This is beginning to sound like an old country song
"Mining, cattle, groves, and the Everglades. Oh, and Lake Okeechobee
Whole lotta nothing down there except for Sebring.
Sugar cane and Pahokee too"
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Hurricane season has arrived....
- Thread starter The Tradition
- Start date
"Mining, cattle, groves, and the Everglades. Oh, and Lake Okeechobee
Whole lotta nothing down there except for Sebring.
Sugar cane and Pahokee too"
The last 12 hrs have it going directly over me on the east coast as a cat1. I'll lose power sometime Thurs, but will have bourbon, batteries, and a bunch of frozen pork that I'll probably be throwing on the smoker Fri to help pass the time.
Watchdog analyst says FEMA is on ‘a razor’s edge’ as it wrestles with multiple storms
The agency’s public statements are reassuring, but a GAO homeland security expert worries it is stretched thin.With the second major hurricane in the past two weeks now barreling toward Florida, state and federal emergency management officials were scrambling Tuesday to put personnel, equipment and supplies in place.
Officials of the Federal Emergency Management Agency — amid ongoing concern over what’s expected to be the strongest storm surge in decades — insisted it is ready for Hurricane Milton’s expected landfall late Wednesday or early Thursday and is fully capable of juggling concurrent disasters.
“Yes, we have the resources that we need, both for the Helene response and for Hurricane Milton,” Keith Turi, FEMA’s acting associate administrator, said this week. “I will defer to the White House on the timing of when we may need additional resources, but we want to assure everyone we have the resources we need to respond to both Helene and Milton.”
Former FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate also downplayed any fears that FEMA isn’t up for the daunting challenge it faces, telling NBC News this week that the “agency is built to manage multiple disasters.”
Not everyone is as confident, however.
Staffing at the federal disaster response agency has drawn criticism in recent years from the Government Accountability Office, a federal watchdog.
“They are running a razor’s edge right now, and they are pretty low in people,” Christopher P. Currie, director of the GAO’s Homeland Security and Justice team, said this week about FEMA’s staffing levels. “This is always the scenario we worry about.”
In May 2023, the GAO found that as of the fall of 2022, the agency had a disaster workforce strength of 11,400 employees — a gap of 35% between the actual number of staff members and FEMA’s staffing target of 17,670, according to the GAO. In that same report, the GAO found that as of July 2022, FEMA was involved in responding to 500 open disasters.
Currie likened FEMA’s situation to “trying to fight wars on multiple fronts,” adding that, based on his past interviews with personnel, “it will have a huge effect on morale.”
The agency lists roughly 27,000 staff members in Tuesday’s daily operations briefing document, but not all of them would typically be deployed to disasters, Currie said.
The agency didn’t respond to a request for its current staffing levels in time for this article; it cited its latest news release, which said it was “pre-staging a full slate of response capabilities in Florida and the region.”
But it’s clear that the agency is low on personnel, Currie said.
In the briefing document, 1,205 workers are listed as “available,” but just three of them specialize in “disaster survivor assistance.” (They are typically the first FEMA workers who speak with devastated residents in the immediate aftermath of a disaster.) Just nine of the 2,580 workers who specialize in “individual assistance” — the people who register people for those emergency payments — are available.
“I was blown away by that,” Currie said.
NBC News reported last week that FEMA put out a call for volunteers for a “surge force” in mid-September, citing a “severe shortfall” in some of its disaster response teams.
In an interview, FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell said the numbers cited fail to take into account other full-time staff members who are deployed as needed. “They take on new roles to help support the response, and then we move other resources around from areas that aren’t supporting life threatening missions,” she said.
Asked about the specialized roles that are especially low in staffers, she said, “That’s something that we watch, and that’s why we have it on our report every day, so we can monitor that.”
Watchdog analyst says FEMA is on ‘a razor’s edge’ as it wrestles with multiple storms
The agency’s public statements are reassuring, but a GAO homeland security expert worries it is stretched thin.
www.nbcnews.com
Thanks @TC Nole OX for all the updates!
This thread is a great source for good info and insight.
This thread is a great source for good info and insight.
Yep....this thread is my go to source. Totally serious.
Thanks TC!
(this and anywhere the grim reaper, Jim Cantore, is hanging out)
Would you stop in this thread please?
FIFYWell, now.... here's a completely stupid take:
what do you mean?
price gouging for essential goods during a natural disaster is just smart business
Hmmm... today the probability for Orlando is 18 percent, and Daytona Beach is down to 2 percent. Which puts me at 10 percent?
It’s going to be absolutely devastating for the Cape Coral/Fort Myers/Port Charlotte area.
Tampa Bay seems to have dodged the bullet.
Tampa Bay seems to have dodged the bullet.
Why did you wait until now to get gas?Well, now.... here's a completely different take:
Second, you can see that wind shear is beginning to act on Milton. The eye has become cloud filled and the center is now becoming displaced on the northwest side of the main convection. This process was well forecast however, will it happen soon enough to substantially weaken Milton before landfall? Probably not because the core is very deep in the atmosphere and will maintain some internal structure and momentum, even if much of the convection gets stripped away.That means, all the folks looking at radar and satellite proclaiming it's weakening will probably be jumping the gun. All that cat 5 energy is not going to just disappear. It will still be felt, just not as concentrated over a small intense area.So as this weakening starts, the wind field will quickly expand, with much of South Florida likely feeling the strongest winds tomorrow (Thursday).
It’s been like that for days. Stations were out on Sunday.
My dad closed on a house in Cape Coral 9 days ago on the fresh water canals. His home was outside of the flood zones so no flood insurance required.
Starting to think flood insurance would of been a good idea....
At least I was able to talk him into leaving the area
He’s right.
People loading five cans of gas now are keeping others from getting any gas at all.
If the price was higher, the guy with five cans could fill two now and three after the storm passes.
But some assholes would rather have no opportunity to buy gas at $3/gal instead of the opportunity to buy gas at $10/gal, so they clamor for gouging laws and we watch tanks run dry.
If they gouged you at $10/gallon, you'd be bitching and moaning about that, too.
They could easily limit 'can filling' to ONE pump, and limit filling only 2 cans per person or 5 or 10 gallon max at that pump.
Go over that, and your credit card gets a $100 fine attached to it that is non-refundable.
You going to ask an attendant making $12 an hour to enforce these rules? In Florida? Before a hurricane?
I hope he makes it through without any major damage. Glad he’s safe. That’s always the most important thing.
After Michael, Helene, and now Milton, I think the state/fed gov is going to have to seriously rethink how they evaluate flood zones.
If he does buy flood insurance after this, make sure he pairs it with hurricane coverage. If you don’t have both, the Fed will claim damage was caused by wind driven rain, and hurricane insurers will claim damage was caused by storm surge or flash flooding. Assume everyone will act as close to bad faith as possible.
You're going to "program" 1 pump to dispense a max of 2 gallons per transaction. And limit transactions per credit card; then, if someone uses multiple cards to bypass, they get $100 fines on each card.
Easy peasy.
I wouldn't, because if I was willing to pay $10 it would be because it was worth $10 (or likely more) to me.
I don't take for granted the fact I pay considerably less than what things are worth to me due to competition.
Having faced empty pumps before I already know I'd be willing to pay closer to what gas is worth to me when I need it.
I bitch and moan about shelves emptied due to economic ignorance, or the price of goods changing because the government goes on a money printing orgy, but I don't kvetch about prices following market based supply and demand factors.
Freely moving prices are what make things better.
Lol. On what planet do you live?
Why would the gas station owner bother?
Have you ever been to Florida?
On a positive note, hotels in the Destin area have offered reduced rates for Hurricane evacuees...
I know his home policy has a higher hurricane deductible at 10,500. Suppose I should get a full copy of the policy and read it.
My wife said something about that yesterday. I'm dubious as to the actual discount.
They'd "bother" if it became a state reg, anytime a hurricane evac order was put in place.
Transaction limits at gas stations are "x" gallons per fill.
If you run multiple cards, you are recorded on camera (all stations have cameras), and they send that recording to the state; they get 90% of the $100 fine and would be financially motivated to do so. Just "10 cheaters" nets them $900. Make that income 'tax free', and they'll hire extra attendants to monitor for that profit whirlwind...
