Katrina and Irene
Adam Gopnik is upset that his Cape Cod vacation got interrupted by a storm that didn’t live up to the worst case scenario:
Obviously, this was a big storm with a lot of water and wind in it; if things broke the wrong way, it could do a great deal of harm to a lot of people—and, just as obviously, the politicians had made an intelligent decision not to get caught with their raincoats down this time. (See Katrina.) But the relentless note of incipient hysteria, the invitation to panic, the ungrounded scenarios—the overwhelming and underlying desire for something truly terrible to happen so that you could have something really hot to talk about—was still startling. We call disasters unimaginable, but all we do is imagine such things. “It hasn’t even started, and the city is already Atlantis,” one of the back seat riders announced.
That, you could conclude mordantly, is the real soundtrack of our time: the amplification of the self-evident toward the creation of paralyzing, preëmptive paranoia. The real purpose not to get you to do anything, but to get you so scared that all you can do is keep the television, or radio, on. This is obvious, and yet there is something truly helpful, really instructive, about experiencing it again after a month of absence and silence. Two things that ought to be apparent all the time become briefly clear to you again. First, that the media, television particularly, are amplifying devices in which tiny kernels of information become vast, terrifying structures of speculation. The news business is one in which a minimum of news is really given the business.
I don’t think the first hurricane to threaten the Northeast in 20 years and a hurricane of remarkable size, if somewhat average wind speed, is a minimum of news. While Gopnik gives lip service to the Katrina comparison, the rest of the article dismisses it to poke at the somewhat hysterical hurricane reporting coming from The Weather Channel and imitated by other networks. And that reporting, like so much cable television news these days, might be ridiculous. But a hurricane, especially one the size of Irene, has real potential to kill a lot of people. In New Orleans, we saw what happens when local, state, and federal governments don’t have it together enough to evacuate people and have a response plan in place. This weekend, everyone did their job. President Obama, governors of all the relevant states, mayors–they all deserve credit for preparing people for the storm. And The Weather Channel’s 24 hour coverage did its part too. People took this storm seriously. I’m sorry if Adam Gopnik lost a day of his beach vacation; I know how hard it is for a man of his extremely limited means to enjoy a bit of down time. If it helps protect people, it’s worth it.
Does it? Or more precisely, did *this* hurricane have real potential to kill a lot of people? This is the real question, isn’t it? It’s silly to imply that we should treat every hurricane like Katrina, and I assure you I won’t be spending any vacation time in Cape Cod any time soon.
And does your last line apply generally, or just to overwrought hurricane coverage? Because it sounds like something I’ve heard to justify a lot of really terrible things in the name of national defense. Or even not-so-terrible things like onerous airline security procedures.
Yes, this hurricane had the potential to kill a lot of people. It weakened slightly before it hit the northeast, but hurricanes are notoriously difficult to predict. Given the potential for a huge storm surge, its arrival during an unusual high tide in many areas, and the dense population density near the coast, Irene absolutely had the potential to kill many more people than it did.
The fact that a hurricane doesn’t kill a lot of people is absolutely no reason to not be extremely prepared. There were a lot of near misses in New Orleans between Betsy in 1965 and Katrina in 2005. Those near misses helped lead to an attitude of complacency. That did not end well.
There you go again, with the mindless comparison with Katrina. Irene was not like Katrina except that they were both nominal hurricanes.
Comparisons end there. Katrina was massively more powerful, and as unpredictable as hurricanes might be (and this seems less true than it used to be anyway, especially relative to weather in general), Irene just wasn’t going to morph into that kind of monster at the last minute.
I remain unconvinced that the worst-case scenario here was as bad as it was made to seem. You want to see “complacency?” Just cry wolf a few times and see how people react when the real thing shows up.
You could be a walking example of everything hurricane planners worry about.
Now there’s a response.
I actually grew up on the east coast of Florida. I’ve helped board up windows. I’ve had to wonder if my house would still be standing in 72 hours. I understand the threats that hurricanes can pose.
And so, I feel fairly confident in saying that this was a very unusual yet not particularly powerful storm. And while I guess things can always be worse, what happened pretty much was the worst-case scenario – that the storm would ride up the eastern seaboard, make a direct or near-direct hit the major population centers in the northeast, at high tide no less, while moving slowly and drenching already-soaked areas with tons more rain.
That’s it. A widespread catastrophic impact just wasn’t going to happen with a storm of that strength, barring years of government incompetence and neglect that a few days prep wouldn’t have been adequate to undo.
A widespread catastrophic impact just wasn’t going to happen with a storm of that strength
Maybe you should work for NOAA. Your predictive powers would really come in handy there.
You want to see “complacency?”
Not really, no.
Also. That bridge was a work of art…
That bridge was a work of art…
It was indeed. That’s a damn shame.
The “crying wolf” metaphor doesn’t really work, since 1) there was a wolf, for real, and 2) saying that it wasn’t as big as the wolf that killed all those people years ago, and might veer away from the village at the last minute, isn’t really reassuring.
Irene was a Category 3 hurricane when it started advancing on the mainland. Katrina was a Category 3 when it made landfall in Lousiana. So, yes, this hurricane had the potential to kill a lot of people, and precautions were taken commensurate with the threat. Waiting to see if the Category 3 designation actually held would have undoubtedly resulted in many more deaths had it stayed at that level of intensity.
I was going to respond to Strannix’s response to Erik upthread with that info. Though it should be noted that katrina also weakened right before landfall and people were expecting it to be cat 4 at landfall.
Also, as problematic as the levees were known to be, LA infastructure and people were better prepared for hurricanes than mid-atlantic and new englanders, so a weaker hurricane had the possbility to do more damage there than it would in NO.
I don’t think anyone was predicting Katrina-like outcomes even as the worst case scenario of Irene. But there was a very good chance Irene could have been much worse than it was. The weakening at the end and the evacuations and preperations did a lot to avert what could have been worse.
Though the million people without power in NJ alone, plus all those stranded in flood waters, plus all those whose homes have been damaged beyond repair would like to point out that while this wasn’t Katrina, it was still pretty bad.
It’s not entirely the case that the northeast coast is unprepared for these things. They fairly routinely get hit with ‘nor’easters’ and non-tropical cyclones that are occasionally hurricane strength and/or push big storm surges. Long Island’s south shore gets hammered every few years – there are plenty of videos of houses falling into the ocean because of non-tropical storms.
I remember visiting my grandparents in Marblehead, Mass one summer about 50 years ago when a big nor-easter hit. Pretty much every boat in Marblehead Harbor wound up on the rocks. The high tide, which normally is not more than a couple feet up the foot of the Swampscott seawall, was at least halfway up it with the storm surge (it’s a very high seawall, protecting the face of a tall cliff).
The “Perfect Storm” hit the New England coast pretty hard, too.
The bigger problem is inland in the NE where people aren’t used to the torrential rains. Events like Hurricane Agnes are rare enough that most people alive today don’t remember them and don’t understand the danger from flash flooding.
My parents had a cottage on Keuka Lake in the Finger Lakes back then. At normal lake level, the water was 6-8′ below the basement slab. By the time Agnes got done, it was almost up to the first floor joists.
A valid criticism of TV coverage is that they focus way too much on the wind and nowhere near enough on water.
This is true: a bad nor’easter (I lived through many) can be as bad as a weak hurricane (I’ve now lived through a few), though typically not as long-lasting.
The NE isn’t the least prepared place for a hurricane (I’d wager it would be Kansas or something), but they aren’t as well prepared as the Gulf Coast for the most part.
Well, at one point it was a cat-3 with a well-formed eyewall and falling pressure. Most people who actually pay attention to the science would probably agree that these factors, combined with the sheer size of Irene, justified a high degree of caution.
The deintensification was fairly rapid and obviously unexpected.
Those engaged in science-free Monday morning quarterbacking of hurricane predictions are invited to publicly register their own forecasts ahead of the next time. It’s easy to be right after the fact.
Science, hah.
The deintensification was always expected – at no time was the storm forecast to hit the NE as a Cat 3. I think the maximum forecast I saw was for about 80 mph winds, although there may have been some forecasts with it as a low Cat 2 over NY.
And indeed it hit as a borderline Cat 1, as expected. This is because storms tend to lose strength as they 1) make landfall, and 2) move north from the Caribbean, both of which Irene was always forecast to do.
This gets to the heart of the matter – no one’s complaining that the forecasts were wrong. The complaints are that the level of hysteria was out of proportion to the actual forecast.
SOME deintensification was expected. The models failed to predict its speed and extent in this case. (The NOAA meteorologists are quite up front about the fact that the current best models are quite good at predicting storm tracks but much worse at predicting intensity.) I can only repeat the suggestion that you offer your remarkable paranormal powers of prognostication to NOAA.
Idiot.
I think the maximum forecast I saw was for about 80 mph winds, although there may have been some forecasts with it as a low Cat 2 over NY.
A “low Cat 2″ directly over NYC could have been catastrophic. Winds of 80 mph at the surface could have been strong enough at the upper floors of many skyscrapers to blow out windows. A Cat 2-level storm surge, had it coincided with high tide as expected, could have swamped lower Manhattan and shut down most of the subway system for weeks on end.
Whatever your point is, you’re failing to make it quite spectacularly.
Frankly, under these circumstances, where the costs of getting it wrong are potentially catastrophic, it is always better to err and the side of caution. If, as in this case, it turns out not to be so bad and inconveniences a few people. It beats the hell out of a possible repeat of Katrina.
Until I listened to a great CBC Radio 2 program today called Deep Roots, I didn’t know goodnight Irene was written by Leadbelly. and here is the video. Serendipity.
Actually Goodnight Irene is credited to Leadbelly and he made it known but he didn’t write it. Most of the lyrics and structure are from an 1886 parlor song (melody unknown)which somehow became part of his repertoire (and he thereafter claimed it as his song) As far as the hurricane goes, Erik is right. This storm had the potential to be worse than Katrina and even at less than that, government actions probably prevented a couple dozen deaths. My daughter lives in NYC and I’m grateful to the municipal, state and federal efforts and the news media who kept me informed and my mind at relative ease. Tired of 24 hour news coverage of the storm – turn the goddamned tv off and do something else..nobody is forcing you to watch CNN or the Weather Channel and it’s not like there was earth shattering news this weekend that was preempted by the storm coverage
It is often impossible to know who wrote just about any song from that era. The first to record is often credited as the songwriter, but that doesn’t usually mean too much.
But here we know that most of the lyrics and form were published two years before Leadbelly was born so he certainly didn’t write most of the lyrics. He may have created the melody but it’s sure different than the melodies of most of his repertoire.. But in any case it’s his version that became known in the folk community, covered by the Weavers and then became a standard
First, that the media, television particularly, are amplifying devices in which tiny kernels of information become vast, terrifying structures of speculation.
It seems a little odd that a person in the business has to be away from his business to discover what everyone else already knows about his business.
I’m not a big fan of Gopnik, generally, but I don’t think he was so much whining about losing a day on Cape Cod as ridiculing the ridiculous coverage of the news media. In that regard, I agree with him. Our local TV News Hairheads were almost criminal in their juvenile, panic-driven bullshit. But when I got sick of them, I turned to the Weather Channel in the naive hope that they’d take a more meterological, scientific approach. They were even worse, and it dawned on me that when weather catastrophe is all you’ve got to grab ratings, the catastrophe is going to be as huge as you need to make it, regardless. For the most part, the only sensible voices were heard in occasional man-on-the-wet-street interviews, where regular people refused to play along and be deathly afraid, despite urgent proddings by the idiots with the mics.
This isn’t to say there weren’t a few reporters with some integrity, and I agree wholeheartedly in preparedness, and you won’t hear a peep out of me about having to evacuate or Bloomberg’s shutting down the MTA.
So the complaint is the death and destruction didn’t meet the expectations created by the government and/or various media outlets.
No way. Hang on.
OK, I have to disagree with your interpretation. His complaint is the same I often have: The 24 hour news hole results in a whole lot of pointless squawking.
Yes, but this was not pointless squawking. It was preparing people for a possible natural disaster.
And a very real natural disaster in the Catskills and many parts of interior New England and eastern New York.
My brother lives near Laurel, Maryland, which is well inland. They got 15″ of rain and lost at least one tree, maybe two. Last I heard, he still had no power, and the 8pm turn-on time had been pushed back.
Also, too, the low death toll just might – MIGHT, mind you – be because people paid attention to the “overwrought” newscasts.
Also, too, a better comparison is Ivan, which did not weaken from a cat 3 when it hit the northern Gulf coast, and caused tremendous damage which was still being repaired two years later in many places. For many months afterwards, you could drive down I-10 and see tarps on people’s roofs, and piles of dead trees along the side of the interstate that had been stacked up for removal. And yeah, people got killed because they didn’t listen to the “overwrought” reporting.
Are you sure about the 15″? I’m about 15 minutes away from Laural and if we’d gotten anywhere near that much … I wouldn’t be posting this, that’s for damn sure.
LaurEL. Ugg. Where glasses?
They have a rain gauge in their back yard. 15″. They sent me the picture.
They actually live in Burtonsville. I say Laurel because people are more likely to know where that is because of the race track.
Extreme rainfall (or lack thereof) can be rather localized in hurricanes and trop storms because it tends to come in bands. We had a storm come through here in the Tampa Bay area a few years ago (I don’t remember which one) where we got about <1" at the house and 12" ten miles up the road at my sister's office.
Come on. You know a great deal of the coverage had nothing to do with helping people prepare and everything to do with HEY LOOKIT ME (and my sponsors)!
To be clear though – I do not object to reporting that gives preparation/safety guidelines. More of that, please.
The TV coverage was indeed often semi-hysterical, but policy makers rely on NOAA, not the TV news in planning their responses, so the two are unconnected.
Never said they were. I thought that’s what Gopnik was saying based on the “shorter.”
I’m such a geek that I’d LOVE it if the only coverage was calm boring officials and experts talking about the storm and how to prepare and stay safe in calm boring voices.
But maybe some people need OMG YOU’RE GONNA DIE to get them motivated.
Just had the same experience here in Taiwan with Typhoon Nanmadol- for one thing, who can be afraid of a typhoon that sounds like a pain reliever?- which was supposed to be cat 3 and ended up quite mild, but the local news outlets reacted with the usual total hysteria.
OTOH, Morakot, which hit in 2009, was only a cat 1 and was supposed to be no big deal. It ended up killing 700 people and wiping away whole villages.
One reason was a piss-poor gov’t response.
Better safe than sorry.
Question: who’s going to be the first wingnut denouncing Obama and those scaredy-cat big gummint liberals for overeacting?
Bonus points if it’s someone who was previously denouncing Obama for not responding to the non-damage caused by the earthquake
My book is in storage. But if anyone has a copy of Generation of Swine within reach, re-read Hunter Thompson’s account of the televised coverage of hurricane Gloria during the mid-’80′s, i.e., before 24 hour, wall-to-wall cable networks intruded themselves on the world. It’s hilarious.
I was on Oahu when Iniki sideswiped the west coast of it and scored a direct hit on Kauai in 1992.
I remember being awakened at 5:00am by a phone call from a neighbor who’d just heard the Civil Defense sirens.
The storm track had been well south of the state until six hours earlier when it made a 90-degree right turn and headed due north for us. There was a great deal of worry that it would directly hit Honolulu.
It took Kauai over seven years to fully recover.
My point is you can’t count on these storms doing what they’re predicted to do. Those saying “Meh, it wasn’t so much” would be talking out of the other sides of their mouths had it stayed a Cat 3 and smashed straight into several hugely-populated cities. The pols and the disaster management people made their best bets based on what the scientists were telling them, and I give them credit. We should all be sitting around saying “Whew, dodged that bullet,” except the people who are still without power and whose roads are impassable.
Perhaps one issue is that people are so complacent about their safety that the authorities are compelled to use apocalyptic messages just to get them to take reasonable precautions?
Perhaps one issue is that people are so complacent about their safety that the authorities are compelled to use apocalyptic messages just to get them to take reasonable precautions?
Sadly, yes.
I think media hysteria is only part of the story. You’ve also got to factor in good old American anti-intellectualism — in this case, the increasingly widespread notion that the so-called “experts” who “study” the weather are actually part of a massive conspiracy dedicated to the further fattening of Al Gore.
You’ve got to yell loudly and repeatedly to penetrate skulls that thick.
Well, it’s not just the Al Gore thing. How long have Americans been making fun of the tv weatherman? Since 1950 or so? The fact is that it’s amazing we can predict tomorrow’s temperature within a ten degree span. But if the guy on tv says it will rain a little and it rains a lot, he’s an idiot. Most people do not understand how complex the weather is, and they do not understand how variables and probability work. It’s not just anti-intellectualism. It’s also people’s refusal to accept that the world is random and unpredictable.
When we predict something like the weather correctly it is the outcome of centuries of research and engineering. It is inevitable that those predictions will be wrong sometimes. But the idea that the government should risk thousands of lives on the basis that the predictions might be wrong isn’t just dumb, it’s reckless. I’m glad Gopnik wasn’t on tv mouthing off before the storm hit.
I’d phrase the problem more that people have no sense of scale when it comes to disaster and risk. People can understand big disasters and they can understand something that isn’t a disaster at all, but something that’s only a mild disaster is something they have trouble wrapping their heads around.
FWIW National Grid in Massachusetts has every office employee working the phones in mandatory 16 hour shifts. This is apparently the highest number of electrical outages ever, beating even the ice storm of a couple of years ago.
It’s also the reason Derek Jeter’s hangnail will receive more attention than a (purely hypothetical) 16-game winning streak by the Royals.
Only on this site would we get an anti-Jeter comment in a post about Hurricane Irene.
“But the relentless note of incipient hysteria, the invitation to panic, the ungrounded scenarios—the overwhelming and underlying desire for something truly terrible to happen so that you could have something really hot to talk about—was still startling.”
This is the guy accusing someone else of hyperbole? Calm down , Adam, you sound hysterical.
Gopnik clearly missed the Christmas blizzard in the Northeast, or else he’d know that he’s being an asshole here.
In that storm, the governments of the northeast assumed that people would be hunkered down for the Christmas holiday and not travelling around, conveniently forgetting that the storm was hitting on a Sunday night when most of the crews that would protect and clean up would also be on holiday and unable to get back in.
Thus, they were called all sorts of names for the INaction in not being more forceful (Christie was on vacation, Bloomberg was in Bermuda, as I recall).
I think their reaction in this case was not only called for, but perhaps even understated. Except maybe Christie.
Surely, one can poke Gopnik and still admit that a lot of the coverage, especially among the weekend-shift teenyboppers on MSNBC, is worthy of serious mockery. My Lord, every time some yob walked down the beach in NJ hours before the storm, some youthful anchor would be all over the guy for doing that AGAINST MASNBC’S DIRECT ORDERS. It was the wind. No, it was the rain. No, it was going to be the storm surge. AIEEEEE! And it turns out that Vermont gets pummelled worst of all.
The problem with people hanging out in evacuation zones until the last minute, when they have no reason to, is that they add to the traffic created by people who actually do have a reason to stay until the last minute, such as, for example, the guy keeping his gas station open so evacuees can get gas, or emergency responders trying to get the yobs off the beach, or residents who are using all the time they have to pack valuables – and there’s never enough time.
There’s a much bigger picture here than the risk to one individual in one place at one moment.
As Jon Stewart once said, when you see that news guy reporting from the middle of the hurricane, you just know he doesn’t have “Senior” in his job title.
I rather like Gopnik, but what I think he misses is that, for better or for worse, it takes a fair amount of hysteria to break-through the thick heads of a large portion of the population. When the bulk of our media is breathless and over-wrought, I doubt that a calm, dispassionate discussion of the likely scenarios would be in our collective best interest. I’m not saying there’s any method to the madness – but it may have worked out for the best.