ATL: SANDY - Remnants - Discussion

[Macrocane]

Since 2005 a major hurricane doesn't make landfall in US, but Gustav, Ike, Irene, Isaac and Sandy have proved that intensity doesn't matter and all tropical cyclones are dangerous.

[HurrMark]

Interesting that up to Sandy the 2012 season was busy but uneventful (unless I'm forgetting something), and now the season will be remembered for one particular hurricane, similar to 1969 for Camille, 1972 for Agnes, 1992 for Andrew and 2005 for Katrina, so again as they say it only takes one...

P.S. As far as lower Manhattan goes, at least this morning any additional storm surge flooding wasn't evident, but during the lunch hour I did read that 10 subway tunnels are flooded - from my memory that's most of the system into and out of Manhattan...

P.P.S. Yes, I'm sure Ozonepete is asleep or his Internet connection is down - his professional forecast about the effects of Sandy's landfall were correct, unfortunately...

Frank

Don't forget Isaac.

Isaac, the only landfalling hurricane this season, was nothing compared to Sandy in terms of the scale of impact...no disrespect for those in Louisiana.

[tolakram]

My opinion is similar to other terms and scales we use. "Major" is a human designation that has no real meaning in natural terms. A storm that does major damage is a major storm.


-- this is a general comment, not targeted to anyone here ---

The other thing that distresses me is how people who were downplaying the storm prior to landfall were, at least before the overwhelming video evidence came in, still downplaying the severity. I heard as much on the radio this morning with a commentator trying to get someone to admit it wasn't as bad as forecast.

For those who don't believe the forecasts ahead of time. If you really don't believe the forecasts then you should believe a storm may be better or worse than forecast, since the forecast in your mind is unreliable. Unfortunately people get in the mindset that a storm will always be hyped and never as bad, regardless, and they're right ... until they're wrong.

We can't fix human nature, it's just something that always happens in each bad storm. There will always be people that ignore the warnings because they experienced that one time where a storm wasn't as bad as they were told it would be. Until forecasting is perfect this will always be the case.

[Evil Jeremy]

Given what we have seen, it boggles me that anyone could find a way to downplay this system. This is worse than what we thought could be the worst case scenario.

[tolakram]

Isaac, the only landfalling hurricane this season, was nothing compared to Sandy in terms of the scale of impact...no disrespect for those in Louisiana.

I'm sorry but I was responding specifically to the term uneventful. I'm not sure what the standard is but for me uneventful is no landfalling storms. We had Isaac hit as a hurricane and before that Beryl and Debby. I'm not sure what the definition for uneventful should be.

[HurrMark]

Isaac, the only landfalling hurricane this season, was nothing compared to Sandy in terms of the scale of impact...no disrespect for those in Louisiana.

I'm sorry but I was responding specifically to the term uneventful. I'm not sure what the standard is but for me uneventful is no landfalling storms. We had Isaac hit as a hurricane and before that Beryl and Debby. I'm not sure what the definition for uneventful should be.

Well, I didn't mean to say Isaac was not eventful (it did cause 2B in damage), but I guess I was referring to storms on the level of Ike, Andrew, etc. that are significant enough to be remembered by the average Joe. Unfortunately, these days, a billion dollar disaster has become so common that the general public almost tends to forget about storms like Isaac. Even Dennis in 2005 is an afterthought for most people outside the Gulf Coast since they focus on the "big three" (Katrina, Rita, Wilma).

[sleepysilverdoor]

Isaac, the only landfalling hurricane this season, was nothing compared to Sandy in terms of the scale of impact...no disrespect for those in Louisiana.

I'm sorry but I was responding specifically to the term uneventful. I'm not sure what the standard is but for me uneventful is no landfalling storms. We had Isaac hit as a hurricane and before that Beryl and Debby. I'm not sure what the definition for uneventful should be.

Well, I didn't mean to say Isaac was not eventful (it did cause 2B in damage), but I guess I was referring to storms on the level of Ike, Andrew, etc. that are significant enough to be remembered by the average Joe. Unfortunately, these days, a billion dollar disaster has become so common that the general public almost tends to forget about storms like Isaac. Even Dennis in 2005 is an afterthought for most people outside the Gulf Coast since they focus on the "big three" (Katrina, Rita, Wilma).

Dennis! It probably proves your point that despite that being the only storm that year that actually affected anyone I know, I totally forgot about it.

[psyclone]

Another thing that gets me about this board .......

People generally flock here during the run-up to the event, start to dwindle off as it's happening, then disappear afterwards during the condition reports and clean-up.

Kind of like company coming to your house for something, then leaving you with the mess.

Some of us have been here right along. I am one of them. I frequently read storm2k while not posting and not logged in. In fact, i read this site heavily for 2 years before i even signed up...and that signing up was prompted when the board closed to guests during the run up to Katrina. A year earlier I didn't even join when the board closed to guests during the run up to Charley, and that storm was headed right toward me! When an epic event is unfolding i believe i best serve the interests of this board by remaining quiet. I wasn't in the strike zone and i'm not a met. unless I have something worthwhile to contribute, i am quiet but that is not an indicator of a lack of interest before, during or after the event. I suspect i am not the only one who does this as the number of guests is almost alway high during an event. plus people just need to check out. life goes on and has other demands, even for the most ardent weather geek.

[WeatherLovingDoc]

Here in Northern Virginia, just down two miles or so from our nation's Capital, it was a pretty horrendous night for us until around 2 a.m. Winds were steady at around 35 mph, with frequent gusts to near 70 mph, our windows rattled and groaned in our brick old house. We moved from the second floor by 5 p.m. as there are trees a good bit away from the house but still very tall and old oaks full of leaves. The rain was intermittently heavy and at one point around 11 p.m., I thought I saw snow. The basement furnace/water heater work room flooded through a crawl space from the ground water accumulation, the electricity went off, stayed off and then an hour or so later would come on. This meant putting on the generator to run the sump pump intermittently and close monitoring through the night. By morning light we found six trees down: four of ours and two of our neighbors which thankfully did not land on the house but rather on the ground or on or over fences. A quarter mile away, a roof blew off an apartment building when a 70 mph wind gust came through and dislodged families with kids in the middle of the night. That must have been terrifying. We feel lucky compared to other's devastation, and amazingly, Sandy's winds tempered by around 2 a.m. to a dull but thankful 10 to 20 mph.

Thank you for your support, storm2k.org and may the road rise up to meet us as a united nation again soon.

[millerm277]

Mantoloking Bridge into Mantoloking, NJ before (google maps) and after.



Posted on NJ Shore Hurricane News facebook page. There are numerous other angles of photo from the bridge as well.

I expect the death toll is going to be much larger than currently listed, there were many who didn't evacuate on the Shore, and I've seen many similar photos of other Shore towns.

[tolakram]

There is a sidewalk on the right side of the after picture. I would like verification those are actually looking in the same direction.

[CrazyC83]

About the major mentions: one day, there will be a 35 kt tropical storm that does catastrophic damage. Even weaker storms can cause huge surges and flooding.

[sleepysilverdoor]

About the major mentions: one day, there will be a 35 kt tropical storm that does catastrophic damage. Even weaker storms can cause huge surges and flooding.

What do you mean "one day"? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropical_Storm_Allison

[millerm277]

There is a sidewalk on the right side of the after picture. I would like verification those are actually looking in the same direction.

There is a sidewalk on the right side of the first picture, the shadows are just hiding it quite well. Here is a video of crossing that bridge, you will note the same structures/pattern as in the before photo.

1 remaining house - Before. Note Chimney in front and location in relation to the bridge, consistent with "after" photo.

Additional shot from end of bridge with 1 remaining house from 1st picture on left.
Before shot from google street view

Unfortunately, this is real.

EDIT: 3rd picture is on NPR (2/14): http://www.npr.org/2012/10/30/163939273 ... torm-sandy
EDIT2: NJ.com report on Mantoloking (north of picture site): http://www.nj.com/ocean/index.ssf/2012/ ... sandy.html

[tolakram]

Thanks millerm. Very unfortunate.

[Stormcenter]

Is it just me or is anyone else tired of the media referring to Hurricane Sandy as Superstorm Sandy? What the heck is a "superstorm"? Sorry I just had to let out that rant.

[Cyclenall]

I think a lot that helped people with the power is that most trees (especially up here) have deleafed already. Had Sandy hit a month or so ago, way different story!

That is only in CT and north. Trees were in full leaf for a major % of Sandy's reach. Jeff Masters even said days ago in his blog posts if this hit the Mid-Atlantic this would be vastly worse than up far north near Maine, etc.

I'm hearing early damage estimates of $45 billion.

And note that there are already a number of "fake" damage pics going around:
http://mashable.com/2012/10/29/fake-hur ... dy-photos/

That estimate is very close to my estimate of $40 Billion+. My guess for the absolute worse case scenario was $260 Billion about 4 days ago. BTW, most of those photos aren't of damage and look fake anyways.

Since 2005 a major hurricane doesn't make landfall in US, but Gustav, Ike, Irene, Isaac and Sandy have proved that intensity doesn't matter and all tropical cyclones are dangerous.

Yeah that is interesting, why are all these CAT1/2 hurricanes all of a sudden doing such tremendous damage after that magic year 2005? They are all topping each other. The answer is not more coastline build-up because only TS Allison of 2001 was before 2005 which fits into this trend.

Given what we have seen, it boggles me that anyone could find a way to downplay this system. This is worse than what we thought could be the worst case scenario.

Just look at this TWN poll: http://www.theweathernetwork.com/index. ... iewresults ... how ridiculous are these results? More people thought it was over-hyped then not, I suspect if the same poll was done for Katrina 1 day after the results would look like this. It will take time for the most extreme devastation to become realized for the general public like Katrina.

I haven't seen any reports of 100 Mph gusts anywhere, that is odd. You would think a 80 knot hurricane/hybrid would be able to produce that on land and there was mostly convection of the west side (on land) to mix those strong winds down more easily. I doubt it was solely over the ocean because there was almost no convection by landfall over waters. Then there are the high-rise windows, any reports of them being blown out? Donald Trump prefers his windows made in the USA, that might be why .

[midnight8]

About the major mentions: one day, there will be a 35 kt tropical storm that does catastrophic damage. Even weaker storms can cause huge surges and flooding.

What do you mean "one day"? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropical_Storm_Allison

I remember that very well

[HurrMark]

Just look at this TWN poll: http://www.theweathernetwork.com/index. ... iewresults ... how ridiculous are these results? More people thought it was over-hyped then not, I suspect if the same poll was done for Katrina 1 day after the results would look like this. It will take time for the most extreme devastation to become realized for the general public like Katrina.

I haven't seen any reports of 100 Mph gusts anywhere, that is odd. You would think a 80 knot hurricane/hybrid would be able to produce that on land and there was mostly convection of the west side (on land) to mix those strong winds down more easily. I doubt it was solely over the ocean because there was almost no convection by landfall over waters. Then there are the high-rise windows, any reports of them being blown out? Donald Trump prefers his windows made in the USA, that might be why .

Is that a Canadian poll? I am not sure what the results would be in the US...I would be very interesting to see.

The RFK Bridge in New York did report a 100 mph gust.

[WeatherGuesser]

I'm hearing early damage estimates of $45 billion.

That estimate is very close to my estimate of $40 Billion+.

New York Subway System May Take Weeks to Recover From Storm
Bloomberg - ‎2 hours ago‎

New York's subway system may take weeks of work and tens of billions of dollars to be restored to full service as officials assess the toll from floods,

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-3 ... oding.html