It looks like family and friends all escaped hurricane Irene with only inconvenience and minor damage. It seems Mr. B. may have fared the worst, but even he and family are okay. Water leaks seem to be a common refrain and given the torrential rain that most places saw it's not surprising. Many places are still dealing with all of that water and the damage and death toll could still go higher. Thankfully though, once Irene got past North Carolina it did not spawn the higher winds or as many tornadoes as had been feared.
It did plenty enough damage as it is and I'm not going to join the second guessers who think it was all just hype. Too many people are still dealing with too many problems to call it that. I think some criticism of the way the media overplayed things is certainly in order, but that hysteria is hardly surprising, especially considering where it was taking place. The charges of "hype" being leveled at some politicians is unwarranted though.
When disaster strikes, particularly disasters like this one where there is plenty of warning, the responsibilities start with the individual and move up the line. Roughly speaking, that line then goes local, state and federal. My initial take is that local and state governments did an excellent job of handling their responsibilities. I do not think the warnings they issued were hyped given the possible scenarios that existed on Thursday. At that point Irene could have made landfall as at least a category 2 hurricane anywhere from North Carolina to New England, potentially wreaking even worse havoc than it did all along the way. All that officials can do is make the best call that they can given the info that they have at that time, keeping in mind that they have to give people enough time to react. I think they did fine in this case.
I think the feds did their jobs too, though the state and local governments did so well that I don't think FEMA was seriously tested. I think President Obama did his job well also. I see no reason to criticize him as some are doing, though he risks overplaying his role if he's not careful.
That leaves the individual. I think people generally took the warnings seriously and acted accordingly, but some did not. I have mixed feelings about people who refused to evacuate, people such as the 100 seniors in Atlantic City. I guess that in the end I support their right to make their own decisions as long as they aren't going to scream for help if things suddenly go south and they desperately need to be rescued. They didn't need to be rescued this time, but if that's needed next time I don't want to see one person risk their life to save them, not one. I hope they truly understand what they did and what it means if they do it again someday.
That gets us to the death toll as of this afternoon. A story from Time has a few details on some of those killed. A handful of those deaths appear to be heroic or just plain bad luck. Most though, appear to be deadly mistakes. I certainly don't want to add to their survivors' pain and there's not enough context to any of those details to judge the victims as foolish or stupid. That's not necessary anyway to draw whatever lessons we can. After all, we are all just one momentary lapse of reason from ending up in the same boat.
That said, canoeing down a flooded is street is probably not a good idea. Being out and about in a hurricane is not a good idea except for the very direst of circumstances. Wind surfing just hours after a tropical storm moves through is not a good idea. The point here is not to mock these victims, but to point out just how dangerous it is even after, or maybe especially after, a major storm moves through and to learn from the mistakes of others. My friend Rob has experienced a number of hurricanes down in the New Orleans area and offers this advice:
If you're in that area and you want to start cleaning up, be very careful. If you hurt yourself with a chainsaw, some other power tool, or just manage to cut yourself on something, you may not have a clear path to an emergency room because trees are down in the roadway. Even if you can reach an emergency room, it may be without power, understaffed, and overwhelmed. I recommend you get the immediate debris out of your way and leave the rest of the job for another day or two until things settle down and return to normal.
Yes, and there are a million ways to hurt yourself in the aftermath of a major storm. It happens in the blink of an eye too. One second you're doing fine and the next the chainsaw has bucked or the road has disappeared in a churning mass of water.
From what I can see, individuals and government at all levels for the most part performed admirably as Irene moved up the coast and that's a good sign for the rest of this hurricane season. If mistakes were made there is time now to correct for them. The media could be a little less hysterical, but good luck with that. Nobody should get complacent though. Irene could have been much worse than it was.
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