Hurricanes

I just got back from NYC/New Jersey, which is still suffering the after-effects of Hurricane Sandy.  Power, gas, and Internet porn are all severely restricted.  Fortunately the DC area looks to have escaped any significant damage, and the gas stations are running normal.

 I think of Texas, Louisiana, and Florida as the main targets of hurricanes.  Come to think of it, when it comes to natural disasters, the US gets almost all of them.  Volcanos?  Yep, Mt. St.Helen’s in Washington State.  Earthquakes?  California.  Tornados?  The Midwest.  Floods?  The Mississippi flooded back in the 90’s.  Blizzards?  Mainly the East Coast, plus Chicago and Buffalo.  About the only one we don’t get are tsunamis.  Brazil, on the other hand, gets none of these (least of all blizzards!). 

 Back in 1988, when I was taking summer classes at the University of Maryland, we had a huge storm.  It knocked over trees and knocked out the power in College Park, although UMCP itself did not lose power.  As nasty as it was, suitemate Jeff, from Houston, Texas, claimed, “this was nothing compared to a hurricane.”

 I recall a weather channel documentary about “storm chasers”, these high-flying bombers which fly above the hurricanes and down into the eye.  The eye is truly bizarre, a round area of complete calm inside the swirling maelstrom of nature’s violence. 

 Although several hurricanes have come by the East Coast a few times, I’ve never been directly in the path of one, nor have I suffered any property damage, injuries, or losses of loved ones due to these storms.  I count myself lucky in that respect. 

 Katrina was the worst recent hurricane.  New Orleans is still trying to recover from it.  Galveston, Texas, was hit in 1900 and never recovered.  Sandy swiped by NYC and headed northwest, then circled up northeast, up around NYC, almost dancing around the Big Apple like one of those Mexican hat dances, Sandy swishing her skirt up left and right as she circled the Empire State Sombrero.  I see almost NO coverage of the hurricane’s impact on Philadelphia, which arguably was directly targeted by the hurricane – outside of Philly news coverage, which obviously focuses on that city.  But on Wednesday, the only NJ Transit buses running were in Camden!  Go figure.  NYC was hurt worse from the glancing blow of Sandy than Philly was head-on.  The PA death toll is 1/3 the NJ/NY toll.  I’m getting the big impression here that “national news coverage” pays too much attention to NYC and ignores everyone outside the NYC metro area as inconsequential.  World Series coverage dropped dramatically once the Yankees were knocked out.   Who won?  Oh, the San Francisco Giants.  Again.  (Yawn).

 Inevitably it’s impossible to completely protect ourselves from hurricanes, but New York’s recent problems suggest that a lot more can be done – and should be done - to reduce the effects.  Look at how little damage earthquakes do these days to L.A., now that they’ve re-engineered their buildings.  An earthquake hits L.A. and the death toll is negligible relative to the strength of the quake itself.  Over in Iran or Armenia a similar sized quake kills thousands of people.  Someone needs to study the weak, choke points here and address them.  Clearly Hurricane Sandy will not be the last one we’ll face.

 Finally, I couldn’t resist posting that pic of Nana Gouvea, the Brazilian model who tastelessly posed in front of pictures of hurricane damage, inspiring a spoof picture of her in front of another disaster, Ned Stark’s imminent decapitation in “Game of Thrones”.  Enjoy.