Here Comes Florence

[Sir T]

Be sure to check your local Waffle house for Storm severity updates.

http://uk.businessinsider.com/waffle-house-index-hurricane-severity-2018-9?r=US&IR=T

People are keeping a close eye on Waffle House as Hurricane Florence churns toward the East Coast — and there's a weird reason why

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has an unusual way to track the severity of a natural disaster, and it involves Waffle House restaurants.

The chain, whose restaurants are open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, is famous for staying open during many natural disasters. When it closes, that suggests an event was especially bad and likely to have devastating effects on the economy.

Because of this, FEMA internally uses an unofficial "Waffle House Index" to track potentially dangerous events.

"If a Waffle House store is open and offering a full menu, the index is green," a 2011 article in the magazine EHS Today says. "If it is open but serving from a limited menu, it's yellow. When the location has been forced to close, the index is red."

[schild]

Yea, the WHI is not fucking around. It's a serious metric.

Also Waffle House fucking rules, so.

[Cyrrex]

Pat Robertson has invoked the name of Jesus to forbid it from making landfall, so you'll all have him to thank when it suddenly shoots northeast.  As long as there are enough donations believers, that is.

[Yegolev]

Florence wrecked a buoy, causing nonsensical weather data and "bad" maps.  This is why none of us get time off during WxSuperbowl.

[Brolan]

The forward path is slowing down, looking like another Harvey.   Jesus, hasn't that area already been plagued by flooding this summer?  The weather is truly insane lately.

[Yegolev]

For those in SE Asia: http://www.metoc.navy.mil/jtwc/jtwc.html

[Brolan]

I’m watching CNN coverage on a beach where the reporters are badgering the people there about not evacuating. I would like one of them to say: “Right back at you buddy.  I’m not going to be the idiot doing a stand up in 50 mph winds later.”

[Yegolev]

That's how meteorologists make them dollars, yo.

[01101010]

Jim Cantore was my hero in the early days of the Weather Channel. If I was able to take a different career path, I would have been chasing storms.

[Cyrrex]

There are already stories of people on their rooftops needing rescue.  Now, I don't know the facts of those particular cases, but generally speaking...if people are given a clear evac order and do not follow it and refuse to seek the other options they are given, can we not let Darwin decide their fate instead of sending FEMA responders?  Seriously, let these retards die.

[RhyssaFireheart]

Local news this morning was (still) preempted by the round-the-clock Florence coverage which.. is a bit ridiculous.  I get it, huge storm sitting off the shore of NC taking a break, but while waiting for the hurricane to actually make landfall and then wander off, we don't really need constant talking heads coverage of it.  The idiots who didn't evacuate aren't watching TV and those who did don't need constant never ending reminders of what's going on over their houses.  Updates are fine, this starts to verge on disaster porn, IMO. 

Although, the more we see about the track onto land, it's going to take a watery shit pretty much on top of my MiL's house.

[Khaldun]

Looks like most of the house rescues are from one town that's near the mouth of the Neuse River--storm surge filled the entire first floor of houses in much of the town in a matter of minutes. Probably doesn't help that around 2 feet of rain have fallen near that town in the last 24 hours.

[Hammond]

Looks like Norfolk is on the edge of this one. Brothers house should be fine.

Man the Weather channel is doing some bonkers augmented reality stuff these days. I wonder how long it takes for them to get this stuff created.

Twitter animation

[schild]

Hurricane season is TWCs Superbowl. So yeah, they pull out all the tricks.

[HaemishM]

There are already stories of people on their rooftops needing rescue.  Now, I don't know the facts of those particular cases, but generally speaking...if people are given a clear evac order and do not follow it and refuse to seek the other options they are given, can we not let Darwin decide their fate instead of sending FEMA responders?  Seriously, let these retards die.

Not to get all "defending dumb actions" on you here, but the truth is some people cannot afford a hotel, or sometimes even the gas to get far enough the fuck out of town to be safe. So they make what is ultimately a dumb decision.

This was also part of why there were so many poor people trapped in New Orleans during Katrina.

[Khaldun]

Yes. People don't necessarily have anywhere to go or the resources to get there.

TWC's augmented reality thing showing what a 9' storm surge actually means from a human perspective was pretty fantastic. It really got the point across for anyone who couldn't fully imagine why 9' of sea and fresh water rolling across a flat landscape is a major catastrophe.

[Teleku]

Hurricane season is TWCs Superbowl. So yeah, they pull out all the tricks.

Companies should start competing for who has the funniest commercials on TWC everytime a major disaster happens.

[IainC]

Here's a very stable genius on Fox telling you what those liberal elites don't want you to know.

The other reason I plan to wait out this hurricane is to remain close to my home and look after my property if Florence crushes it. You see, if you flee it can be very hard to return because of the flooding and storm damage. So if your house gets a massive hole in it while you are displaced, then it will get rained on for two weeks and be raided by wildlife. You got to defend your home. As my friend Mark put it while we were sitting in Waterline Brewery drinking Mango Kolschs yesterday, "Death before Dishonor."

[Yegolev]

Looks like Norfolk is on the edge of this one. Brothers house should be fine.

Man the Weather channel is doing some bonkers augmented reality stuff these days. I wonder how long it takes for them to get this stuff created.

Twitter animation

I know one of the guys who does this.  There are about four or five people on that team.  Won awards.

Hurricane season is TWCs Superbowl. So yeah, they pull out all the tricks.

We actually do this sort of thing all the time, but who watches TWC unless there's a hurricane?

[Yegolev]

In the vein of whoring, if you want to mail in a video: hurricaneflorence@weather.com

[01101010]

We actually do this sort of thing all the time, but who watches TWC unless there's a hurricane?

People on vacation?  

...but mildly serious since when I used to go on vacations, this was constantly on. Of course that was prior to smart phones ...

[Yegolev]

This is fine, we sell ads there too.  New app, in fact.

[Yegolev]

About the flood graphics, someone said it was created using UnReal Engine Immersive Mixed Reality (IMR).

[WayAbvPar]

Here's a very stable genius on Fox telling you what those liberal elites don't want you to know.

The other reason I plan to wait out this hurricane is to remain close to my home and look after my property if Florence crushes it. You see, if you flee it can be very hard to return because of the flooding and storm damage. So if your house gets a massive hole in it while you are displaced, then it will get rained on for two weeks and be raided by wildlife. You got to defend your home. As my friend Mark put it while we were sitting in Waterline Brewery drinking Mango Kolschs yesterday, "Death before Dishonor."

So what happens when the hurricane puts a massive hole in you?

[schild]

We actually do this sort of thing all the time, but who watches TWC unless there's a hurricane?

i mean

that's the superbowl comment, yes

[Trippy]

Looks like Norfolk is on the edge of this one. Brothers house should be fine.

Man the Weather channel is doing some bonkers augmented reality stuff these days. I wonder how long it takes for them to get this stuff created.

Twitter animation

I know one of the guys who does this.  There are about four or five people on that team.  Won awards.

Wired article on how they did the animation: https://www.wired.com/story/weather-channel-hurricane-florence-storm-surge-graphic/

I wonder how long it takes for them to get this stuff created.

90 minutes from the time they got the data.

[Yegolev]

More on TWC and the graphics:
https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/blog/the-weather-channel-taps-the-future-group-to-provide-revolutionary-mixed-reality-capabilities

[Yegolev]

Thanks to Slack, Florence, and our awesome team, I was just made aware of my new favorite TWC feedback.

Your videos are bullshit. You recently posted a video on "the largest recorded blast on planet Earth" and said that it was the Tunguska event in Russia. It was not: that explosion had an estimated explosion of 10-15 megatons of TNT. The Tsar Bomba (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bomba) had an estimated explosion of 25 megatons of TNT. You guys have horrible ads, horrible videos, and your shit is on the verge of fake news. I fucking hate your guts. The weather is always wrong. Get your goddamn facts straight you good-for-nothing cunts. If you don't I hope you all burn in fucking hell with your families for providing BULLSHIT NONSENSE to the public just like the rest of the goddamn internet. Fuck you in the mouth and the asshole, hope you bleed out your asshole to death you fucking shitstorm fuck ball shit bitches.

[Hammond]

More on TWC and the graphics:
https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/blog/the-weather-channel-taps-the-future-group-to-provide-revolutionary-mixed-reality-capabilities

Thanks for the link! Gives me a place to start looking up technology that I am curious out.

[Fraeg]

A work thingy:

https://stn.wim.usgs.gov/FEV/#FlorenceSep2018

a lot of prep and energy goes into collecting data and I have some good friends who worked their asses off getting things deployed.

[Yegolev]

Nice.  I'll give the mets the link.

[Yegolev]

Did some more casual reading and WIM is suspiciously advanced for a government project.

[WayAbvPar]

Thanks to Slack, Florence, and our awesome team, I was just made aware of my new favorite TWC feedback.

Your videos are bullshit. You recently posted a video on "the largest recorded blast on planet Earth" and said that it was the Tunguska event in Russia. It was not: that explosion had an estimated explosion of 10-15 megatons of TNT. The Tsar Bomba (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bomba) had an estimated explosion of 25 megatons of TNT. You guys have horrible ads, horrible videos, and your shit is on the verge of fake news. I fucking hate your guts. The weather is always wrong. Get your goddamn facts straight you good-for-nothing cunts. If you don't I hope you all burn in fucking hell with your families for providing BULLSHIT NONSENSE to the public just like the rest of the goddamn internet. Fuck you in the mouth and the asshole, hope you bleed out your asshole to death you fucking shitstorm fuck ball shit bitches.

This reminds me of my high school days. I worked for the communications center for Godfather's Pizza, and one of the things we did was sort through comment cards. One was similar to this...we ended up photocopying it and showing everyone. Mentioned fleas swarming in the salad bar, and ended 'your mother sucks shit-coated demon cocks in Hell!'. I am not sure I ever laughed that hard while on the clock. Pizza is SRS BIZNESS.

[Yegolev]

Got a FB post from the team with them all standing in the neighborhood flood circle from the TWC video.  They should get some (more) awards for this.

[Yegolev]

5pm govt alert: FLORENCE NOW PRODUCING TROPICAL-STORM-FORCE WIND GUSTS IN FLORENCE SOUTH CAROLINA