Because the usual storm that hits florida is not anywhere near as big as this storm. This storm has hurricane force winds 175 miles out and tropical force winds 520 miles out. Unheard of I think.
Then in Irene last year Virginia had almost 2 million people without power. Add to possible Virginia, NY, NJ ect and you could see possible how many millions without power.
Plus flooding because of the way it is approaching.
It should not be a big loss of life but the power is the big problem and people need to have the right supplies because some could be 3 weeks without power. Maybe more
Is it overhyped ? possible,Still the size of this storm is really large. Im hoping the oaks outside my window are left standing if this part of Virginia gets it. Last year several neighbors with trees on houses and one missed mine by 3 or 4 feet. Big trees, It’s no fun.
If the storm were closer to the coast right now places in NC and Virginia would probably have seen 20 or so inches of rain. Irene produced that I think. Also this storm is moving pretty slow and being so big that places are going to experience tropical force winds longer than the typical hurricane. 24, 48 hours of continuous wind.
Plus some places may recieve up to 50 inches of snow in the mountains. Pretty unusual and big storm.
This storm is also supposed to produce 25 foot waves in lake Michigan. We can only wait and see.
Yeah,it sounds like a big, bad scenario and the storm surge sounds awful. We live on a peninsula, and they have done simulations where storm surge could literally breech the peninsula make it impossible to get from the southern part of the county to the northern part. But they’re always quick to mention that water drains off quickly back into the Bay and the Gulf. Storm surge flooding in the area affected by Sandy has nowhere to go once flooded.
We’re so used to being without power, not just from hurricanes, but from frequent storms we have a generator that keeps our food frozen and allows us to install and run a window AC that we keep for emergencies, in one room. We keep a store of gas, but if power was out for 3 weeks, that would be the problem, getting more gas. In an urban metropolitan scenario where folks live in high rises, I can’t imagine how they’d handle weeks without power.
I think building codes in Florida are pretty strict, at least since Andrew we use the Miami Dade codes, so wind seems to do less damage to buildings than it did when we had a storm blow through when I was a kid. I’m a native Floridian, 6th generation, our kids are 7th generation and still live here, and their kids are 8th generation...we’re a rare breed :)
That last TS we had (Debby) was slow moving, and though it didn’t do much damage to buildings (except flooding) from water overflowing the Bay and about 17 inches of rain, it sort of stalled offshore and pounded the beaches, and when it was gone, 1/2 of the width of many beaches had been eroded. Slow movers do cause more damage.
Well, prayers that this one does not turn out to be as bad as they expect and people have enough sense to evacuate if they’re in harm’s way.