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Any watchers living there? From what I see in Norwegian media conditions are quite nasty in the big apple and surrounding areas atm.

pibbur who hopes affected watchers are ok
 
Doubt anyone living there could or would bother to post atm. Have not been able to get hold of my brother-in-law for past 2 days now. Phones are out and cell towers are busy.
 
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Getting the power grid back on line can be more challenging than you might think. You've got hundreds of transformers soaked in sea water. You can't turn them on without power washing the salt out. Most power washers run on...electricity. Ah, but there's gas powered units! Well, they need gas to run, so off to the gas station. What runs the gas pumps? Electricity, which you don't have.
 
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They are estimating like 20 billion in damages and 7.5 million people without power. I can't imagine what this has done to the subway system that so many rely on to get around. They will be cleaning up after this for a long while.
 
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I'm guessing they have some kind of emergency contingency plan?
Obviously, it gets done, but it's certainly not simple. When my dad was getting a hydrogen plant back on line down in New Orleans after Katrina, the army actually commandeered generators and large pumps for him at gun point (quite literally). The plant made hydrogen fuel for the space shuttle, so Uncle Sam was tremendously interested in getting it on-line promptly.
 
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It pisses me off to no end how short-sightedness is now going to cost a lot of dollars and personal pain. People saw this coming but since it was unlikely in their lifetime they did nothing about it. For stupidity/selfishness little was done to protect the city against this sort of event.

I bet it will be months before the flooded subways are completely operational. Sea water does nasty things to electrical components, especially when they are 100 years old. I'd say it's a good opportunity for NYC to modernize the whole subway system. And build some flood control systems and dikes while they are at it. It's just gonna get worse…
 
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...But just who is going to pay for all that?
 
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(..) since it was unlikely in their lifetime they did nothing about it. (..)
Ain't that the truth for humanity in general (think politics). Most of what we do is so incredibly short-sighted ...
 
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Agreed. But we can't prepare ourselves for every (un)thinkable catastrophy. The cost and the demand for resources of that would be impossible. Where to draw the line is difficult, and no doubt we usually land on too little preparation.

pibbur who has prepared himself by storing a couple of campbell soup boxes in his cellar for that purpose. And bought a house 20 meters above seal level.
 
They did have some planning for this. They shut off power to major sections of the city before the worst hit, leaving only the need to clean and dry rather then replace shorted out equipement. They also flew in hundreds of water pumps before it hit. But the amt of flooding and damage left behind is going to take a lot of time to clear.

We did finally get a cell phone call from our family there. No lights but otherwise they were very lucky. They only live a few miles from the beach, but the dunes the city built up did keep most of the flooding in check in their area.
 
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Yeah, my parents over in southwestern PA came out pretty lucky. Had 6 large trees either uprooted or snapped off and lots of missing shingles on the upwind side of the house, but only had a few flickers on the electricity. They're high enough up that we'd be building arks before they had problems, but the house sits on a shelf of shale so drainage can get interesting. Dad says his neighborhood should thank him--since he took the time to get his generator positioned, primed, and ready to run, it naturally become unnecessary. ;)
 
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Alot of my area is at sea level or below it so I specifically bought a house thats about 100 feet above sea level and has great drainage. I feel very safe to flooding tho the last big hurricane my power was out for 12 days. Luckily I like to camp so I have all the neat gear. The only thing I really missed was hot water.
 
NYT called out city’s flood-protection problems in September

New York Is Lagging as Seas and Risks Rise, Critics Warn


Duh, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out they needed to protect against rising sea levels. Looks like they will be taking this "opportunity" to waterproof or move some of the electrical power connections and switches. They are talking about moving the power lines out of the subway tunnels though, but where would they go instead? Transmission towers and lines? Yech.

Consolidated Edison, the utility that supplies electricity to most of the city, estimates that adaptations like installing submersible switches and moving high-voltage transformers above ground level would cost at least $250 million. Lacking the means, it is making gradual adjustments, with about $24 million spent in flood zones since 2007.
That's a fucking drop in the bucket compared to opportunity costs lost by having no electricity not to mention the human impact. Penny wise and pound foolish. Con Ed took weeks to restore power in LA after a big windstorm last year. They were totally unprepared. This is why critical utilities shouldn't be provided by private companies.

The most vulnerable systems, like the subway tunnels under the Harlem and East Rivers, would have been unusable for nearly a month, or longer, at an economic loss of about $55 billion, said Dr. Jacob.
Instead of “planning to be flooded,” as he put it, city, state and federal agencies should be investing in protection like sea gates that could close during a storm and block a surge from Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean into the East River and New York Harbor.
Duh….

The waters on the city’s doorstep have been rising roughly an inch a decade over the last century as oceans have warmed and expanded. But according to scientists advising the city, that rate is accelerating, because of environmental factors, and levels could rise two feet higher than today’s by midcentury. More frequent flooding is expected to become an uncomfortable reality.

With higher seas, a common storm could prove as damaging as the rare big storm or hurricane is today, scientists say. Were sea levels to rise four feet by the 2080s, for example, 34 percent of the city’s streets could lie in the flood-risk zone, compared with just 11 percent now, a 2011 study commissioned by the state said.
“There’s a lot of concern about angering developers,” said Ben Chou, a water-policy analyst at the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Oh, too bad, the little children can't behave like responsible adults on their own. Just gimme, gimme, gimme.

The AP (10/31, Borenstein) reports that climate scientist Michael Oppenheimer reported just eight months ago "that what used to be once-in-a-century devastating floods in New York City would soon happen every three to 20 years," blaming "global warming for pushing up sea levels and changing hurricane patterns." However, scientists caution "that they cannot yet conclusively link a single storm to global warming, and any connection is not as clear and simple as environmental activists might contend." Still, several climate scientists say that "some individual parts of Sandy and its wrath seem to be influenced by climate change," including rising sea levels, the rising average temperature of the Atlantic Ocean, and a warmer than normal Gulf Stream. Governor Cuomo concluded, "Anyone who says that there's not a dramatic change in weather patterns I think is denying reality."

The New York Times (10/31, Gillis) reports in its "Green" blog that "a detailed understanding of the anatomy and causes of the storm will take months, at least." However, several climate scientists said, "A likely contributor to the intensity of Sandy…was that surface temperatures in the western Atlantic Ocean were remarkably high just ahead of the storm - in places, about five degrees Fahrenheit higher than normal for this time of year." Meanwhile, "other scientists are looking at this year's historic loss of sea ice in the Arctic as a potential contributor to the track of Sandy, and possibly to the severity of the storm." Scientists say that the hybrid nature of this storm makes trying to pinpoint its causes of more difficult.
 
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