Hurricane Irene: is this lady NUTS?!

[Freedom]

Here in RI, half the population has no power, and it will be about a week before everyone has it back. (We didn't lose power)
Smithfield, RI water supply contaminated, they have to boil their water.
Providence alone has more than 70 streets closed - trees, wires.

My cousin in No Kingston NH lost power at about 3 PM and doesn't expect it back on any time soon.

My back yard as that "sploosh" effect, Karen, lol.

[Freedom]

On eastern seaboard, over 4 million have no power.

In RI, 2 main transmission lines are out, and 24 substations are flat. These 24, it is not due to the transmission lines, these are separate issues.

Next high tide is between 7 and 8 PM, and has raised concerns.

[sasvermont]

I was without power from 2PM to 8PM. Not too bad, actually. The horror is not knowing how long you'll be without it. I had cranked down the freezer temperature as low as it would go, in preparation for such an event.

No trees down so far. Just branches and lots of leaves. We still have the rest of the night to go through. The rain has eased up but the winds are high and gusting.

I think Irene is going home soon. Phewwwwwwwwwwwwww. She had my house creaking and swaying.

I hope everyone else is doing ok.

[kitten645]

I'm sorry but Irene is just plain RUDE! Hope everyone is safe.
I've decided to keep my old fashioned, not electrically powered, phone at home! I can't imagine being without power for a week! Good gravy! I guess I could power my cell in the car but what a pain!
Stay safe everyone!

[Lady's Human]

Tell that to the 4 MILLION without power for who knows how long; tell that to the States of New Jersey and Vermont both dealing with massive flooding; tell that to the 15 (maybe more) who have died - in the rainstorm with high winds.

Latest death count increased to at least 21 people in 8 states.

Okay, I will.

We've had more power out and more flooding than this due to normal rainfall, and noreasters routinely do more damage.

Media hype and over saturation.

Of the deaths, at least three could have easily been avoided........it's called staying home, instead of going out to surf in the waves, or going for a drive in the heart of the storm.

Maybe if the Media were more responsible, people would take evac orders seriously instead of ignoring them due to the constant hyperbole every time a storm occurs.

[Puckstop31]

LH... Lemons.... Lemonade....


You know this kind of hype is only going to get worse as technology and time advances. So, take advantage of it. I moved some funds around and bought Home Depot and Lowes stock last week.

I understand news organizations telling you a hurricane is coming. What I find to be utter hype were the five channels on Direct TV dedicated to nothing but Hurricane Irene updates.


Just be prepared ALL the time. Its not rocket science. Be able to provide for you and yours for at least 2 weeks, always. That way when it hits the fan for real, you can be a person able to HELP and not one of those standing on your roof begging for somebody else to save you.

[Lady's Human]

2005 ice storm.

flooding all over the northeast in 2006

2004 ice storm

* The Great Blizzard of 1888
* The Ash Wednesday Storm of 1962
* The Eastern Canadian Blizzard of March 1971
* The Groundhog Day gale of 1976
* The Northeastern United States blizzard of 1978
* The Late November 1984 Nor'easter
* The 1991 Perfect Storm (the "Perfect Storm," combined Nor'easter/hurricane)
* The Storm of the Century (1993)
* The Christmas 1994 Nor'easter
* The North American blizzard of 1996
* The North American blizzard of 2003
* The North American blizzard of 2005
* Nor'Ida (2009)
* The December 2010 North American blizzard


Need I go on?

As to the TV coverage, I did turn it off, however, judging by the response over the internet, many didn't, and bought into the hype.

If people weren't wound up by the hype, why does this thread exist?

[Lady's Human]

Mea cupla for not meeting the precise numerical content requested.

There are ice storms not put in that list that wiped out the power grid in several states, one in 2004 knocked out power to most of NY, Ohio, PA, WV, VA, and a huge swath of Canada.

If Irene had knocked out power to NYC, then you could say that 12 million people had their power knocked out..........but it would have been for a very short period of time, as urban areas have dense power grids and customers are quickly brought back on line. The number of affected customers is a lousy metric for how much damage an incident has done.

In the 2004 ice storm, there were people in upstate NY who went without power for a few weeks in the dead of winter. They fired up their generators and moved on. The restaurant where we ate breakfast was running off of a tractor generator for a couple of weeks.

[sasvermont]

For all those folks who think the preparation scare was hype:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?f...3521629&type=1

We now have dueling chainsaws going in my neighborhood. I have only limbs and leaves, small enough to move by hand or lawn tractor. Many, many trees are down in the woods behind me. I can see them hanging, as I look from my bedroom window.

Some areas got it more than others. Flooding seems to be our enemy here in Vermont.

Was it the worst I've ever been through? Well, I have never felt my house sway or heard it creak before last night. It was gusting last night so I got little sleep.

I would prefer the hype so that people will be safe rather than sorry. Mother Nature is so unpredictable at best.

I have friends in PA who still have no power and they have brought in generators. Oh well. We will survive.

I prepared for the worst, hoped for the best and got something in between. Not bad.

Now I must go pick up all the yucky stuff in the yard.

I did get tired of hearing the TV channels' coverage of the hurricane, especially when they had some poor sucker standing at the pier or intersection, getting blown around....how silly.... so I turned off the TV and just tracked the hurricane on the NOAA website.

Some people's lives were turned upside down by the hurricane and I hope all the "hype" kept them scared enough to be safe. I was fortunate and now grateful that I prepared and didn't have to use all the preparation. I may not be so fortunate the next time.

[pomtzu]

Thought I would check in - we just got cable and internet restored around noon today. It went out sometime after midnight on Saturday, so yesterday was a day for movies and reading. We came through pretty much unscathed. We only lost power a couple of times, but it came right back on within a few minutes. There was water standing everywhere in this area - in the farm fields, people's yards, and roads made impassable, a lot of tree limbs down, but no structural damage anywhere that I saw, in my trip into town this morning. We had a lot of tree branches down, but that was the worst of it for us. We are protected somewhat by woods on 3 sides of us, so it's not like being a sitting duck, and out in the open. We got the worst of the storm between 8 and midnight Saturday, and it was pretty wild there for a while. There were tornadoes being tracked all around us - some as close as only 5 miles - but none touched down that I know of. There was one down in the beach area that did damage to 15 homes - one of them sustained major damage. Of course the ocean beaches sustained heavy erosion damage as they always do.
I for one, was not one to scoff at the warnings, just as I never do. And I have been thru a lot worse from blizzards, ice storms and Nor'Easters. I take them all seriously. If that forecast blizzard fizzles out and only dumps and inch or two, then that's fine with me, however, a forecast of an inch or two can turn into a monster blizzard and leave you even unable to get out of your own driveway for days and days, and be without power for even longer. Been that route before too.
I just hope that the nay-sayers and skeptics aren't sitting back and thinking "I was right - I knew it wasn't going to be so bad", because if this experience (and maybe some more in the future) makes you complacent, one day that complacency is going to bite you in the butt! I am glad that it wasn't as bad as it could have been, but I was prepared for the worst anyway.
Glad to hear from the PT'ers that have checked in, and that you are all okay.

[Karen]

Yes, it took the furthest westward path of the ones they predicted, and I don't know if Vermonters even got the amount of pre-storm hysteria we did. I saw several reports saying it was possible that Wall Street would be under 7-8 feet of water ... and nothing about the potential for Vermont or Upstate NY suffering.

It is worrisome, because the next Hurricane that comes, people who evacuated this time "for no reason" as it turns out may be tempted to stay, and suffer because of it.

[momcat]

Hurricane Katrina hit 6 years ago today.

[Karen]

45 dead

12.4 Billion in damages, so far -
[snip]
All this from a Category 1 - just a rainstorm with high wind.

That was just what he said we would get when it finally got up here. Why the running tally, especially of the dead? Many of those deaths were due to senseless human error/stupidity and not simply the fault of the storm. I would not "blame" the Hurricane for the death of someone foolish enough to stand at the edge of a raging river in a hurricane and risk getting washed in and drowning - that was that person's decision, foolish though it may be. Likewise people who get washed off the sea wall, or off the beach when the beaches have all been closed, and signs posted to keep away. Or for the death of someone who decided to try canoeing in the rapidly rising floodwaters ... how is that a good idea? The rescue worker who died trying to rescue someone from a car when the driver foolishly thought they could just drive through the water, when it was pouring rain and in the middle of a hurricane, and we are all told as student drivers "don't ever try to cross running water on a roadway" ...

Yes, some of the deaths were tragic - the man who died when a tree fell on his house while he was inside is one example. But saying "45 dead" does not tell the whole story by any means.