09:11 – I just read an interesting article about hurricanes: The flip side of years of no hurricanes: Good luck runs out
The point of the article is that we have been extraordinarily lucky over the past century. Katrina and other memorable hurricanes notwithstanding, we’ve suffered only a small fraction of the loss of life and property damage we might have expected based on historical norms. People tend to underestimate hurricanes. Even a small hurricane is gigantic, and dissipates enough energy to make a hydrogen bomb look like a BIC lighter in comparison. The real nightmare would be a Cat 5 hurricane striking Houston, not just because tens of thousands of people might die, but because the damage to our petroleum and gas infrastructure would be devastating and take years to replace.
Another email from Jen. She, her husband, her brother, his wife, and their two kids had a different kind of Memorial Day get-together. First thing Saturday morning, they declared a test emergency. Her brother and his family evacuated to Jen’s house, where they hunkered down in emergency mode. Jen’s husband turned off the electric power at the main breaker, as well as the natural gas and water. They spent the three-day weekend using only their emergency supplies. They did grill out Saturday, but as Jen said they’d also be doing that in a real emergency before their frozen meat spoiled. Jen said that things went pretty smoothly, but they did encounter a few unexpected issues, which they treated as learning experiences. They’re planning another emergency simulation over the July 4th three-day holiday.
More kit stuff today.