Stormy Weather
By: Nancy | April 10, 2008 | Category: Home and Family
April showers may bring May flowers, but this year, they're bringing some pretty substantial storm damage with them, too.
Friends in Jackson, Mississippi told me that they've been without power for days and that their part of town looks worse than it did when Hurricane Katrina came through three years ago. Right now, the story's similar throughout Texas and Oklahoma.
Rain, drought, tornadoes or other natural disasters—no matter where you live, extreme weather is almost inevitable. A little preparation though, can get you ready to endure those tough weather conditions.
One of the best ways to prepare for a disaster is to assemble a supply kit with the food, medications, tools and other things you use on a regular basis and special items that you might need in an emergency. When I first decided to put a kit together a couple years ago, it felt a little overwhelming to assemble it all at once. So I added a few items at a time to my weekly shopping list. As I put my groceries away each week, I dropped the emergency supplies into my box and it wasn't too long until I checked off all the items on the list and had a full box of supplies. About every six months, I rummage through the box and replace food and water before it expires so everything will be safe to eat or drink when I need it.
USA.gov's severe weather section features links to information to help you get ready for and to recover from specific weather events like hurricanes and floods; extreme heat and drought; tornadoes and earthquakes; fires and winter storms.
And for my friends in Jackson, I found a great section on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's website about staying healthy and safe during power outages.
What's your story? Have you been through any extreme weather events?
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Posted by Citizen Jmaximus on April 10, 2008 at 08:56 AM EDT #
Close to graduation, there were many parties and events going on that week in Nashville. The storm killed one person, a Vanderbilt Univ senior who was engaged in moving his ROTC event out of the storm when a tree fell on him. Most of my experience consisted of waiting around for the first responders to give the all clear or help us move some chair-bound folks out of the building. Usually about 40 minutes, the trip home took about 4 hours.
I noticed later that in East Nashville, the storm destroyed or damaged five prominent churches but did not touch any bars, adult bookstores or "showcases." I have my theories about that...
Posted by porzitsku@comcast.net on April 10, 2008 at 10:34 AM EDT #
I was 13 years old in the Bronx, New York City for this event. The brunt of the storm in the city was between 5 pm and 10 pm. Record steady-state winds of over 100 mph was (officially) recorded at the US Weather Bureau station in lower Manhattan on the building roof, about 15 stories above street level. The rain was heavy, and the windows in my
bedroom at 3 floors high were buckling with each gust - but didn't break - because
my apartment did not directly face the wind. The eye crossed central Long Island
at about 8 pm, moving NNE at a good speed. The next day, I saw numerous trees were blown down, but not much structural damage in my vicinity. New England states of
Rhode Island, and Massachusetts got hit hard as the eye passed over their coastlines
- curving NE. Since the forward speed was high, not too much structural
damage occurred. The hurricane was downgraded to storm intensity as it plowed NE
passed the Canadian Maritimes - towards the open Atlantic.
The following is from the
National Weather Service - NOAA historical archives..........
The Great Atlantic Hurricane of September 14, 1944
The Great Atlantic hurricane went virtually undetected until September 9, 1944 despite the implementation of air reconnaisance the previous year. The storm that was to become the Great Atlantic hurricane was of hurricane intensity when it was first detected several hundred miles northeast of the Windward Islands.
The hurricane tracked steadily west-northwest over the next several days and underwent a rapid intensification as determined by an aircraft penetration on September 12, 1944. At this time reconnaisance aircraft reported winds strong enough to shear rivets off the wings of the aircraft.
The "Great Atlantic" hurricane as the storm was referred to in a radio transmission was reported to have covered a diameter of 600 miles and possessed winds of 150 mph or more. The storm was probably of Category 5 intensity as determined from a central pressure of 909 millibars (26.85 inches of mercury).
The hurricane approached 75 West and began a recurvature which threatened the Mid-Atlantic region. Hurricane warnings were raised for North Carolina and Virginia on the afternoon of September 13th. The hurricane passed very near Cape Hatteras, N.C. shortly after 9:00 am September 14th. The barometric pressure at Cape Hatteras dropped to 947 millibars (27.97 inches of mercury) with the highest winds clocked at 110 mph.
The Great Atlantic Hurricane passed 75 miles to the east of Norfolk just after noon on September 14th. At that time, hurricane force winds swept over portions of extreme southeast Virginia. Winds peaked at 73 mph in downtown Norfolk with gusts to 90 mph. At Cape Henry in Virginia Beach, peak 1-minute winds reached 134 mph with momentary gusts to 150 mph, the highest ever observed at any site during the hurricane. The lowest barometric pressure reported during the hurricane at Norfolk was 985.7 millibars (29.11 inches of mercury). The high winds were the result of intensive convective activity which occurred in the western semi-circle of the storm. Over 4 inches of rain fell in a three and a half hour period from 10:00 am to 1:30 pm. Fortunately for the area the hurricane passed at the time of low tide and tides only reached 6.0 feet above MLLW with little or no flooding reported. The bulk of the damage was due to the hurricane force winds which brought down numerous trees in the area.
The great hurricane moved on to produce record wind gusts in Atlantic City, N.J., New York, N.Y. and Block Island, R.I.
(2007) WAS THE 63rd ANNIVERSARY OF "THE GREAT ATLANTIC HURRICANE".
Posted by SEAZSky on April 10, 2008 at 01:21 PM EDT #
Living through big storms marks us the way things like 9/11, the Space Shuttle explosion and assassinations do. The details of what we were doing at that moment are so clear, even decades later.
Do we have any Hurricane Katrina survivors reading today? I'd love to hear your story.
Posted by Nancy on April 10, 2008 at 05:25 PM EDT #
Posted by DISATER IMMUNITY on April 11, 2008 at 01:28 PM EDT #