Wind Part II

[mnwizard]

Yeah and I guess you had a front line view of just how bad it can be:YeaBaby:

Sad to here how badly your neighbourhood was hit Jack, will the insurance cover it properly?

:) Yep, that's one of the great things about capitalism in the US, If you want to borrow the money to buy a house, ya gotta have the proper insurance to get the mortgage. So me and my friends are covered.

Part of the reason why the houses aren't steel and concrete here in tornado land is simply the cost. Not of the materials, but for the skilled labor. You can't run over to Home Depot and hire some cheap labor to put up I-beams.

Also, unlike coastal areas and hurricanes, the chances of actually getting hit by a tornado are pretty slim. Still, I don't think I'd ever live here in a trailer or in a house without a basement!

[mnwizard]

I dont know about up north but after Andrew hit you had to be pretty rich to be able to afford hurricane insurance..

Act of God and all that jazz.

It's the same here with flood insurance. Tornado, fire, semi-truck in the living room, you're ok. Water damage and no flood insurance - too bad, so sad. The irritating thing is that according to the insurance companies, water damage isn't covered as storm damage.

'Course in New Orleans you can't buy flood insurance for any price.

Makes me wonder about guys in Holland where the whole country is pretty much below sea level.

[DierWolf]

I Beams???

There isnt a single i-beam put into any of our houses, in residential construction of concrete block houses the ibeam is replaced with whats called a Ring beam, this is poured concrete with steel.

There is no special labour in building concrete/block houses, in fact is much easier to build with it...... Its definately the cost of building it thats the factor... But the returns are much better as well, insurance is lower, you dont get damaged (all depends how they build and secure your roof to the ringbeam) House stays cooler as well and hold in heat better (for those up north).

there was back in 89 an american guy that came down and built 100 homes from frame and stucco in this one area and pretty much convinced alot of people to buy them as they could handle 120 mph winds (guess these people forgot thats only Cat 3 and even Cat 2 Hurricanes Gusts are already way over that)... anyways In 1995 Luis came strolling over from Africa and parked its huge Arse right on top of our island for 37 hours (just stalled, stopped moving) and it was Catagorie 5 Hurricane. United States says it was Catagory 4 (like they were there) in fact the only reading they got by Hurricane Hunter was prior to it reaching the island which at that time it was Cat 4.

wind meters at the Airport and Government building had sustained winds of 182mph with gusts up to 220 mph.

I was not here, i was living in florida at the time and i remember watching the news on Channel 4 and the weather guy specifically said while pointing at the satalite infared photo ..... " You see this wonderful dark purple color around the eye? We have never seen this color before and we can only GUESS what wind speeds that could be"

Anyways these "Houses" in that area simply VANISHED! and the occupants of all of them as well. Mostly Illegals from Haiti and Dominican republic..... Its said their bodies were recovered and government simply put them in containers and sank them (since there is no way to identify them as they are all undocumented illegals) Thats what was said anyways, plus to hide the drastic situation from the USA as we rely on Tourism down here.

Anyways America tried sending Supplies (including myself and my wife tried to send 2 containers of diapers and powered milk) and the island government refused and turned away everything coming from the USA, only ones allowed to enter were the dutch... This was all done so that the USA couldnt know the full extent of the damage and in tern not mess up tourism so badly.

There was no electricity in most areas for 6 months, Hills had no leaves and everything was covered in salt..... My brother who was there said he felt like he was in Bayrute for 6 months it was that bad. I guess this Excerpt from the link below says the same thing.....

" At noon on the 6th, it seemed to be safe to go out. It was like after a bombing... I never saw that in my life before!!! it was like nothing was left, that no houses had a roof anymore, no trees, nothing! Only debris and desolation. "

The winds blew apart a major supermarket built with 18x12 I-Beams, i wish i could find the pictures for you, it twisted these ibeams like they were wet noodles into every shape you can imagine including a twisler... you know what it takes to bend an I-beam? let alone twist one into a pretzel??

Anyways, my bro (the one that passed away) had tons of pictures but i have no idea where he put them, they were up on the net at one point on his ISP server as a webpage but the government had him take the page down so now only thing you can find for pictures is a few on the net.. like at this page http://sxmcoconut-retriever.blogspot.com/2007/09/12-years-ago-day-after.html

One american's tourist experence and a few pictures, nothing really showing the really bad damage but just some pics for you too see.

The Hurricane packed only winds, little to no rain in it... But one week later Hurricane Marilyn Rolled in and Flooded them out for 2 days....

There is a joke and i am sure anyone from holland here can verify it.. when the Royal air force flew over to access damages they must have been too high or something but they reported back that "Everythign seems fine, everyone has a swimming pool"

Needless to say all the blue things they saw from looking down were Blue Tarps on the roofs of everyones house.... Most all roofs were damaged in some way but yeah, thats wood sink roofs.. but everything else survives..

Anyways babbled enough, Hurricane season starts here in 2 days :) Whippie!!!!!

LOL its always nice to have a fishing trowler parked right next to your hotel room :)

http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o280/tabbakhady/Hurricane%20Luis/scan0005.jpg

[mnwizard]

Unfortunately, because of the temperature extremes here, you can't use poured concrete structurally in single houses other than for basement flooring. (which is below the frost line) The constant expansion and contraction causes it to crack and crumble relatively quickly, especially the unheated exterior walls. A crack forms, moisture gets in it, it freezes, moisture expands, cracks get bigger, pieces break off.

I'll take 2 minutes of a relatively narrow tornado over a hurricane any day!

It's a relatively narrow path. Notice the trees and structures still standing on either side of it.

http://i30.tinypic.com/rhpnqu.jpg

BTW - I love the trawler right next to the hotel.

[DierWolf]

Yes thats tornado damage for you. In luis we had alot of small tornadoes as well, you could see where they were compared to regular hurricane damage.

Yes trawler is good example on how to imagine the Storm Surge height, as its sitting straight up so sea level had to be pretty much at the 2nd story level to place it nice and neatly like that and not fallen over on its side.

the ocean floor and in the lagoon is littered with such recks and now makes for great fishing spots :)

[mnwizard]

the ocean floor and in the lagoon is littered with such recks and now makes for great fishing spots :)

Great for diving too if you're into it.