Seriously, forces of nature? It's the first week of school! Fingers crossed she bumps to the east again; otherwise, we might be out of school Thursday & Friday!
I'm a weather junkie. I've been keeping an eye on it. I hope I can get to the beach sometime this weekend. A storm in the Atlantic does amazing things to the water; I want the kids to see. Prayers and good wishes for everyone's safety of course.
We're keeping an eye--Lauren is heading off on an island vacation with a friend's family starting this weekend and she's hoping for some good weather. Hopefully there won't be serious damage.
chebrutta, I hope Irene decides to head out east and away from land!! If she heads up the east coast, we'll likely get hit on Sunday. I remember all the hype surrounding Hurricane Earl last year; we ended up with a little bit of rain. Hopefully Irene takes a cue from Earl.
UGH, I hope so, too. The waiting to see what it'll do is always the worst (and the, "Should I go to the grocery store and fight the crowds?") NOAA has her hitting up near Wilmington now
I hope everyone will be safe and sound. I hate this time before a hurricane--you know, when the local weather feels obliged to stir everyone into a complete frenzy of blithering mindlessness and stockpiling. Also, the opportunity to say, "Hunker down" seems to get their juices going. Nonetheless, we have zero idea where it will be going, but it could possibly hit us. Why do they always say that? The weather people in my area get on my last nerve.
What happened in my area last year was that we had all the news people flipping out over the possibility that Earl was going to hit us. (Yes, we were in ONE of his projected paths.) So on the day that Earl was supposed to wipe us off the map, we ended up with a short rainstorm and the most horrendous humidity. A couple of weeks later we were SLAMMED with the remnants of one of the tropical storms-- much worse than what Earl brought us. Naturally, no one in the news warned us of that one. "Oh, just expect a little bit of rain and wind in the forecast."
Hurricane Andrew was supposed to miss Homestead, FL entirely...see how that turned out. My parents still live there, so I still keep an eye on these things. Last I checked they thought S. Florida was reasonably in the clear.
mm, I was just watching storm coverage (yes, I know it's 1500 miles away. Told you I was a storm junkie.) Anway, tomorrow is the anniversary of Andrew in Homestead. I'm sure the people there are particularly uneasy,
Hard to believe it's been 19 years... And yes, every time there's been a storm threat around the end of August, those of us who were there for Andrew have grown a bit unsettled. After all these years, I can still close my eyes and hear the storm...feel it even. I remember the smells, the outright terror, and then going outside when it was over. I can't describe the feeling. My father made the comment that we just needed to get a continuous loop recording that said "oh Sh*t, look at that!". It was all you could say. My father owned several townhouses in this complex One of my favorite "omg" pictures This is where my grandmother lived. Another "yikes" picture I can't find any pictures of my old neighborhood online, though I know they exist somewhere. I've found them before. I pray that this Irene does roughly what the last storm named Irene did: That Irene (2000, I think), dumped a whole lot of rain and was a major annoyance, but wasn't much more than that.
It looks, at least, as though FL will be spared. This could be an interesting one for the mid-Atlantic and New England though.
Alice, I admit I'm not much into meteorology. Do you have any ideas for my kids to help get them into the unit? The Washington Post has a great weather blog called Capital Weather Gang. They're starting to cover Irene. The guys that do the blog explain a lot of forecasting "secrets," and talk a fair bit about the science and history.
Molly, here is a link to NOAA's education resource area's hurricane collection. If you look along the right hand side, there's a bunch of links to different activities and lessons.
Here's another nifty experiment.... http://www.ehow.com/list_6527846_3rd-grade-hurricane-activities.html
The weather channel just used the term "potentially catastrophic for the northeast." Yes, I'm a storm junkie and buy into all the dire predictions. I'm not afraid, but I believe in listening to the warnings. So I'm prepping the basement. I've refreshed the water I always have on hand-- I probably have about 6 gallons in the basement fridge and another few in the basement pantry. There's a manual can opener there as well. We have an almost full propane tank for the grill, and some duraflame and regular wood logs for the fire pit. I just filled a rubbermaid bin with a pair of sneakers, and 2 changes of clothes for each of us. The first aid kit that lives in the basement is unopened since we bought it just after 9/11, We have cash on hand and I'll fill up my car after tomorrow's doctor's appointment. I know I'm going overboard, but that's OK. My biggest gripe about Katrina was that they KNEW it was coming and so many who could have apparently didn't prepare.
OH, we'll be fine. It's not due till Sunday. And I'm about as far from the water as you can get on Long Island. I did just email my brother and sister, both of whom live much closer to the water than I do, offereing a comfy place to evacuate if it becomes necessary. I doubt they'll come; both have grown kids who live a bit further from the water than they do.
Peter is a camera junkie the way I'm a storm junkie, so we have tons of batteries. And I stocked up on, then didn't use, bug repellent before we went upstate a few weeks ago. I think, worst case scenario, we're talking 2 or 3 days without electricity... in August. So heat isn't an issue, and we have tons of food in the pantry. I just did a Target run, and got lots of munchies. I'm due to go food shopping, but that will have to wait until after the storm. I also got juice boxes and a 4 pack of flashlights. We have plenty of them in the house, but I don't know where they are, and at $8 it seemed like a bargain. I also picked up 2 bottles of wine in Lake George . I'm not expecting this to be bad, but I refuse to put myself into a position where I regret not preparing.
The track of the storm brings the eye right through my town up here in New England! I hope it stays off coast.
I hope it isn't bad. But either way, stay safe. My mom said they're already a bit nervous. Wantagh flooded pretty bad during that last storm and they spent 3 days getting the water out of the basement. They're already borrowing pumps from other family members on higher ground as a just in case. They said probably Friday they will begin to set hoses up to suck the water out as well, along with pull up all the carpets that they have down and securing the cords for all the electronics.
The other thing I want to do tonight is put a copy of all the valuable papers (insurance, Brian's adoption certificate etc) into a zip lock baggie, just in case.
Irene from space: http://www.weather.com/weather/videos/news-41/top-stories-169/raw-irene-from-space-21645
I have a couple really neat tracking apps for my iPad. At least you sound smarter than we were for the snow storms: we had tons and tons of food, but precious little that didn't need cooked. We felt dumb; we know better, of course. I'm going to whip up some batches of granola, some bread, a pie, and roast a big pan of chickpeas just in case we do loose power for a while. The pie is so I won't whine about no power as much. It's harder to whine while eating homemade apple raspberry pie, right?
From www.weather.com : "In fact, the concern among meteorologists is high. National Hurricane Center Director Bill Read: "We are very concerned with what's going to happen in New England. The benchmark is the 1938 hurricane. I am very concerned with what will happen there." The potential is real for the strongest hurricane hit on the Northeast in at least a couple decades this weekend! " OK, a question for you guys: I just put together a ziplock bag of important documents-- birth certificates, adoption cert, marriage cert, insurance info... Where do I put it? Back in the file cabinet in the basement, wrapped in its ziplock cover? On the first floor in the china cabinet, where I put all the day to day important stuff? On the pool table in the basement? Higher up on a shelf??? Wherever I put it, I'm intending to put it back into the file cabinet, as is, on Monday.
Put it into a bag, waterproof if possible, that you would take with you should you need to leave. We would put together a tote with some stuff like parrot food (we have our priorities!) and our ids, etc. If we had to leave, we would grab that one thing. We aren't really near any water, so our worst case here is heavy rains, winds, down power lines. We would most likely just be safest to stay put. It isn't a bad idea to have a disaster proof safe box. They aren't expensive. We have one for our business computer backup files.
Alice, I'd put it wherever you can lay you hands on it in an instant in case you need to leave immediately. Do you have a knapsack packed for everyone? If you do, put it in yours and keep everyone's handy.
Hahaha, there's a first for me on this forum. I managed to start a new thread INSIDE someone else's completely unrelated thread.
Honestly, there's no where for us to go. We're as far from the water as you can get. Any further north and you get close to the LI Sound; any further south and you're approaching the ocean. In fact, I emailed my brother and sister today, offering my home as a place they could evacuate to. I'm thinking of a place within my house that's relatively safe from water damage should, say the roof come off or the basement windows flood.
Don't forget to stock up on bottled water! It's funny hearing people talking about hiding from hurricanes in basements. We don't have basements down here to hide in!
I'm thinking in case you have to leave the house during the storm... a tree went through my neighbor's house; they had to go next door for the duration of Frances. Or a tornado... another friend lost their house during a Jeanne-tornado. After '04 and '05, I firmly believe in being prepared for EVERY eventuality. Do you have a safe room with no windows? That would be a good place to keep it.
Oh, good point. Maybe I'll leave a copy of all my important documents across the street at Vivian's, and suggest she do the same. And you're right; I'll pack a tote bag in case we have to run there. It would KILL me if the big tree on my front lawn went down. It's gorgeous! And, nope, no safe room. Every room in the house has at least one window, though the ones in the basement are pretty small. I'm figuring on the basement if things get rough. It's comfortable; I'm there right now.
My house has no safe rooms. Our basement isn't even fully floored. One of the rooms in the basement has no floor, just dirt. I'm a bit away from the beach. I'm at the highest point in my town, so we'll be good
When I lived in Florida, all my documents of that nature were in a firebox in the most interior, windowless room in my house. In a monster storm, like Andrew or Katrina, it's just not going to matter. Most my my parents stuff, even stuff that was "prepared" was blown away or otherwise destroyed. In spite of that, when it came down to it, and even though it was annoying to have to replace all that stuff, it didn't matter. We were all alive and unhurt.
When Frances stalled off the coast, we spent the better part of the day watching a) the shingles blow off one neighbor's roof and b) the 60+ foot pine in my back neighbor's yard SWAY AT THE BASE in the wind. If it had gone down east or west, it would have taken out back porches. North - my house. South - the neighbor's house. It went south - and at night - and fortunately, went through the Florida room and living room; everyone was safe in their bedrooms.
We have a waterproof/fireproof safe we keep our important documents in. It wasn't very expensive, I think we got it at Walmart. Might be worth it to invest in something like that.
We are going to refill our water and make sure we know where the flashlights are. We have plenty of food. Other than that, I think we are far enough inland that I am ok, but we did talk about what we should do this morning. Will probably go out and clean up the porch. I need to figure out how to protect my tomatoes which are still green. More worried about my parents in DE, but I think they will be fine. We've definitely seen worse, although it has been awhile since one has come up this far without hitting land first.
