Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

[DrJay]

Might as well open the thread, they'll be plenty to talk about. (I know there's a NYC Marathon weather thread elsewhere).

Looks to be pretty bad, events will play out, but some of the stories have me thinking about how reporting has changed in the digital age. From CNN:

"This storm will be studied for years to come, said Louis Uccellini, who is responsible for environmental prediction at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

CNN Weather estimates damage from Hurricane Sandy could reach $3.2 billion. This estimate is based only on wind damage and does not include flooding."

http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/27/us/tropic ... ?hpt=hp_t1

So, it looks like the coastal Carolinas are just now getting the very first drops of rain, yet CNN is talking about "studied for years to come" and talking economic damage $$ figures....aren't those things one usually writes about AFTER an event? The news cycle has shortened so drastically, the race to be first and to sensationalize to capture readers/viewers become so intense, that the media fast-forward through things that haven't even occurred yet. It's bizarre, like eating a meal so quickly you haven't even tasted the appetizer when the dessert hits your stomach, like some weird real-life variation of "Minority Report", or some Einsteinian distortion of space-time reality....."We're going to tell you all about this even though it hasn't happened yet." I can't quite put the feeling into words, but the logical end will be news coverage so accelerated/compressed that stories shrink and then disappear before they even appear. There will be no news.

That is all.

[Marlow]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

The news cycle has shortened so drastically, the race to be first and to sensationalize to capture readers/viewers become so intense, that the media fast-forward through things that haven't even occurred yet. the logical end will be news coverage so accelerated/compressed that stories shrink and then disappear before they even appear. There will be no news.

Jon Stewart often does a rant about it, especially in an election year. News services so desperately want to be the first to report something, that any little sniff they get, they run with. If they're later proven to be right, they crow about their superior coverage. If they're wrong, they just bury it under an avalanche of new speculations.

[DrJay]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

I wonder if Italian meteorologists will predict landfall near Naples, to cover their asses? (See "Italian Courts Sure Are Tough" thread.)

[Conor Dary]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

The news cycle has shortened so drastically, the race to be first and to sensationalize to capture readers/viewers become so intense, that the media fast-forward through things that haven't even occurred yet. the logical end will be news coverage so accelerated/compressed that stories shrink and then disappear before they even appear. There will be no news.

Jon Stewart often does a rant about it, especially in an election year. News services so desperately want to be the first to report something, that any little sniff they get, they run with. If they're later proven to be right, they crow about their superior coverage. If they're wrong, they just bury it under an avalanche of new speculations.

Exhibit one for CNN was getting the ACA Supreme Court Decision wrong, for which they got widely panned.

Cable news is, for the most part, pretty useless. Which is one reason I never watch any of it.

[bambam]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

I'm gonna bet its not as bad as they're predicting for 2 reasons. 1) that's normally the case - the ones that are terrible and do huge damages are often surprises, and 2) the storm is supposed to go right through New York, the center of the media universe, so they will beat the story to death.

[Halfmiler2]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

During 2010-2011, we had a Nor'easter, a hurricane, and a Halloween snowstorm, so I am hoping between all the weak trees being knocked down already and the multiple repairs by the power company, that we will be able withstand what the next few days bring to Northern New Jersey.

[Daisy]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

I wonder if Italian meteorologists will predict landfall near Naples

Hilarious :lol:

[mcgato]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

I am currently scheduled to move out of Hoboken, NJ, on Monday, and move into Bryn Mawr, PA, on Tuesday. Needless to say, things are up in the air. I'm pretty sure that Monday morning move out should be OK. Not so sure about Tuesday move in. Should be an adventure. I'm hoping that it is not as bad as currently predicted.

[Friar]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

Panic stricken women worrying not about the power outage potential but whether their Halloween parties will have to be 86'd.

The last Hurricane I took a Midnight walk around the hood in complete darkness (not too smart). No lights anywhere and an overcast sky so no moonlight: utter blackness.

At Noon: I'm getting 20-30 sustained winds, gusting to 50-60. Power isn't going to be around much longer....

[tandfman]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

I'm gonna bet its not as bad as they're predicting

You lose.

[catson52]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

"CNN Weather estimates damage from Hurricane Sandy could reach $3.2 billion. This estimate is based only on wind damage and does not include flooding."


If that was accurate - and I have no idea how one can make a proper estimate - looks like water/flood related damage could total at least 7-10 times that amount.

[bambam]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

I'm gonna bet its not as bad as they're predicting

You lose.

You're right.

[gh]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

Just coincidentally, yesterday afternoon I was surfing across one of the 357 cable channels I pay for and don't really need and came on a rerun of an episode of that series Life After People.

Mostly projections, of course, but stunning to see how quickly old ma nature wins and we lose.

The close was that if we all disappeared today, it would only take about 10,000 years before virtually all overt signs that we were ever here have disappeared. There'd still be remnants of the Great Wall, but in terms of recognizable objects, they hypothesized that a weathered version of Mt. Rushmore (carved out of granite, as it is) might be the only thing remaining.

Fascinating stuff.

[lonewolf]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

I enjoyed those Life After People programs and while I agree the earth would revert to nature, I always thought the presumed rate of decay was too accelerated.

There will certainly be climate/weather changes but !0,000 years is a very short time geologically, hardly enough time for another Ice Age encroachment which would indeed obliterate all evidence of man's fleeting occupation of the planet. While cataclysmic continental shifts are not required to wipe out evidence of man's existence, coastal areas could be affected by rising sea levels and be submerged.
China's Great Wall and Mt Rushmore are good candidates for survival but we currently have ruins and physical evidence approaching 100,000 years in age (African Stonehenge) and ruins in Middle East estimated to be 8000 to 10000 years old.

But yeah, the place will be pretty run down in 10,000 years.

[mcgato]

Re: Hurricane Sandy/Frankenstorm/superstorm

Since I'm posting on other threads after a few days without significant internet access, I'll update my move (not that many care).

The weather did barely hold out for my Monday morning move. The moving van got to Hoboken at about 9, and had me cleaned out by about noon. There was a little rain, but not too bad. It was getting quite breezy, but not too serious yet.

I left Hoboken around 3:30 on Monday afternoon, but not before seeing a large chunk of roof fly off of the 6 story building down the street.

Since I was moving, and my new company was paying all relocation, I just needed to find a hotel. I figured that would be easy. The first I checked was on the Hudson River, and already had an evacuation notice. After a couple of other full houses, I was a little worried. In a parking lot outside one hotel, I was calling around about vacancies. While on the phone, my car was shaking back and forth from about 50 mph winds. I kept moving west and finally found a vacancy at a hotel near the Meadowlands complex. The hotel was fairly well protected, which held up pretty well to the (I'm guessing) over 70 mph wind gusts that we saw that night. Lost power for a few hours but other than that no real difficulties in the hotel on Monday night and all of Tuesday.

I went back to Hoboken on Wednesday to finish cleaning out my apartment. There was no power in almost all of Hoboken. I was a bit surprised to see a lot of the others in the building still there after a couple of days with no power. They were no worse for wear, but were getting a bit tired of the situation. My end of town, the high end, saw flooding for probably the first time ever. The other end of town, the low end, was under massive amounts of water. I'm reading blogs, and some power is coming back on in Hoboken. I'm lucky that I moved into my Bryn Mawr apartment yesterday, after staying at a nearby hotel for the past two days.

That is the adventure that was my move out of Hoboken. I'll change my little ditty on my posts some time in the future.