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I think we need to keep in mind, sooner or later this downplaying of risk mentality will get hundreds of Americans killed when a storm zigs instead of zagging. There was a bit of that with Ike and a lot of it with Katrina (who really needed to die on the Mississippi coast or in Slidell LA from Katrina? It was obvious 24 hours in advance that doom was approaching.)

Also, I can understand that for many, it’s always a question of cost, sure it’s fine to evacuate but how many days or weeks will they keep you from returning home, and what will that cause? So people sometimes roll the dice, sometimes with success, other times not so much.

There will come a day when a storm veers off course in the worst possible place and time. Thus I believe people need to factor in that all these forecasts are probability-based and made with that variation in mind.

Also, anyone reading this in Georgia and South Carolina might want to be cautious about taking it all verbatim. Storm surge is a complicated business, the surge is not all near the eye of a storm. It depends on how the flow of water is constrained by the shore, tidal factors, runoff from flooding rivers and estuaries. I would not bet my life on storm surge underperforming anywhere north of where Matthew is now.