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Hurricane Sandy Nears East Coast
An anonymous reader writes "Scientists have been following and projecting Sandy's path with all the tools at their disposal: ocean buoys, radar and satellite imagery, and computer modeling. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration also gathers information from special reconnaissance aircraft, which fly over hurricanes and can drop instruments into them to measure wind speeds, air pressure, temperature, and altitude. The latest data gathered on Hurricane Sandy point to an unprecedented and mighty tempest, scientists say." A couple of our East Coast offices are closed today and people have been told to work from home. Please share your storm stories, and updates while you still have internet access.
It doesn't take long for the second guessers to arrive, does it?
Sometimes they even show up too early.
Well, it could be spun for or against either candidate.
That's the problem with self-styled religious oracles claiming omens, it's always down to their personal agenda and there's nothing divine about that. The simple truth is that shit happens and the universe is indifferent.
Started as a minor storm but the press have blown it out of all proportion. Now is a big one.
I hear you. The elements that you have to face is different than what senior management is willing to face. Two sets of rules. They don't mind putting you in harm's way while they spend the day at home watching Sportcenter.
Can't ask your manager for remote access to your terminal and/or tools?
Wearing pants should always be optional.
Exactly. Imagine the mess South Florida would have if a freak winter storm dumped 2 inches of real mid-afternoon snow on downtown Miami and the surrounding 3 counties, and it kept coming down all night so that we woke up the next morning to a city where every road was impassable to anything less than a SUV or truck, seriously dangerous regardless, and every vehicle that was outside overnight had ice crusted over the windshield wipers. We'd have people getting electrocuted trying to melt ice on the windshield with blow dryers (until the weight of the ice caused the power lines to fall down), and I shudder to imagine the carnage on I-95 and 836 when drivers who can't even avoid accidents during afternoon rainstorms suddenly had to deal with ICE.
A category 1 hurricane making landfall in South Florida is like a "Snow Day" in Cleveland or Buffalo -- work from home today, limp and tipetoe around tomorrow, life as normal on day 3. An afternoon snowstorm that persists into the night would shut down South Florida for almost a week, and probably cause more deaths than a landfalling hurricane.
Really? So where do you propose we should be moving everyone that is at zero risk from hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes, tornadoes, floods, wildfires, and any other natural disasters i'm forgetting about right now?
I don't know about the rest of the world, but in North America we'd pretty much have to move the entire population of Mexico, the US and southern Canada up into the Canadian Shield. Trying to move close to half a billion people into north-east Canada would be a logistics and economic nightmare, and i'm pretty sure the kinds of moves that would be required in other parts of the world would be equally drastic.
Realistically, if we don't want to pack all of humanity into tiny fractions of the earth's surface, we have to accept that almost everywhere people live is going to be subject to the occasional natural disaster. Yes, we should avoid the _worst_ areas and/or have contingency plans for those spots, but we're not going to be able to avoid everything.
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Thanks for your 'voice of reason' post. 'Sandy' has already been the cause of death for over 60 people, so far. This storm is no joke, and to hear how it's being "politicized" is a shame.