Where I am, which is north of the Bronx near Yonkers, ain’t nothin’. Run of the mill storm. I was expecting sheets of rain and howling wind, and it just isn’t happening. I still have power, so far.
I understand there is considerable flooding near the shores. The ocean is flooding streets and probably filling some basements. Some people are probably going to be sorry they didn’t move their cars to higher ground yesterday.
The worst of this is supposed to be over by noon, and the storm should be completely gone by early evening.
It’s the same up here near Poughkeepsie. It’s just windier than usual. Locally, they’re telling us the worst is yet to come, and I have no reason to doubt them.
I don’t think the NY Times made it out of the city this morning. The NYS Thruway’s closed, as are several other of the major N-S roadways.
So, I’m going to sit and read blogs, and comment – unless the power goes out.
And if that happens, I have several good books ready, and some candles.
I saw film of a Category one that stalled off NC. For almost a day, it refused to make landfall, dumping water it sucked up from the Atlantic. The cumulative effect of the winds broke up a cinder block building. The media whores will milk this for all its worth, but the potential for flooding and storm surge is entirely a matter of chance. The cities and states taking precautions and asking stupid people not to do stupid things are doing their jobs right.
Doug — believe me, if I lived nearer to Long Island Sound I might well have packed up my car and found a motel room upstate someplace. There are lots of flooded cars and basements, downed power lines, downed trees, some property damage from debris flying around. I haven’t heard of any deaths or injuries in NY or NJ.
Comments dumped the reply I sent early this morning. I wonder why?
In NY City, not only were all sporting and cultural events cancelled, but Bloomberg even closed the bars, according to reports I heard yesterday.
The bars?
I can understand no baseball or football games, and no Broadway plays or opera’s or symphonies, but bars? Pretty much all across the city, there are bars every few streets that cater to the locals, and only the locals, so pretty much no one’s driving to them. And as a former bartender, let me tell you, YOU WANT to work on a night like that. People spend, and tip, a fortune! It’s kind of like the 3 Little Pigs mentality, singing, “Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?!”
I did hear an interesting take last night on, of all things, a NY sports radio station – I had to get away from “All Irene, all the time!”. The host had on some guy from Boston who was very bright (at first, I thought it was the great Charles Pierce, but it wasn’t, though he had the same kind of smart and funny take he has), and he said that the reaction we’re seeing may be the result of Katrina, where not just the Federal government was found lacking, but so were local and state governments – hence, all of the shutdowns.
I thought that was an interesting way to look at this. And the more I think about it, the more I think he’s right.
And the biggest plus that I can see out of Irene?
The Sunday morning bloviation fests were cancelled!
YAY!!!
An ounce of prevention…
I’m glad Irene turned out to be not so bad; we had three in a row score direct hits in my town back in ’04.
Charlie was first, followed by Jeanne and Francis. Charlie knocked down 50 or so 100 yr. old oaks in the neighborhood. We had no power or water for 12 days, it was over 2 months before I could get shingles to repair the roof.
I had the great idea of boarding up the windows before Charlie, to the amusement of the neighbors. Charlie was projected to enter Tampa bay and head north, but hit Charolotte Harbor and ran up the Peace River to Orlando/Kissimmee.
Luckily, Charlie was compact and fast moving, so those 100mph+ winds (only) lasted a coupla’ hrs. The plywood stayed up ’till almost Thanksgiving that year, and many lessons were learned.
Erinyes, my mother, sister and brother-in-law lived in Punta Gorda at that time. They were not the type to hang around, but as I recall the order to evacuate came late and the causeway was already flooded. My family had to take their chances. My mother was 88 years old and handled it like a trooper. They all lived on a canal, but fortunately, didn’t get flooded. My mother moved in with us for several months. When I drove her back down to Punta Gorda, she thought I got off at the wrong exit. The damage made it look like a different place.
The succeeding hurricanes gave rise to T-shirts that said, “Another weekend, another hurricane”.
Completely off topic, but a worthwhile time killer: NYT has a Neal Gabler article entitled “The Elusive Big Idea” it’s interesting and short. After you read it, search youtube for “BBC Inside the Medieval Mind power”. The documentary series “Inside the Medieval Mind” has four parts. The episode on power has a lot about the oppression of women and sexuality by the church. It concomitantly provides an insight into the evangelical and bagger minds.
Sorry, I didn’t plan to mention this, so no links.
Mr. Gulag,
Someone put up a video on You Tube (sorry forgot link) about drunks in the hurricane, so maybe preventing this was behind the closing of bars.
And as a former bartender, let me tell you, YOU WANT to work on a night like that. People spend, and tip, a fortune!
I had no idea this happened, but I guess it makes sense. People band together, feel the camaraderie, loosen up and spend.
I remember getting hosed mightily by some big wet storms, back when I lived in the NE. Out here in SoCal (valley), it’s just bloody hot. Temps expected over 100 degrees today. Could use some of your wind and rain.
As one person in Upstate NY explained to me when I asked why people came out in bad summer or winter storms, when I always stayed home, he told me “If you’re driving like we do in nice weather, you’re a f*cking drunk – but in sh*tty weather, you’re just another sh*tty driver. The cops and troopers are too busy to deal with you.”
Made sense to me!
I never over-served, but people always, ALWAY’S, drank more in bad weather than in good. Go figure…
Goatherd,
Small world; my sister and her husband bought a house in P.G. several months before Charlie hit.( they picked P.G. because they thought it the safest place in the US to retire to, HA!)
The day before it hit, I called her and told her to get out of the way, but she declined. When Charlie arrived, she called from her closet saying the roof was about to let go, then the line went dead.
I thought I’d be going down to id some bodies the next day. We switched to the weather channel, and watched in shock as the storm raced up the Peace River.
Charlie then turned North, the weather man saying it was 15 min from Poinciana, then the power went off. I spent two days cutting downed trees from my driveway so I could get my truck out.
My sister and her husband survived with no injuries other then PTSD, which prompted them to run to Georgia when Jeanne and Frances threatened.
I traveled to P.G. shortly after the storm for my job, and was stunned by the level of destruction. The main cause of damage in my neighborhood was from tornadoes spawned by the storm.
I lived for 24 years in Maryland and remember at least two sometimes three hurricanes per year that we had to prepare for. Only one in the 24 years actually landed and caused damage. However, I don’t think it hurt any of us to prepare for the other storms and to be glad it wasn’t as predicted. The coastlines, of course were different and usually had a lot of damage.
erinyes…I remember the people evacuating the Tampa Bay area and heading for safer ground in Orlando…only to take a direct hit when Charlie decided to go to the Magic Kingdom.
Swami, that was a real blooper, but they at least has some solid buildings to ride out the storm in.
My wife got a room in a hotel a bit west of where we live , she works for a nation wide insurance company, and had to do claims work.
Charlie was like Mike Tyson, compact, hard hitting and very fast.
Because of this, the damage was substantial, but the path of destruction was not large.