Last edited Thu Sep 13, 2018, 11:08 AM - Edit history (1)

One woman is staying with her children.

Isn't this child endangerment?
Can't the children be forcefully removed if necessary?

numbers (!)--as though if there are enough people, the hurricane and floods won't dare come at them. Or maybe there will be enough people to push back the floods or stop the winds.

She also said it would be too hard to get back home after the hurricane (apparently heavy traffic is scarier than huge hurricanes and deadly floods!).

I think some stay because they are afraid of looters, but looters wouldn't be able to handle a major hurricane and flooding, either.

I do sympathize, though, with people who stay because they can't find a place where they can evacuate with their animals. I could not abandon my pets to a natural disaster, either.

There were plenty of people there...and plenty of deaths.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/weather/topstories/threat-becomes-reality-florence-begins-days-of-rain-wind/ar-BBNg8R6?li=BBnb7Kz

But no one looks at that way.

when the fools suddenly realize how much danger they are actually in.

People call when the storm hits and demand someone come rescue them, but by that time, rescue cannot make it thru the damn storm.

There are also those who wait till the last minute to flee the storm, and don't think about the thousands of other people who have the same idea at the same time.

I have an image burned into my brain at seeing, from an overpass, hundreds of stationary cars sitting on the freeway, in the rain, because too many people put off evacuating until just ass the first bands of the storm hit. Many many people had to ride out the hurricane, parked on the freeway.
I cannot imagine a more uncomfortable place to be. You can't run your car A/C for long unless the car is moving, or else the engine overheats and can die. You can't open the windows for air, you get water. You can't drive because traffic won't move, and it you do manage to get off the freeway ( they call it the 4 lane down here) you can't drive on the 2 lane county roads because of falling tree danger.. and you find everyone ahead of you has already thought about exiting to roadside gas stations, the off ramps are now blocked.

hundreds of people were trapped on the freeway, and learned the hard way how long a hurricane can blow.
This was Opal, 1995, a Cat 4,, so she reached all the way up to and over my lil town, 90 miles inland.

I remember reading something like that as Harvey was approaching...something about people had died from a
botched evacuation?

than were killed by hurricane Harvey.

Harvey hit near Corpus Christi which is over 150 miles away from I-45 which is the primary evacuation route when a storm is coming up from the Gulf. Houston didn't really see much rainfall until a day or two after landfall when the storm stalled out then looped back into the Gulf before making a second land fall.

The primary route out of Corpus Christi is I-37 to San Antonio. Other roads that were evacuation routes were US 77, US 181, US 281 and for those willing to go west US 83, TX 16 and TX 123. Those that evacuated on US 77, US 181 and TX 123 probably wish that they didn't choose those routes since those areas were drenched after the storm stallled.

So when it said it was headed to Houston practically everyone tried to evacuate. I know my family live on the coast and it's normally a 5.5 hour up to DFW. It took them 24 hours. Another friend took 13 hours from Houston to Fort Worth (normally 4 hours).

I think with Harvey no one realized it was going to stall out and dump 30-50 inches of water. My family always evacuated for hurricane but they didn't for Harvey bc no one realized.

She was traveling alone since her husband works for the electric company and was required to be stay behind. I don't know what she will do in the future if another hurricane comes since the in-laws that were in DFW died a couple years later.

because of what happened with Rita. Those zones are based on storm surge.

Harvey's flooding wasn't storm surge, but rain.

My sister eventually had to evacuate even though she was far from an evacuation zone but close to a reservoir where they were planning a controlled release.

Plus, it's unbelievably more expensive after there's 4-10 foot of water down the streets.

I believe the government should attach a warning to coastal properties when they change hands stating that owners will have to leave during mandatory evacuations. Period. Or, they won't be rescued and no one will blame the local or fed government when they perish.

I think we've all see the daring videos of people getting hauled off rooves and in boats: They think they'll magically be saved, and that does impact their decision to stay.

preferably on the beach in NC.

the saying of better safe than sorry. You can always find refuge somewhere but you cannot replace a life. Sad some people do not get it.

!!!!!

broadcast last night. He had survived numerous other hurricanes and this was just another one to him. He didn't want to move his wife and said there was nowhere to go anyway.

The younger people with children staying on the coast really piss me off. If this thing stalls they're in for hours and hours of wind/rain/flooding which translates into unnecessary stress and trauma for those kids. Not to mention the potential devastation of their home and possibly losing their lives.

They are not interested in letting any facts get in the way of their beliefs.

People are territorial by nature and given how difficult it is to return after devastating storms, some would rather go down with the storm in their own space.
Others live from pay check to pay check and simply do not have the resources to leave.
The minority just have to show the 'govmint' that they don't take orders from anyone.

Thank you.

You would think they would be the first to evacuate. The old people never ever evacuate.
They hate the conditions in shelters and they fear looters. They'd rather stay home and die.
I think we'd leave but I'm not sure, because we never had to consider it.

After Georges hit the Keys, the authorities wouldn’t let people back in for weeks.

Many never left after that debacle.

People just don’t understand if they’ve never been through it. Lots of judgemental people here who know nothing making judgements about people they don’t even know.

that where possible home is the best place to face it. No water, no electricity, no regular meals and then living with complete strangers is no easy situation.

and where did they stay in the meantime? How much did it cost them? How much further loss did they incur because they couldn't go secure and protect what was left of their property? How many pets died slow, horrible deaths because they weren't allowed in shelters and were left at home?

I've been in a major hurricane. I know what it's like during and I know what it's like afterward. I would not leave if I was in a good sturdy building at a high enough elevation. If my place was flimsy, or was in a low-lying area, well, that's a different story.

People were furious. I can’t imagine the money they had to spend during all those weeks.

Including Cat 5 Irma last year. We know what to do, and we do it.

I knew someone who lived in Key West. Wouldn't leave. Couldn't get back in good time, looters. I always thought that was kind of a manmade deterrent to leaving. Those are peoples homes. You don't want to sit at the Best Western for weeks while everybody who didn't leave rifles your house.

there are things to be done to protect property from further natural damage. You can cover missing roof shingles and broken windows, you can dry stuff out that got wet, etc. You can also feed and water your pets!

Hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis, Yikes! Poor Port Royal has been hit by everything mother nature can throw at it. Anyone ignoring evacuation orders has a long history to examine and heed its lessons.

and many stay put

The city provided buses for a lot of low income residents, esp. in the lower 9th ward. They bused hundreds to Houston.
and while the people were in Houston, trying to figure out how to afford to return, post-storm, N.O. city officials boarded up undamaged low income apt. blocks, and refused to let people move back in.
Many of those those who owned houses in the area found out the lots leveled, the city claimed the houses were too damaged and had to be removed. 2010 census shows a 119,000 lower African/American population than before Katrina.
A reminder: this was during "heckuva job,Brownie" Republican Bush rule.


Source:
Spike Lee's When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts

David Simon's Treme series

Various news reports

Watched it and cried several times.

I also remember how separated the women and children from their men.
That pissed me off big time.

Then it was all out Disaster Capitalism as described by Naomi Klein - gentrification on steroids.

until the moment their loved ones are missing or underwater.

I also don't believe we should be bailing out uber-expensive coastal properties: If you can't afford to lose it all in a storm, don't buy waterfront in hurricane territory. Take the chance and use your own money to rebuild.

I went through some scary times, but I was always glad I had stayed. In Wilma, as the surge rose to almost my height, I was able to save many belongings that otherwise would have been lost.

There are many, many reasons people stay.

. . .evacuating from the Keys could be worse than staying. Easy to get stuck on one of the bridges, unless one lives in Largo. Then after 17 miles you're on the mainland.

With Irma, our friends in KW had to wait 6 days to go home after the storm because Route 1 was closed due to debris and flooding. Can you imagine getting stuck on the 7 Mile Bridge in that?

there is a major hurricane. There will always be people who will opt to stay and weather the storm.

My daughter was in Florida during the 2004 hurricane season. They left the east coast and drove to the west coast, but a hurricane was headed there. Back to the east only to be told they needed to evacuate yet again. People were exhausted and many just hunkered down where they were and prayed for the best.

Yes, some of the reasons people are staying are pretty lame, but next year there will people who will do the same. We've all seen this movie before.

You hear all the reports about the people who died, the people who don't have any food or water, etc. You never hear about all the people whose homes are intact or mostly so, who have plenty of supplies and who aren't suffering from anything worse than lack of air conditioning.

It is easy to look at them from a distance and criticize them, based on the news coverage we are following, but we aren't in their shoes.

It is a gamble that many are taking and if in their position, I probably would evacuate, but I'm not, so I really don't know for sure.

In 2004 when three major hurricanes passed over their house in Central Florida, my parents refused to leave their house. Back then neither parent were disabled, though they were both in their 80s and Dad had problems with his lower back. Even though their roof had been damaged when Charlie passed over, they stayed home with a tarp over the hole through Frances and Jeanne.

Dad had lived in Florida since 1925 and never once left his home for a hurricane. We stayed in our house during Hurricane Donna in 1960 - which was a terrifying experience for a little kid. During the eye Dad went out to the detached garage to get boards to cover windows that were leaking, leaving four little girls alone in the house (Mom was in Alabama with her dying mother).

Last year when Irma's eye passed only twenty miles away from Mom's Home (Dad died in 2013) my sister tried for days before the storm to find a place for Mom to stay. There simply was no where in Florida for a 96 year old woman to stay with 24 hour supervision that was safer than her own home. In the end Mom stayed in her house with one of her caretakers (which have been 24/7 since before Dad died). In fact, the caretaker brought her family members to Mom's house where they weathered out the storm - it was safer than the house trailer they live in. They had no power for a week but they managed.

With that kind of history it is hard to convince people to leave a place where they have been safe. They just won't believe that *this* is the storm that could wipe them out.

By The Columbian
Published: April 1, 2010, 12:00 AM

... The 83-year-old Truman, proprietor of the Mount St. Helens Lodge, oversaw a crumbling collection of cabins, 16 or so cats and a fleet of boats rented out in summers. He and his wife, Edna, had built the lodge and cabins. She had died three years earlier and Truman had closed the lodge, which was slowly being taken over, and smelling like, the cats.

Truman’s favorite drink was Schenley whiskey and Coke, and his favorite word was “goddam,” which he used at the rate of nearly one per sentence, unless another profanity intervened ....

... he told Cowlitz County’s sheriff, “I have lived up here a long time and wouldn’t last two weeks if I had to move to some apartment down in Longview” ...

Harry Truman spit in the face of death. On May 18, 1980, death responded with both barrels, pointed right down the volcano’s north flank and into his front door. Truman, the pink Cadillac, his herd of cats and a lot of good whiskey ended up beneath a couple hundred feet of rearranged volcano.

<Originally published: May 15, 2005>

https://www.columbian.com/news/2010/apr/01/the-old-man-and-the-mountain/

Others have no reliable transportation

. . .is "deathly afraid" of dying. Evacuating is a big damned deal. Some people just take their chances and if the "worst" happens, "oh well".

I don't hear that said aloud too often. Maybe it should be.

She ended up trapped in her house without water, airconditioning, electricity, for a week. But she's one of those who says, "You can't tell me what to do!"

She survived, and brags about it, how she defied "the government". She'll probably drive herself into Florence's path so that once again she can show how no one can tell her what to do.

Every time I stayed we had a generator and a month’s worth of food and water.

for ordinary healthy people. Did she not put up enough water to keep herself hydrated and clean?

... barrier islands/beaches that might as well be sandbars -- will realize it's smarter to leave.

Here's what's going on at my favorite beachfront hotel on the Crystal Coast -- originally very close to predicted Cat4 landfall...

https://www.theinnatpks.com/

Scroll down the page to their Beach Cam, and compare the amount of beach normally accessible by the photos.

So far the island still has power. and while I watched people Tuesday and yesterday with lots of plywood trying to board up, and no obvious guests past Monday, when they were gathering the umbrellas and chairs from the beach. But no one today. I suspect they left at sunset last night when no more work could be accomplished to prepare, and the bridges were going to be closing. It's not as bad as predicted, but I don't know how much longer that cam will stay working. Most people wouldn't want to be there now, even if it doesn't get worse.

The problem for many is that they don't live in the "obvious areas". Even though it looks like Atlantic Beach/the Crystal Coast will be spared a direct impact, and people who lived on the barrier islands near Wilmington probably knew to come in anyway for a big one. But there are people who live "inland" and not in "mandatory" evacuation zones, but so near inlets, rivers, and other waterlogged areas that surge is unpredictably dangerous.

And Florence discussion archives in the NWS show how difficult it really is to predict hurricane intensity and direction. They can predict a certain area should take precautions, but they can't say how bad it's going to be or exactly where. And for people NOT in obviously dangerous areas no matter if it's barely a Cat1, it means they delay evacuation until it's too late because of the uncertainty, or think it might be just a false alarm.

https://www.cnn.com/specials/live-video-3

And like I said elsewhere in the thread, you'll never hear any stories about all the people who remained whose homes are in pretty good shape, who have plenty of water and food and ice and batteries and other supplies, and who are just fine.

And have never evacuated and never will.

The only people who say people who don't are stupid are people who have either never been through one, or/and have money. Who pays for my gas? Who pays for my food? Who pays for my hotel? What do I do with my pets? What happens when I'm on the road in gridlock for literally a day, and only move five miles? How about your job? What if you need to eb ready? Work for McDonald's or Starbucks? As soon as power is on, be at work or you are fired. You going to give them money to love on?

It is almost always safer to just hunker down -- we know what to do. It is certainly much less expensive.

If not, I sympathize. People not in obviously dangerous places even in a Cat1 do have some hard decisions to make.

If so, I pray you continue to survive.

Edit to add: even if my questionable-survival-instinct-possessing father rode out Fran and dealt with inland flooding, he did leave his rental condo on Wrightsville Beach and come into Wilmington to "protect his mother's property" from looters while she was wise and departed to relatives in the mountains. He was stuck on the second floor for awhile, but survived when he likely wouldn't have on Wrightsville Beach.

I live nowhere near the ocean or a river. I live on fairly high ground. Both times I came back to some broken tree branches on the ground and that was all, no significant property damage whatsoever.

The ONLY reason I will leave for one from now on, is if we get a Category 5 like Hurricane Andrew aimed directly at my area. A Category 5 could destroy my dwelling. Last year Hurricane Irma (Category 4) ravaged the Florida Keys, but by the time it got to me, it was vastly reduced in power. At least I got a nice vacation from evacuating from it.

If I lived near the ocean, the gulf or a river, I'd think much more seriously about evacuating.

eta: Jeanne in 2004 was the other one.

I have been through at least 8 starting with Camille.

If you are in s surge prone home then it is crazy to stay.

But I know a man in Morehead City right now. New house and roof rated to 140 mph. Lives on a Bluff a good bit away from the water. A 15-20 foot surge would not get him because the area is protected by barrier islands.

I live in Central Florida and Irma went over my house. Ripped off most of my shingles because the roof was pre-2004 code. My new roof can take 140mph winds. Not a fun night. But we were told not to evacuate because we were not at risk of being injured and would just clog up the roads.

And if the idea of living for a few days with no power is unthinkable to you, do not move to the gulf coast. Cause it will eventually happen.

This is not a powerful storm. The TV makes you think it is and 2 days ago it was. I would have no qualms about riding it out if not in a flood prone area.