The death toll in Texas now reaches 44 and rising. Over 20,000 homes are flooded and the costs is put at $50 billion.
That is appalling.
But spare a thought for the Asians. They too have experienced unprecedented flooding due to increased rainfall as a result of warmer air.
The death toll in India, Nepal and Bangladesh is now 1200 and rising and millions are now homeless.
In America the homeless are being put up in temporary shelters, clothed, fed and have clean water. Their life will be miserable but they have help.
In Asia there is nowhere for most people to go. No food to eat, no dry clothes and no fresh water to drink. They are drinking unclean water and thousands will die of waterborne illness. There is no help forthcoming. Most are subsistence farmers and have lost everything. They will wait for the water to recede and…
Lineman restoring power after Hurricane Irma falls to death
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – A Florida lineman who was working to restore power following Hurricane Irma is dead after falling from a parking garage.
The Sun Sentinel reports that 26-year-old Scott Christopher Reid Jr. was killed Sunday morning when he fell from the fifth floor of the Westin Fort Lauderdale Beach Resort garage.
Police say Reid was standing near his truck, preparing for work, before he fell. Detectives haven’t offered details about what caused the fall, but they’re not calling the incident suspicious.
Reid lived in Sebring, a rural community northwest of Lake Okeechobee. His family says he worked for T&D Solutions.
Frustrations boil over in Miami following Hurricane Irma
Alan Gomez, USA TODAYPublished 3:41 p.m. ET Sept. 20, 2017 | Updated 10:36 a.m. ET Sept. 21, 2017
Residents return to damaged homes in Miami
Inside the Edgewater section of Miami, several roofs were ripped off, power lines lay on the ground and a large truck was overturned on its side in the middle of the street. (Sept. 11) AP
MIAMI — Ten days after Hurricane Irma made landfall on the west side of the Florida peninsula, residents on the east side are growing increasingly frustrated that government and power officials haven’t yet gotten the region completely up and running.
After threatening to plow straight into downtown Miami, Irma veered west and spared the booming metropolitan region from its full wrath. The National Weather Service estimates that Miami-Dade County received sustained tropical storm force winds between 50 and 70 mph, with frequent Category 1 and 2 gusts up to 100 mph.
Those winds were strong enough to knock out power to 90% of homes in the county, and many feel that the region’s most vulnerable remain in the dark. The Miami-Dade County Commission held a budget hearing on Tuesday night that transformed into a public venting session for angry residents, who were repeatedly asked by commissioners to keep their cool as their voices raged.
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“In the days after the storm, families went hungry, elders suffered from the heat, people with diabetes were desperately asking for ice for their insulin, and the level of need was reprehensible,” said Andrea Mercado, executive director of the New Florida Majority, a group that organizes political campaigns focused on poor and minority communities. “It didn’t need to be this way.”
Valencia Gunder echoed those concerns. The community activist estimates that she coordinated 200 volunteers who helped hammer plywood on people’s windows and delivered food and water to poor neighborhoods. She pleaded with commissioners to stop congratulating themselves over their hurricane response and start scrutinizing the gaps in their response that has still left some people without help.
“I do not know the complete protocol for emergency response after a storm, but I really believe that it needs to be revisited now,” Gunder said. “We need to revisit every plan, turn over every page.”
Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez bristled at accusations that the county has been slow to respond to poor neighborhoods in the county. He pointed out that the county oversaw 661,000 evacuations and opened 43 shelters that housed 31,500 residents — all county records.
“I’ve never heard of these people,” Gimenez said during a break in the commission meeting Tuesday. “So their claim of feeding people, etc., etc., I don’t even know if it’s true. I know the county response was very good. In the street, we get complimented all the time.”
The anger in South Florida has also been directed at Florida Power & Light (FPL) which powers half the state and nearly all of the Miami region.
While Miami-Dade County was spared the worst of Irma’s winds, they were still strong enough to knock out power to 90% of homes in the county. Residents pointed to the nearly 10,000 homes that were still in the dark Tuesday night and wondered how the city could survive a stronger storm if Irma was able to do so much damage.
“The hurricane didn’t hit. The power stayed out for how long? It’s still out in some places. Have you talked with those people?,” said David McDougal, who worked with activist groups to help low-income residents prepare for and respond to the storm.
Two law firms filed a lawsuit against FPL this week, arguing that Floridians have been charged higher rates intended to strengthen an electrical grid that failed during Irma. City leaders in Coral Gables and the Pinecrest neighborhood of Miami have also threatened litigation over the outages.
FPL dismissed those threats, issuing a strongly worded statement blaming Coral Gables in particular for not controlling the massive, street-covering trees that define the upscale city and knocked out power lines throughout the city.
By midday Wednesday, FPL had restored power to all but 890 accounts in Miami-Dade County, meaning 99.9% of homes that lost power during Irma were back online. FPL spokesman Peter Robbins said that’s a remarkable turnaround given the widespread outages throughout the state.
“There’s no such thing as ‘only’ a Cat 1 or ‘only’ a weak hurricane,” he said. “By definition, they are incredibly powerful forces of nature and Irma was no exception.”
Engineering experts agreed. Jerry Paul, an engineer and former state legislator, said he feels terribly for anybody still living without power 10 days after the storm. But he said overall, FPL’s ability to get the majority of Miami-Dade County homes back online within a week was “extraordinary.”
The company has spent nearly $3 billion since Hurricane Wilma in 2005 to install concrete power poles for its transmission lines and make its entire system more resilient. Paul, who used to worked at the U.S. Department of Energy, said that resulted in a statewide response following Irma that is the envy of the nation.
“Any state in the country will give anything to have that response following a tornado or a hurricane,” Paul said. “That’s no consolation if it’s you that is out of electricity. But relative to other places and how long they’re out, it’s night and day.”
Slug: Sinkhole damage Date Taken: 7/14/17 Location: Land O’ Lakes, FL (Ocean Pines Drive) Mandatory Credit: Pasco Sheriff (handout) Source/URL: https://twitter.com/pascosheriff Submitted by: michelle.baron@cbs.com Cleared For All Platforms In Perpetuity Description: Twitter Caption – “Another view of the home on ocean pines drive in Land o Lakes”
Homes were evacuated after a sinkhole formed Friday morning in a Land O’ Lakes neighborhood
NOT ONLY HAS THE WORLD GONE MAD,BUT PLANET EARTH HAS TO,FROM GREEN GASSES,TO POLLUTION,LEAD IN DRINKING WATER,IN SOME CITIES WITH DRINKING WATER THE LEAD IS SO HIGH THAT IT CAN CAUSE,DEATH,BRAIN DAMAGE,DEATH,LEARNING DISABILITIES,LIKE IT HAS DONE IN FLINT MICHIGAN.WE NEED TO BE MORE EGO FRIENDLY,IF CITIES LIKE FLINT MICHIGAN HAD BE MORE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR OWN GREEDY ACTIONS TO SAVE MONEY,THE SO CALLED CITY OFFICIALS WOULD HAVE SPARED A LOT OF FAMILIES OF THE PAIN THEY HAD TO GO THROUGH.
THE WORLD GONE MAD 