happens, but that's really bad" forecast. North Carolina coast will get hit too, but that's a more normal thing.

http://www.weather.com/weather/hurricanecentral/article/tropical-depression-nine-storm-hurricane-irene_2011-08-20
http://www.wunderground.com/tropical/tracking/at201109.html

I recall another one being forecast to do exactly the same route a few years ago.  What actually happened was it hit the Carolinas and then spun out to sea again.  Mayhap that will happen this time as well.

Nah, with the way things have been going lately, this thing is going to pass right through NYC.

I knew this was gonna be a 'not Florida' thing from the get go.  Unless they start out around Barbados or St. Lucia, they'll always turn north and tiger-uppercut the east coast.

GL to all you earthquake 'veterans'  :awesome_for_real:

May it snow in So. Cal so the east coast can laugh back.  :awesome_for_real:

I know there's some NoVA folks on here - good luck to you guys and everyone else in the path.  Irene's looking pretty serious.

Latest from the Hurricane center is showing it breaking on the Carolinas and down to Tropical Storm strength when it gets to NY (and for me Cape Cod.)

Yeah. Still probably means a big storm surge for NYC but not so much wind for the Mid-Atlantic.

Much ado about nothing is what it sounds like.

Gotta love the instant media for drumming up panic whenever they can.

The entire East Coast is going to be swept into the ocean. I'm expecting a volcano to erupt in D.C. sometime next week.

Media panic didn't get thousands of people to leave Miami when Andrew hit.

Media panic and post-Andrew coverage didn't get thousands of people to leave New Orleans when Katrina hit.

Hurricanes are serious business.  Let the media do there thing in this regard.  At least then it makes the idiots that stay behind look dumber when they cry that they didn't know and/or didn't listen.

After Katrina, better you East Coast assholes be prepared than drowned.

But that is all part of the plan. Media panic is for people outside the blast zone. When I was in South FL, we paid attention to weather models from the local weather service and hurricane center. We didn't give a shit about the news' stories predicting the end of the world. What got people to pick up and get out (myself not included) was a knock on the door from the cops saying a required evac was issued and if we chose to stay, we were basically on our own till the storm passed.

Then again, the news loves weather stories because it's a big gambling game. Whoever picks the correct path model wins the game!

No nags head for me. Bastard.

Yah, a friend of mine was supposed to go down to the Outer Banks this weekend.  Don't think that's so much in the works now.

Nope, Its all been evacuated. Thankfully ill get my money back.

New Orleans people didn't leave because they were dirt ass poor or dumb as rocks.

I'm betting it spins off into the oceans after skimming the coast and makes all those projections look silly. Either that, or it slams into NYC and ruins the city.

I'm fine with either.

In the 2004 Hurricanes people in Florida did actually evacuate, but by the time the 3rd one hit us most gave up trying to escape it and just bunkered down.

Coward  :why_so_serious:

Hurricanes are the worst when they hit areas that, well, aren't built with them in mind. Florida, the Gulf Coast, the Bahamas -- at least they build things (in general) and do planning with hurricanes in mind.

NYC not so much.

Still wouldn't top the one that managed to hit England a few years back. I didn't even think that was possible.

Hurricane Hazel made it all the way up to Toronto back in the '50s and people died in the flooding. It taught us not to build in flood plains anymore.

Most of the taller buildings in midtown and lower Manhattan were built to withstand some serious wind. That shouldn't be much of an issue. The outlying boroughs like Brooklyn and Queens stand to get seriously flooded if there's major storm surge. There could also be some serious flooding in the subways which will gum up public transportation, but barring tornadoes, we should come out beat up a little but not devastated.

If Atlanta can survive a hurricane, so can NYC.  Of course, our bar for what is an acceptable level of functionality is lower.

Look at you Cana-Diens thinkin' you're all special and shiny because you learn from history.  American exceptionalisim will protect us from the past!    :grin:

People still bitch about hurricane ties on buildings around here, even after Ike came this far north and wrecked shit in '08.  We don't learn.

And "beat up but not devastated" can still be a financial mess because of things that don't get tied down or are allowed to happen in the areas outlying NYC because "Hurricanes/ strong winds don't happen here."  Roof losses alone are bad.. roof losses + water damage?  Awesomesauce time.

Oh, we're gonna tie our shit down. Make no mistake. That "It can't happen here" shit was shaken out of our systems after 9/11. 'Sides, New Yorkers have always been a bit paranoid anyway. The people will be ok, Bloomie's assholes might fuck shit up, but the people will be ok.

A Cat 2 or worse hurricane hitting the Northeast would be a Really Big Deal.  Here on Cape, we haven't had a hurricane in 15 years and it's been twenty years since we had a Cat 2. The last Cat 3 was in the 50s. There's a lot of construction and development that's never been tested against hurricane force winds and is likely to go away.

You misunderstand, I don't mean windblown debris like trash cans, planters and lawn furniture.  These are things your average homeowner isn't going to be able to fix because they're inside the wall.

When I say roof loss, I mean picking it up and peeling it back like a pop-top because the only thing holding the trusses in place are a few 16d nails.  Storm surge has the possibility of doing the same to sills at foundations on 25+ year-old homes depending on how they're connected to the foundation.  If it's just a few powder-actuated fasteners instead of sill bolts or straps.. the water's going to shift things.

If there's actual honest-to-goodness flooding, even worse as there's the possibility of hydrostatic pressure pushing foundation walls off of footings.  Hurricane & flood-prone areas tend to have flood vents to prevent this, I doubt the older homes in the NY area have been retrofitted with such.

'Course that's all worst-case scenario stuff, but when that's what you're forced to plan for it's what you foresee happening.

You need to skip about a minute in until you get a view of it.

Hurricane Irene View from Space ISS, Category 4 Hurricane (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7OnEIqCt10)

Could just look larger because of the perspective. But I thought it was pretty neat. Storms from space look rad.

You're definitely right about that kind of stuff. We aren't prepared for all of that and probably never will be. There has been some flooding preparation in the past but I don't think it's that high-grade. I'm hoping it doesn't come to that though. Last hurricane I really sat through was when Lenny decided to park over St. Maarten for three days back in '99. That was some scary shit. Listening to the radio, hearing about roofs ripped off and hearing at least one tornado as it spun off the eyewall while hiding under a sink. Thought I was pretty much done for. Weirdly enough, my rental car came out unscathed, while the one right next to it had all the windows blown out.

It's not the wind so much as what the wind is carrying.

Ideally it will utterly destroy any and all on Wall Street.  :oh_i_see:

Cept Surlyboi, because we hope to have him take over and redistribute some of that wealth to us, his "friends", right?

It's that kinda thinking that got us into this fucking mess in the first place....  :why_so_serious:

Considering I haven't been on Wall Street in almost eight years, let the fucker fly.

Hay now, its gotta go over me to get there!  :cry:

I wonder if the earthquake 'loosened' anything that wouldn't otherwise fall down in this?

I wondered the same thing.  There's a good possibility it, considering we've seen actual building damage from such a "minor" quake.  High-winds after the fact could be a hell of a one-two punch.

Sorry, acceptable loss.  We'll repost pictures as a tribute to your memory.

I'll play cookie metal at your funeral.

Meanies.

I have to say hurricanes kind of scare the shit out of me. Way worse than earthquakes!

I am the exact opposite. You can see hurricanes coming and get the hell out of the way. When earthquakes hit, you are proper fucked.

I hope it doesn't level Cape May, I liked Cape May. Atlantic City can go though.

If I had a dollar for everytime I wish a hurricane would blow through and level (insert local ghetto area here), I'd be a rich man  :grin:

Sadly, my local ghettos are still here :(

...yeah that isn't what I was getting at.

NOOOO, then where will I play Craps for 4 hours at a time?  :oh_i_see:

Also, perhaps I should move my car tomorrow to...some place without so many branches overhead.

Whatever, motherfucker. The forecasters are obviously just in the tank trying to drum up ratings. Or maybe they're honestly trying to prevent the worst-case scenarios.

What the fuck is with the cynicism? "Oh, dear, you mean predicting the exact behavior of a chaotic weather system three days from now isn't perfectly fixed? Better not to say anything, cause you'll look sensationalist. Also, only dumbasses die from NOT paying attention to weather predictions because they're being cynical."

I'd buy you a ticket to a three-day cruise off of Atlantic City if you think it's all just lol don't worry just ratings.

Here's an odd thing. In the late summer of 1944, the NE of America got hit by a 5.8 earthquake. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1944_Cornwall-Massena_earthquake), Under a week later, a catagory three hurricane (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1944_Great_Atlantic_hurricane) skimmed up the east coast before making landfall in New York.

Funny how these coincidences play out.

E: Does this mean no more Jersey Shore?  :awesome_for_real:

Like WayAbvPar said, hurricanes are predictable. You can see them coming. I vastly preferred the NJ natural disasters, which are weak-ass hurricanes (most of the time  :why_so_serious:), weak-ass blizzards, and the occassional nor'easter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nor%27easter), all of which you see coming. I guess there are sometimes fires, too, but it's not like the entire state bursts into flame during the summer like California does.

Much rather have predictable disasters. It's nice to lay in stocks for the apocalypse. The line was nearly out the door at Luke's Liquors.

I was going to fly to New York on Monday. Should I reschedule?

Help me weather gurus!

NYC or elsewhere?

Finger Lakes region.

http://www.weather.com/weather/hurricanecentral/article/irene-rare-dangerous-hurricane_2011-08-25 (http://www.weather.com/weather/hurricanecentral/article/irene-rare-dangerous-hurricane_2011-08-25)

Read that article and the headline, chuckles, and you go ahead and tell me if they are just drumming up sensationalist crap.

Could a hurricane hit there? Yeah, and by Friday night we will have a pretty solid idea. This sentence though? "Confidence is growing that locations from eastern North Carolina and the eastern Mid-Atlantic states to Long Island to southern New England are all in the potential path of Hurricane Irene." Confidence is growing on the potential path may hit about 1000 miles of coastline? Brilliant, tell everyone to freak the fuck out on the Eastern seaboard.

All I'm saying is that kind of shit is full of panic laced insanity that has no place in a simple warning.

You know, it's not hard to hit 1000 miles of coastline if you crawl up that coastline. Nor'easters pretty much do exactly that in the wintertime--the storms form in the Southeast and then turn and crawl up the entire Atlantic seaboard. And you know, they often cause a lot of problems from Georgia right up to Boston. So a hurricane doing roughly the same thing is going to...do roughly the same thing. See, the thing is, much of the population of the East Coast is close to the coasts.

You might recognize this if you looked at a map.

I agree, weather.com is highly sensationalistic. My favorite is the EXTREME WARNING MAP. But it covers anything that could potentially get a tropical storm. A tropical storm is not really all that big a deal unless you're sitting on the exposed coast.

Weather underground has great coverage, a lot of maps including the different models and an averaging of them. And none of the YOU ARE DOOOOOOMED stuff. In fact, the forecast here is simply "showers 100%. Hurricane Irene."

Damned if you do and damned if you don't when it comes to sounding the alarm. If you don't make a fuss, people who should leave or prepare don't. If you do make a fuss, people mock all the doomcasting. Weather.com has an extra reason to turn it up, which is ratings for the Weather Channel. But the NHC is making a pretty big deal about Irene too, using some of the same language. Wunderground isn't just twiddling its thumbs either: on Masters' blog, "People living on the the east coast of the US from the Carolinas to Cape Cod should closely monitor Irene and be in the process of finishing their hurricane preparations. If you have not started preparing for this storm, start immediately. If an evacuation order is given, please follow it. Irene will be a large storm, impacting areas far from the storm center track.". A good deal of attention to flooding scenarios also there and everywhere, and part of the reason is that some of the heaviest rain is going to fall over Philly metro and suburbs, which have had the wettest August on record already--rivers and creeks are at peak, ground is extremely saturated. That makes tree falls more likely and it makes floods pretty much guaranteed.

I'm pretty much expecting that we won't have power for 1-4 days after this, and that warrants some preparation. Our house isn't subject to rainfall flooding, but there are houses not far from here which are vulnerable. All of us live on lots with a bunch of trees.

Khaldun, that warning you mentioned about preparing and following information is fine. That's a responsible attitude to a possible storm.

What's not fine is. "Dire warnings are being issue in advance of Hurricane Irene.  It will affect North Carolina tonight before moving to the Northeast with EXTRAORDINARY impacts expected."

I'm not making that up. It's a line from the top of TWC.

Did we really need to yell out dire warnings and ALL CAPS extraordinary? It's insane.

Hurricanes are something people don't take very seriously.  Unless you make a big deal, they kind of twiddle their thumbs.  While I'm all for natural selection, it makes the rescue workers' jobs that much tougher.

One of the folks who has a hard time remembering he doesn't have my gmail address is in the Guard, so I've got the email with disaster prep and county contact info and whatnot if anyone's interested :P

I really like a solid blizzard. Keeps the assholes at home, and I can stay nice and cozy in my toasty place and play guitar. Chop wood and keep a well-stocked pantry, folks :) Maybe go for a nice drive in the FJ.

Is it inaccurate?

You expect to be without power that long, Kal, then expect to be without water as well.  Fill up all your tubs with water as the storm hits or soon after losing power then don't use it again until you've verified it's ok with your Water & Sanitation department.  (Or, go buy a few 5-10 gal jugs now but I'll bet they're out.)

One thing people forget is the water purification system can be fouled in storms, power-outages and floods.

Every time weather forecasters and authorities are too low-key about a storm and it turns out to be brutal, like Andrew, the same people who complain about alarmism flip-flop and complain that the alarm didn't go out strongly enough.

Filling up water jugs tomorrow. Stores are pretty much out of water and D batteries, as you might expect. I'm just guessing on outages, but my neighborhood goes off for 12 hours + even in relatively mild thunderstorms, our line runs through a densely wooded borderland which the local utility guys don't really trim much.

Never lost water to any hurricane, but have been under boil orders for them. No big deal to boil a huge pot of water and let it cool then transfer it to empty bottles. People always over-react to any news of incoming storms. Every time we got word in Pittsburgh that we were going to get heavy snows, the bread aisle would suddenly be empty along with soups and bottles of water as if we'd be snowed in for weeks. meh...

 If you in fact lose power though, remember, frozen foods first and clean that grill and get to know your neighbors. I had the best grilled thanksgiving-style turkey ever after Wilma blew through and met quite a few people in my neighborhood.  :awesome_for_real:

Having a boil advisory is what I was talking about.  Since Smooth-Top ranges became chique a power outage becomes a water outages for vast numbers of the US.  No gas stove = no boiling water. You want to save your propane for cooking, not boiling simple drinking water.   :grin:

Yes I fully agree and took huge advantage of the fact that I had a gas stove. Buuuuut, just how long do you expect water treatment plants to be off line? Residences are usually last on the list as critical infrastructure is the first to be back online. I guess if you are the type who just HAS to drink his/her 8 glasses of water a day, you might start getting nervous. Meh, to each his own I suppose.

Oh and you can also do the bleach treatment if you are in a pinch. Taste might not be the greatest, but at least you avoid the dysentery and other nasty things. A bottle of bleach can go a whole long way.

What happens when the natural gas gets cut off?

Well you're a Mountain Man, Sky.  We expect you and your huntin' cat to go traipsing through the woods felling elk with your mighty axe or something.

I can't find a damn thing that isn't a news article on this hurricane. If it hits NYC, then it'll likely cause some trouble in Southern Ontario, which is shit because I'll be downtown this weekend. So, any news on what's going on with this? Where it's headed?

While it doesn't look to be a problem with this one, storm surge and winds on unprepared/not built to withstand places aren't the only problem.

There's also just "rainfall".

Ike was pretty damaging to Houston -- a ridiculously large, slow-moving Cat 3. However, Allison -- a mere tropical storm -- did just as much (if not more) damage. Because it parked on top of Houston and dumped so much freakin' water than stuff that hadn't flooded in 100+ years did.

Long range forecast has Toronto as sunny and clear for the whole weekend. I guess that could change though.

I slept through Ike.  Allison freaked me directly out with how much water it dumped on us.  And not only did it park over Houston - it then drove off, put it into reverse, and backed over us a couple of days later.   :uhrr:

Best wishes to anyone in the path of Irene (especially those who aren't getting out of said path).

I tried to sleep through Ike, but that was the only time our power was out, so it wasn't a very comfortable sleep.  We made up for it by being the only block with power in the county for the next ten days though.

I was in Baton Rouge for Allison. Much fun was had by my community. Taking a canoe down to the corner Circle K was pretty entertaining as well.


edit: forgots the spoiler tag

You know, when you are already groin deep in dirty water do you really care if the top half of your body gets wet?

It's a different, more annoying kind of wet.  Raindrops in the eyes and all the fun of feeling them work their way down your skin in that tickling raindrop way.

I totally get it.

If you are talking about the kid in the 2nd pic, he was trying to keep his camera dry... I asked him the same thing as I stood there taking a pic of him.

And why is Obama weighing in (http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/08/26/tropical.weather/index.html?hpt=hp_t1) on this? I don't recall Bush saying a damn thing about Katrina.

No, but he had plenty to say about "Brownie."   :why_so_serious:

Love the comments on that article.

Haven't had a chance to read yet, but you know if Obama doesn't say anything, then he's insensitive to the problems of the people.  If he does say something, then people ask WTF is he opening his mouth.  It really is a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation.  My guess is he might be commenting because the hurricane is going to pay a visit to his house, too, though.

So, the brand new mega-supermarket downstairs has turned into Upper East Side Shitshow: Hurricane Edition. Lots of UES mommies and their brood AND their nannies battening down the hatches for the coming storm, buying out all the Pellegrino and Poland Spring. The HUGE line (like 20 long) of shopping carts waiting for the delivery guys to make the rounds from the last wagon train of grocery carts they've taken to their destinations. (Most of which are probably not more than a block away.) All the grass fed beef is gone and some woman is raising a stink about it because what's she gonna feed her spoiled little kids when the storm hits? Heaven forbid it's mere sirloin.  :oh_i_see:

Meanwhile, we've got 16 gallons of water, food for the next week, 12 bottles of sake, 40 bottles of wine, a 30-year-old bottle of whisky and tape and board for the windows. I think we're good to go.

Surly, I though you guys lived in Palo Alto, no?  Moving?

make sure you got pasta, rice, beans, and freezer packs for your cooler/fridge/freezers.  Good luck.

Not yet.  He's working on it.

That's the way to weather a hurricane.  G'luck.

Actual conversation. I explain that when the power goes out, we're going to lose email as our server location has no generator. They suggest that we put in a generator. I then explain that if the power is out, cable is going to be out. One jokes that cable always goes down before the power anyway. And I then remind them that comcast is our internet provider and when they go down, so does the internet connection between them and our mail server and between our mail server and the rest of the world.

And Mass Emergency Management has been pushing hard to run everything through web portals and emails for the last 8 or so years.

Exactly the whole problem of this. I am not faulting them for trying to stock up a little more to compensate for what might be a week without power, but I can not stand this "THE EAST COAST IS DOOMED!! SAVE YOURSELVES!!" thing that seems to be going on for what will be a Cat 1 or 2 landfall.

The whole thing is patently ridiculous. Plus it cancelled the baseball games for the Braves vs. the Mets. Pussies!  :mob:

This is probably best for politics but he is weighing in on it because the media sucks and is already trying to portray Obama as not caring.  There was a snippet on the CNN yesterday going "When asked if Obama is going to cut his vacation short due to the hurricane the white house said no".  They phrased it in a way that could easily be blown out of proportion as "OMG he doesnt' care that the east coast is going to be decimated!!"

Well, it IS baseball.  :oh_i_see:

As for Palo Alto, bought the place there with the intention of doing the bi-coastal thing starting next year and renting it out in the meantime.

Still here in NYC at the moment though.

Got a ton of soba and rice and a pantry full of canned goods, peanut butter, soup and enough oatmeal to choke a horse. Thanks for the well wishes guys. I'll liveblog if shit gets real.  :grin:

People need to learn-up and get a bit more 'nautical' with this particular storm.  Pay no mind to the category, windspeed, etc.   What you NEED to be mindful of is the shear SIZE of the storm and the surge potential.  This storm has very close the same surge potential as Katrina did...  lemme say that again, this storm has very close the same surge potential as Katrina did (kat was 5.1 and this is 4.9 I believe, out of 6.0).  Okay.  Now that you understand that.

Surge is all about fetch (amount of sea the wind blows over), direction, time (how long it blows), and windspeed.  This storms' TS-force winds extend outwards 300 miles.  It is slow-moving.  And it'll have ample time blowing in the same direction over deep water before it slams the northeast. (Jersey shore, NYC, newport, long island, etc.)  In Newtonian terms, this storm bears way more overall Force than Andrew did.

As for Beaufort/Morehead... just write them off.  They're rightly fucked with no lube from the coast up into Pamlico Sound.  BUT, those places are somewhat used to such things and build as such; hardy folk in them there redstates.  Saddest thing?  The damned "Queen Anne's Revenge" (Blackbeard's ship) site will be ruined and we just found it a few years ago.  :heartbreak:  

Though NC will bear the brunt, afterwards the main core of the storm will have another 24hrs to gather mass under it before it plows into the NE.  And this only accounts for the main core.  The "meat" of the storm in the N.E. quadrant will have been over water for 3 days before it starts feeding water into the bays and sounds of NE.  SLOSH models show that even a cat. 1 surge event such as this can flood the lower battery NYC, along with most of the sounds and rivers east into CT, RI, and MA.  All it really takes is about 8 ft. of water at high tide and it's curtains.  We'll be scarily close to that with this storm.

Anyways, this thing is a water event (not even talking about rain yet).  Break out the swimfins and kayaks bishes!

 :popcorn:

Oh don't mind me...I'm just down here in Florida enjoying the great weather from Irene vacuuming up all the moisture and giving us a nice lawn-mowing day.

Continue your panic, please  :grin:

That reminds me to fill the gas can for my chainsaw. I gotta cut up the pile of branches in the back corner of the yard anyhoo.

For future reference, Surly, we always get told rice (also dry beans, pasta, etc.) is a terrible choice for disaster prep food here because you need so much water to cook it. Sounds like you have the 'right' stuff otherwise though.

When we have floods or ice disasters round these parts, the preparedness kit was ready to eat soup, canned pasta, canned tuna, canned veggies, juices, wine, liquor, and jugs of water.

Agreeing with Paelos here on the food choices (and liquor  :drill:).  Flashlights and a battery-powered radio are good too. 

Also, fill the bathtub a few hours before the storm hits.  You can't drink out of it, but you can use the water to flush the toilets if the power is out for an extended time.

I remember the season when Wilma&Friends (the 2005 season) hit soFla and most folks were out of power for damned near the entire summer.  ICE was the commodity the ladies took their tops off for.  If you have ice, you're pretty much Master Blaster.  That, and/or a generator.

Ah, memories...

Don't forget Charlie  :grin:

Watching MSNBC, I swear it's like they've never covered a hurricane before.  They're trying their heart out to spin the hurricane in with the politics, and it's all commin' out  :uhrr:

'course, Glenn thinks you're all sinners anways. (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/26/glenn-beck-hurricane-iren_n_938411.html)  But we knew that  :awesome_for_real:

Wilma blew out power to South Beach for the better part of a week... good times.

Out of curiosity... do presidents in the US ever do any actual WORK? They keep on cutting their vacations short (or not, as this case may be) every time something happens. I'm starting to suspect they are always on vacation just in case something occurs which will then require them to cut their vacations short (or not).

Bush Jr. spent 1/3 of his time on "vacation" so that's probably distorting your view on things.

Sure you can. Just boil it first.

It may be a bit late for those in the path but you can also buy tub "bladders" to hold the water so you can just drink it out of the bladder:

http://www.redcrossstore.org/Shopper/Product.aspx?UniqueItemId=513

And let's thank Odin for that.

More first world problems before this shit kicks off proper...

Woman walking out of her $500 a month gym next door to me, "They really need to have more people cleaning up the towels today." Sometimes I want to hit my neighbors with a goddamn shovel. Seriously, you spoiled bitch, go run by the river when the storm surge hits. Of course, I'm kinda guilty too, 'cause I ran to three different coffee shops looking for espresso because I forgot to grab some yesterday and didn't realize we were out. Got some more batteries or the flashlights and the night vision goggles too. (In case shit gets really real)

Fallout 3: NYC -- Surly Edition

We need a running commentary from Surly with pictures of the upper 1% and their antics I think.

If it gets weirder, totally. I still may run out and get some more provisions before the weather turns really bad.

I believe shit is real now

ChrisLicht All Starbucks closed in NYC. Now this is getting serious.

My maniac friend just knuckled under and cancelled tomorrow morning's tennis game. That's how I know things are getting real, since he once yelled at us all for not making it to the court during one of those big snowstorms last winter. I didn't have the heart to tell him yesterday that none of the people who actually unlock the building are gonna be there anyway.

Going back to Ghambit's point its crazy watching a live stream on the surge you can see it going up feet every few mins

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/hurricanetrack-com

Main difference though is Katrina blew her wad in one shot, all over the redneck riviera.  This storm is taking pot shots up the NE, so the overall energy is a bit dispersed... especially since the Cape Hatteras landshield did its job.   :oh_i_see:

I got nervous a few days ago when a few of the models had the high building back in and shoving the storm back west after it crossed Hatteras offshore.  THAT would've been disastrous.

Anyways, /personalupdate:
-Still havent heard from my dumbarse sister who decided to ride it out at her beachhouse on MarshHarbour  :why_so_serious:
-I'm chillin in D.C. right now on the boat.  Much of the beltway region is blacked-out.  Meesa has generator though, and so does CLEAR Wireless it seems.  Man, lack of regional power is good for pings and bw I tell ya.   :drill:

Hurricane-related light relief from Damn You Auto Correct (http://damnyouautocorrect.com/11767/6-hurricane-irene-autocorrect-fails/)

:ye_gods:

Still have power, to my surprise. Just to our east, apparently, there's a big area without power. I could see the transformers blowing around 10:30 last night, which might apparently have been a small tornado touching down--radar picked up multiple tornado signatures right around our town. Tons of small tree debris down in our yard, but no big branches. I can see a pretty sizeable branch down about three houses away, but it just looks like it fell into his yard and didn't damage anything. Every river and creek is flooding, most of them heading for possible record crests later today or tonight, apparently. All and all, not too bad. The tornado warnings were a bit nerve-wracking and there was one point where the winds were gusting pretty intensely before midnight. Closer to the coast sounds like it was pretty hairy in spots. Saw some substantial damage last night on TV in Lewes Delaware.

That is the one thing that really sticks out in the memory: the noise. The constant wind blowing for hours - makes it very hard to sleep because unlike white noise, this is a random flux of noises... that and the idea that your window might blow out. :ye_gods:

I'm glad that Irene didn't murder the East Coast.

Thing is carrying a lot of water. Wind isn't bad here, but it's been constantly raining all morning. Looks like I get to spend this evening wetvac'ing the basement. They're saying 30mph sustained winds with 45mph gusting, but I'm not seeing it here. I can hear a light wind, maybe 15mph in the treetops, but the woods are breaking the lower winds pretty good.

We saw the first streamers of clouds rolling in last night at an outdoor burger joint at sunset, really nice show. Amazing how massive the storm is.

Swing and a miss over here, looks like. A ton of rain and some minor flooding, but it looks and sounds like the worst has definitely passed.

We got a lot of wind and rain here in southern NJ, with a tornado touching down in the next town over. Nothing major visible from home, although I haven't left the house yet because I know the access road out of my neighborhood is flooded.

Friend of mine works for the power company down here -- the company that does the lines and transformers, not generates power.

He was part of a mile+ long convoy that left for the NE day before yesterday, I think. He posted on facebook seeing at least one other convoy like that.

One of the few benefits of hurricanes is prep time. You can start moving assets -- and at least these guys didn't have to drive through the hurricane to get to it.

One of the reasons it took so long to restore power after Ike (some people in Houston took two weeks or more) was that half or more the linesmen they brought in had to turn around after half a day and head back, because Ike was fucking up shit from Texas to Ohio and further north. And all the guys they brought in were from states north of Texas -- right along Ike's eventual path.

Here on Cape Cod, it didn't even rain. We have some wind, but not even what you'd expect from a good storm in the winter. So far, we had a couple of flickers and a 2 minute outage, but electric seems stable, though work 7 miles from here is down.

It's actually pretty nice. The wind is pleasantly cool and for the first time in weeks we have a quiet house because we don't have fans running 24/7.

By the third landfall Irene basically petered out into a rainmaker.  STILL a close call for NYC though (another foot or two of surge and it'd be a different story), and NJ and DE look like they got hit pretty hard specifically with flooding... which is still getting worse.

News crews seem out of position to report the real news stories, since the swath is so wide.  If I had a camera I'd be in Beaufort, Norfolk, and the rivers of NJ (where people are currently being airlifted from flooding).  Its like they think they're on fuckin vacation or something...  hanging out in Times Square, Newport, etc.  Seriously?  Do your goddamned job and get out there where the REAL people live and do some reporting!

Local webstreams are kicking cable news' ass.  As usual for this type of thing.

I'm shocked. You mean the weather channel was overreacting? I don't believe it.  :why_so_serious:

You know, if it hadn't lost some punch just before NC landfall--something that not even the NHC was predicting, in fact, they were predicting possible strengthening at that time--it really might have been a different story. As it is, I went for a drive this afternoon and there are flooded areas all around, trees down on the road, power outages.

It's not an overreaction, just a misplaced one.  They spend all their energy focusing on the large media markets instead of the places that actually get effected.
Much of Cape Hatteras right now is effectively no more (even those historic dunes have been washed out); and what's left has to be re-charted.  Do you see much coverage?  Nope.  Or rather, you see it JUST now.

I get more news from my Jersey friends on FB than cable news.  And many of them are whining that they're flooded in.
And what pisses me off more than anything else is that the entire NE is under a state of emergency, yet TV stations play commercials every 5 minutes.  If things are so dire why am I staring at Viagra commercials?

This is why we all loved Japanese and Arab news.  'Cause when shit hits the fan they dont hide behind "American Idol" promos.

I'm glad nobody was really hurt by this, but you can't spin it as anything more than a bunch of media sites freaking the fuck out over water damage.

Preparedness is one thing, that wasn't what we got out of them. We got HOLY FUCK HIDE YOUR CHILDREN!



That and I was right, so I'm gonna be a smug ass about it.  :awesome_for_real:

This was a Russian Roulette hurricane.  Good chance you weren't actually going to get fucked, but if you did, you got fucked hard. 

I still say the media was justified for getting everyone prepared...better to be ready for a Cat 5 and get a Tropical Storm than expect a depression and end up dead.

And now we go back to the political scene, where I'm sure the GOP will hold recovery money hostage in exchange for more bullshit  :uhrr:

It wiped out the Dunes?  Fuck, those were awesome and by far the best part about Hatteras.  I liked them even more than the lighthouse.

The weather channel idiots overhyping stuff is eventually going to get someone killed because these things are dangerous. You prep for hurricanes when it's so early you might have a bright sunny day because by the time you know for certain it's going to hit you, it's too late.

I shit you not that I made a bet with a co-worker that there would be some idiot who'd walk outside during the storm and have mother nature drop a branch on him, much like a similar event here locally when Charlie came through.

I am now $50 richer (http://www.wcnc.com/news/local/NC-man-killed-in-Irene-storm-128524873.html)   :drill:

Yah, Russian roulette wherein half the chambers are loaded.  Literally, half the models had this staying offshore before slamming the NE. 

Poor Taste...

You weren't right, unless you mean, "TV channel says stuff with hyperbole to make ratings". At which point, big deal, what's next, the sun is rising in the east tomorrow? If you mean, "I knew all along this wasn't going to be a big deal", it's a pretty noticeable deal to some people and it very plausibly could have been a much bigger deal than it was. I'd trade being overprepared for a plausibly worse scenario than underprepared for it, thanks, and not just for me but for everyone.

Dude give it up. New Yorkers freaked out over nothing. Let it go.

The news folks are still trying to get us to understand how it's not NOT a big deal. So they are reporting how many people are out of power. Not a death toll, not homes destroyed, OUT OF POWER.

Man, the tornados in Alabama were worse than this. Let's all feel bad for New Yorkers being out of power! Oh there are floods! Our covered bridges got knocked around!

Please. Send your relief pity to Tuscaloosa.

Geez, you are sounding like a huge ass.  Death toll is going to be in the 20-40 range and billions in damages. This was not a non-event. It could have been worse, other weather has caused more deaths, but it was major storm.

Hurricane Irene covers Fox reporter Tucker Barnes in raw sewage. (http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2011/08/28/2011-08-28_fox_weather_reporter_tucker_barnes_gets_covered_in_sewage_reporting_on_hurricane.html)

He thought it was sea foam with "plankton or something". He ate some.

A matter of a few miles different on the trajectory and it doesn't hit the stuff that lowered the storm's energy, and no prediction is that accurate. Should always prepare for the worst case scenario.

:ye_gods:

Fox delivers the awesome. Meme of the event.

That's good for starters, where's your uncut timber pile?

Behind it?

Streakers on the Weather Channel (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pY4gJoKwtAQ)  Well, ok one guy rips his trousers down the rest keep their boxer briefs up.

Yet another Fox News (local) fail (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82kAKimV0tw)  Maybe you should check the scale of your footage before sticking your weather person "out in that" via Green Screen.

Paelos, you're beginning to sound like the Right-Wing idiots circulating that this was all mandated government hype to distract from "Obama's jobs problem."

Seriously.  I've been through a dozen hurricanes.  Some fizzle, some do massive damage.  I've known tropical depressions that shut Houston down for weeks and I've known Cat 2s that blow on by with little more than a couple of tree limbs down.  You can never know which it was until it's over.

The most we can say about any storm is that the more powerful the winds, the larger the system, and the more slowly it moves, the more likely it is to cause wide-spread damage.  And the worst damage is usually due to a combination of structural failures brought on by the stresses of the storm.  All you can do is prepare and hope it's a dud.

I'm out of power.

ETA: 3 days - 2 weeks.

Dominion power sucks.

It's not your power company, exactly. From personal experience with major storms that take down wide areas, they prioritize in a certain fashion:

Hospitals and other major public buildings (cops, jails, shelters, water and sewage treatment and pumping facilities) first -- and anything that is dangerous unpowered.
Supermarkets, gas stations, other dense commercial areas second. (people need gas and food. They can live without electricty, but not without food and water)
Dense Residential -- large apartment blocks, etc -- and places where they can restore large areas with small fixes. (Replacing a single transformer or downed line that can restore several blocks, etc)
Houses and line breaks and dead transformers near the end of a line last.

Moral of the story: try to live on the same circuit as your local HEB. :)

No, its them, most of this area has overhead power lines.

Its retarded in a coastal area this old.

Wish we had gone up to the Inn at Long Trail, route 4 got washed out on both sides of the pass. "No, sorry...can't make it back to work, stuck on the mountain!"

Route 7 also got washed out, VT got hit pretty hard by floods.

You guys aren't even in the prime hurricane zone. When Ike came rolling through, Centerpoint was years behind their tree-cutting schedule.

I know, because I'd called in to ask early that year about having some branches cut back that were getting too close to the lines -- there were places where tree branches, large ones had penetrated and wrapped around lines. They had to have been growing around the lines like that for ten years.

The person I talked to said they'd try to bump me up, but that Centerpoint's line-clearing teams were four or five years behind schedule. 

Funny, that was the same story around here with Duke/ Cinergy when Ike came through.  I lucked-out by being a newer subdivision (2003).  Right up the street, not more than 500 feet, there was a group of houses without power for a month because a tree had taken-down the street-to-house lines and those are the very last things to get fixed.

My parents were on the grid that serviced my town's main street (the one with supermarkets and gas stations) and all buried lines. They got turned back on in less than 36 hours. I was on the end of a line, and went 11 days -- had a pole down on the one line into my street.

My in-laws actually went longer (13 days) because they  were in a cluster of 4 houses that had something...weird. I don't know what -- it was buried lines there too -- but they were dead last. Not that it was a problem -- my father in law had two generators, and had loaned one to the neighbors. Their neighbors tossed an extension cord back over when they got their power, so he didn't even have to clean out the fridge. He still talks about getting one of those fancy all-up natural gas home generators.

I can't intellectually fault their priorities, but god does it suck to be among the last handfuls of houses to get the lights back.

Amen man. As the Miami Beach was coming out of Wilma, the power came on in increments. My neighbor and I was chatting, having a cigarette while he strummed his guitar and all the sudden the street lights came on and the apts across the street all lit up. You could honestly hear a muffled cheer from that side of the street. Our side still had to wait a day and a half.

No need to cut tree limbs when they are underground :)

Areas around here lost power due to low wind gusts.

I wondered why here -- you know, in Houston -- we have so many above ground lines. Most new development is buried, but I get the impression that's mostly aesthetics. Part of it is cost -- it's expensive to bury lines when the original ones work fine. You'd still think they'd save money, long term, by burying as much as they could.

Until they flood and blow-out the buried transformers.  :drill:

Burying is all about aesthetics, no doubt. I think buried lines also lead to vermin in the access areas that cause problems in addition to the extra cost of the vaults & trenching, etc.  Not sure there, though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6b54bZepoA

There are downed power lines and road blocks all over near my work. Positive: I am in a diff state and unaffected personally. Negative: we have numerous fiber cuts to our colo facilities and our failover did not go smoothly. No eta from covad or level3, and It's been a rough 5 hours so far trying to get shit working on a hastily created limited-bandwidth VPN going out to the internet and back into the colo from another direction.

Check the Dominion power website (http://www.dom.com/storm-center/overhead-vs-underground-electric-lines.jsp). They say its all a problem of cost. Never does it enter that they currently have thousands out of power for the next week or two.

You know the fit hits the shan when libertarian Vermont starts asking for federal help.  They're saying it's the worst nat. disaster in 80 yrs there.
I think taken as a whole, Irene probably did as much dmg. as some of the worst Hurricanes on record.  Amazing.

More to come this season btw, with the weather pattern we've not got in place.  We'll possibly be out of the woods come October, but for the next month it'll start getting dicey.

Power in a couple of towns is down, including where I work. I just got back from a very frustrating meeting where people couldn't understand the concept that even if we hooked up to a generator, Comcast's lines are down and email and the cable tv channel are still going to be down. Eventually we hooked up a generator and I demonstrated the concept. (And yes, MEMA is sticking with distributing information only via internet.)

On tree limbs, we apparently evaluated the cost of burying power lines, but that debate lasts only as long as it remains dark. The minute the power came back on suddenly it was too expensive.

My mom had underground power to her house.  In 2004 when we got hit by a cat 1 or 2 hurricane she still lost power, but my house (5 miles away) with above ground power lines still had power.

Underground power doesn't mean your power is less likely to go out.

It does mean fewer trees dropping your power poles in high winds though.

I did wonder about flooding.

Yeah those people are nuts. However, The NY Times sums up my feelings on the situation pretty nicely. (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/29/us/29forecast.html?_r=1&src=tp)

The grids next to her had to have been all in as well. Even FEMA agrees, so do most reports that underground is preferable to overhead ( With some regional restrictions, like areas build on sand banks ). Most of the reports I am reading seem to mix up the huge main supply lines with residential to muddy the issue and inflate cost numbers.

The ONLY barrier to doing this is cost, a cost your power company does not want to pay, even if its a superior method with less likely hood of breakdown. This is why, in new construction, or even road expansions, they ARE buried.

Distribution lines aren't that expensive to bury. Transmission lines are monumentally expensive to bury. Be interesting to see where the outages occur to see if burying distribution lines would help the problem.

One of the recent thrusts in meteorology right now are revamping the classification system.  Safir-Simpson themselves even said they didnt intend for their system to be used as it was, for as long as it has.  Irene is a classic example:  the overall energy of the storm wasnt contained in a small region underneath the central dense overcast (CDO), instead the energy was spread out.  That's not to say the energy was less, it was just located in a broader area.

Also, our current classification system doesnt account for anything related to water.  You have to dig deeper for that information, but that's getting into grognard territory that the media doesnt routinely get into.  This has to do with surge and rainfall estimates, which can get complex due to terrain and seafloor characteristics beyond the usual speed and fetch considerations.

Lastly, any time a storm travels relatively parallel to a coastline, very small shifts in track mean huge differences in landfall.  In this case still though, it was only a difference of about 50 miles that determined NYC/NJ's fate.  There were a few ERC wobbles after passing the bahamas that easily accounted for this distance, meaning the storm couldnt bring the core of its surge past Hatteras uninterrupted.  50 miles to the east and 3 days worth of unfettered 500 mile cane-surge slams into NYC/NE.

I look at it as a difference akin to when Andrew wobbled last minute into South Miami rather than South Lauderdale.  A difference that basically spared the entirety of SoFla proper and cut the dmg. costs easily in half.

Anyways, regardless of all this most of the states in the NE broke many records and are recording 1-100 yr. flood events.

Pretty much the same situation with my townhouse complex and Ike (their side of the street was on the same circuit as a grocery store and a pharmacy).

If you want a really quick response, be on the same circuit as a hospital.

Flooding is bad, but consider our ground and what's happening with all the water pipes around here.  Our clay gumbo isn't stable at all.

Yeah, when California had the summer of endless rolling blackouts, our power never went out at home as we were on the same circuit as Seton. If only my office had been next to a hospital too.

Vermont is the most liberal state in the US, if you don't count DC.  Link. (http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/02/25/new-poll-identifies-most-liberal-and-conservative-states/)

The Champlain Valley was fucked pretty hard by geography.  The Adirondacks in the East, and Greens on the Vermont side, mean there isn't any good place for the water to go and areas are reporting between 4 and 8 inches of rain.  Streams and rivers are out of their banks, bridges are down, and flash floods have devoured roads all over the place.

I spent the day helping my parents drain their basement (thankfully, pumps were going again before the water drowned the furnace), and finding alternate driving routes because roads are closed all over the place.

Back on the buried vs lines topic, NPR actually covered this today in ATC.

The rule of thumb - per the interview - is approximately 1:10 line vs bury.

http://www.npr.org/2011/08/29/140042767/would-burying-power-lines-reduce-power-outages

Apart from, you know, the two dozen or so dead people.

115 people die every day in American car accidents. That is my response to that. And take this next part with a grain of salt, but you could probably do math about how the Hurricane may have saved lives by keeping them off the roads.

I know this.  But, I've always considered them more like self-sustainable (independent) liberals.  People go up there to be left alone and take care of themselves... liberal or not.
Anyways, I"ve always looked at libertarianism more of a liberal thought process than most people.  But, that's a politics forum discussion.

I used to dream of buying a place up there and writing a book (like everyone seems to do)  or designing a one-man produced game.  Maybe Irene will drive down home prices up there and I can make this happen!  Maple syrup, here I come!

Good lord...I watched Matt Lauer lay into his own weatherman on the Today show yesterday about the whole "Irene wasn't as bad as we thought, so why did you all freak out about it?!" thing.  I swear I wanted to punch him in the neck through the TV.  Never mind that he was trying to shift the blame about hyping up the storm on the backs of his own comrades so that he looks better, but all this hindsight talk is just going to setup the same scenario as what occurred with Andrew and Katrina...people will think "oh, well the last storm that actually hit us didn't do shit, so we'll just sit through this one too."  And then BOOM, lives get lost.

Whatever...I hope the next storm that uppercuts the coastline actually hits as serious Cat 5 and blows away your kittens, dogs and/or whatever material possession(s) you have that would make the nay-sayers shut the frack up and thank whatever deity they want that they're at least alive.

SHORYUKEN!

It won't. They don't work that way. Hell, Hurricanes get close to New York all the time, but they only cause about $100M in damage or more every 20 years. Also a major hurricane at Cat 3 or higher hasn't hit New York since 1938.

Now, the Carolinas and Florida? yeah they know the drill by now.

Video link for above mentioned Today clip.  Skip to 3:30 to see Matt start the attack on Al and Jim 'Hey, look'it me!  I'm in a cyclone 'ere!' Cantorri (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26184891/vp/44311595#44311595)


Frack yeah we know the drill.  We 'invented' the drill, along with the post-Andrew building codes to storm-proof a home as much as possible.  We tried to teach that drill to New Orleans with Katrina, but no...all those free spirits and thoughts of "well we've had our city under the sea level for this long, what's a hurricane gonna do?" turned off actual logic.  And now post Andrew and post Katrina, we get a big hurricane to attack the most amount of people 'ever', and because it wasn't 'as bad as they thought' it would be, the drill gets questioned into obscurity and fuels the GOP's fight to shut down FEMA and other legit things we need for shit like this.

:argh:

I think you're reaching. New England folks don't really need to be worried about hurricanes. Like I said, it just doesn't happen often enough to warrent panic every time a tropical storm dumps rain on the area.

Logic failure...attempting to auto-correct...


I agree, and Florida/Carolinas don't freak out either when a TS/TD is bumping the coast line.  We WELCOME them for the large amounts of rain they bring, esp. with the dry times we've had the last few years.  But up until the 11th hour, Irene was a full-on Cat 2 hurricane.  It's radius quite literally blocked out the sun for miles around.  It's storm intensity and storm density were menacing.  You don't go on national TV, say all of that, and then follow up with "yeah, but it's not a big deal.  Great kite flying weather, actually."

When it does happen, the damage will be tremendous if it's not taken seriously.  Which it won't with attitudes like that.  People on the Gulf Coast forget this after the first storm that passes near but doesn't do much.  Gods help the East Coast when that happens.

The Storm of the Century is called that because it hits once a century.  Being all "it's no big deal" and having a storm turn out to be that one will ruin a lot of people's day.

Problem is, counties and municipalities are broke.

We just lost all our funding from the county, they didn't even bother sending out the paperwork this year.

So, while it's nice to plan for the storm of the century, there's no money to make it happen.

Don't worry, FEMA will remain funded... by cutting other programs (like libraries)  to make those payments!

One of my wife's college friends is crying a fucking river because their family cabin, second house in the Adirondacks had a bridge washed out.  "Oh no, our ski trip is off this year it looks like... :("

Fucking shit makes me sick, I had to hide her fat ass on FB.  The poor top .1% of the ultra rich and their woes...

When a Cat 5 hits Carolina, people will freak the hell out as usual. Worrying about a storm every 100 years isn't worth it.

"Welcome to Vermont, your Island Paradise!"

Allison was a tropical storm -- and flooded Houston with 100+ (I think it was 118) year water. Ike was a Cat Three that was roughly the size of Ohio -- and fucked up the country in a directly line from Houston to North Dakota.

It's not the strength of the storm -- it's exactly where and how it hits, how big it is, how much of a surge it's pushing, how fast it's moving. A jiggle of just fifty miles at landfall would have seen NYC fucked several times as hard, for instance.

With hurricanes, it's really difficult to tell exactly how bad it's going to be until just a few hours before landfall. And by then, it's too late to do anything. Much better to treat it like a worst case, every time. Fewer people die that way.

Nah.  Maybe he's right.  Irene was nothing to note (http://ireport.cnn.com/open-story.jspa?openStoryID=655725#DOC-664651).

I am highly suspicious of the death count (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/28/hurricane-irene-deaths_n_939421.html). Not to say that some of these aren't tragic (even though I am a heartless bastard and don't care much) and some of these are truly a primary result of the Irene thing. But some of these are a very far stretch...like the ones in FL? A traffic accident at a traffic light that was out? Some guy has a heart attack while boarding up his windows? Trees falling on people, sure... but who the fuck goes camping during a hurricane. I am a storm maniac and even I am not that retarded. I'll give them the flood victims because that is a direct cause. Even the trees... the others, not so much.

However, I think the main shit no one is talking about are all the god damn killer trees out there...  :why_so_serious:

Two of the deaths were in Florida from guys surfing out there.

 :oh_i_see:

Again, Irene was not that bad. Nothing posted about power outages or roads or X dollars of damages even registers on my list as "Bad" considering that: 1 - Four months ago something worse happened in Alabama, and 2 - more people died in the regular act of driving around that day in other parts of the country.

Paelos: shut up

Nate Siilver brings the stats: http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/29/how-irene-lived-up-to-the-hype/

I think Vermont disagrees with you.

But whatever, don't let anything get in the way of being a douche about a storm that was expensive and fatal and was within a butterfly's wing of being a good deal worse.

Paelos isn't posting in this thread anymore so he's not going to be able to respond to your replies to his posts.

I suggest we just drop that discussion and move onto other things.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Inn-At-Long-Trail-and-McGraths-Irish-Pub/126409216398

We've been joking that we should've gone up there last Friday...extended vacation! But to be serious, that's the reality of central VT right now, folks have been stuck up there for days on the mountain. We were going there next week (guess I'm the ultra rich whining now hah).

Scroll down to the video they got of Rt 4 getting washed out, including a house that got washed out completely.

More people around here than I guessed are still without power in the Philly suburbs. The local Trader Joe's just got power back yesterday afternoon late, and of course they have no perishables of any kind now. They're getting a full restock sometime late today, according to the manager. A lot of my colleagues had no power for 12-48 hours, we apparently got quite lucky. One colleague has six inches of water in her basement and no sump pump, first time she's ever had water in there.

Hope that everything returns to normal for those of you that got caught in this one - I remember being without power, etc for 3 weeks with a caved-in ceiling after Ivan, and it was absolutely no fun.

I wasn't directing that comment at you, man.  They have partial ownership with three total families for what is basically a small mountain up near Lake Placid area.  It's absurd, the house/cabin thing is a second home and it cost more money than I'll ever make in my life.  Probably my wife, too.  

I just don't have patience for people with the smallest of problems, yet can't see any of the real, true devastated lives in situations like this.  

You should advise them to sell because next weekend we could likely be doing this chat all over again with "Katia."  No, I'm not joking or doomcasting.  The issue lies somewhat with the TD in the GOM... basically, it helps create a situation where there's just enough weakness to the west that the prevailing bermuda ridge is allowed to build back in behind this next trough (which is too far out to make Kat a total "fish").  By the time the gap in the ridge reforms it'll be too late.

Not only that, but we're now seeing some possible absorption of the TD remnants by Kat in 5 days... so yes, a hurricane Grace scenario (perfect storm of sorts).  The setup is very very very bad (worse than Irene).  It has a truly major cane off the carolinas threatening the NE again next weekend, only stronger, and not effected by any landmasses before landfall.

NHC is shitting bricks on this one.  Biting their tongues so to speak.  Give em 3 days and they should have it pretty well nailed down what's going to happen.

Weather-nature is a fucked up thing.  Every weather-hobbiest I know had Kat likely a fish till this next system popped up and changed the atmosphere (along with Kats speed slowing down and her strength not improving quick enough to induce more Coriolis poleward) just enough to make things a bit more complex to figure out.  Now we've got a cane that'll have 2 highs to spinup her winds and 1 remnant low to beat away the dry air.

So how many NYers will be bitching next weekend eh? (during the 9/11 anniv. no less)  pfft.  Hey!  Let's defund FEMA tomorrow just before this storm too while we're at it.

If Katia fucks up the first weekend of NFL football there will be hell to pay.