Update: Shaz in Houston and Ike

Shaz - good to hear from you. I remember going through hurricanes in Louisiana so I know what you're facing. As bad as your area was hit, remember the people in Galveston.

Keep us up to date on what's happening.

Mike
 
Hi Shaz - been watching for news of you. Glad to hear all is well, mostly. Never-the-less, I knew whatever state you found yourself in you would be content.;)
Hi Rennie :wave:,
You know my secret!:D Thanks,
Shaz :)

The destruction was widespread. Arkansas still has several thousand homes without power. Flooding is very serious in Missouri, Illinois and Indiana. A friend is leaving to visit relatives in Indiana today, and they are also still without power. My Internet service was out for two days. Not life threatening but sobering. The Internet was born of the Cold War days as a means of maintaining communications in the event of a cataclysmic event. Failed with one storm. If Ike had been a cat. 4 or 5, we can only imagine how crippling it could be to the whole country. Gratefully, loss of life was very minimal. However, suffering continues.
Hi Frank :wave:,
Thanks as always for your input. We need be aware of many of the unknown items that you interject. Thanks for sharing.
Shaz :)

Glad to hear you came through ok Shaz, keep up your health and spirits. :wave:
Hi Darren :wave:,
Thank you for your well wishes, Just several days ago, as I entered the nearby post office, I held the door open for an older man, maybe 75. He had several days growth, and his hair was short and white. He had old jeans with a look of having been worn a bit, you know, worn into that "comfort zone".:rolleyes: Well anyway, I held the door open and said as he was needing to exit, "After you sir". He looked at me almost startled, even as he responded to my request saying "thank you. I needed that. I hope someone returns the favor." A simple encounter I shall never forget.
Thanks Darren:thumb:,
My best to you.
Shaz :)

Shaz,

Glad to hear you're ok. Those pics are pretty typical of a Houston storm (I used to write up tree damage assessment for my colleagues' insurance claims when I lived there). What you describe is pretty typical of the heavy black gumbo clay inside the Loop. The oaks can't get their roots down very far into it (there's no oxygen down there), and especially when it's wet, when the wind hits them, they just fall over, roots, clay, and all. The pine trunks aren't as strong, of course, but more important, their roots go deeper, so it's easier for them to just break instead of uprooting.
Hi Bill :wave:,
Thanks for this bit of interesting and very relative information. I appreciate it! It is knowledge, glad you share.
Shaz :)

If you want bizarre, you should have seen the hackberries in Nashville when the tornado hit. It didn't touch down in the yard, but it almost did... and it literally sucked the hackberries out of the ground, crown, trunk, rootball, everything, in one piece, and then laid them down several feet away. Imagine something strong enough to wrench out and pick up a 100' hackberry! Now, that was odd! ;)
Hackberry is my favorite spalted wood (an aside). It is hard to imagine how things like that can be but they are! Remember that twirling house picture from Kansas?:rolleyes: S :)
Thanks,

Bill

Glad to hear you're well and carrying on Shaz.
Hi Ken :wave:,
Thank you Ken, so far just a few branch nics and cuts in my own bark,:D
but other than that...:thumb:.
Shaz

Glad to hear you weathered the storm Shaz!
Hi Ed :wave:,
Thanks for trying to call through. Just got my cell phone to the place where the network would allow me to call out. I could recieve (indications that someone was calling in) calls and voice messages, as I noticed on the little phone monitor, but in trying to call the voice mail box or even answer calls, it just wasn't going to happen. Anyway that has changed and I am grateful to be okay. Thanks again!
Shaz :)

Shaz - good to hear from you. I remember going through hurricanes in Louisiana so I know what you're facing. As bad as your area was hit, remember the people in Galveston.
Hi Mike :wave:,
Folks don't know until they experience this stuff. Sadly Ike went far north causing destruction. Having done time in Louisiana you know all too well what happened here. Your words are so important, there is someone worse off, Galveston and Bolivar Peninsula took the big hit this time.
Shaz :)



Keep us up to date on what's happening.

Mike
In keeping with Mike's request,
just this morning the local new said there are about 1,250,000 customers with out electricity in the houston area. Schools haven't opened and may not for a while as the majority of the schools have no power. I am in charge of branch patrol and am getting better.:D
I will have to post more later as I think MJ may have gotten her raise and promotion and has gone off the air for now.:rolleyes::D Thanks for starting this thread MJ.
Shaz :)
 
Every day the news shows the hardship and disappointment of folks wanting to get back to their home and resume normal lives. The desire for normality seems to override the reality of the situation. It is very sad and leaves many questions. Like, should those cities even be rebuilt.... As always, glad you are well and we offer hopes and prayers for all affected.
 
Like, should those cities even be rebuilt....

Frank,

It odd how this always comes up, especially since the answer, for thousands of years, has always been the same. There have really only been a couple cases when humans haven't rebuilt their cities: Angkor Wat and the mayan cities... and even in those cases the land around continued to be inhabited, just in a different way.

Perhaps the best story comes from 396 BCE. Brennus has just sacked Rome. The damage is pretty substantial, as you can imagine. Most of the city was burned. The survivors are sitting around in this ruined, indefensible place, wondering what to do. Now, it just so happened that the Romans had sacked Veii six years before, after a ten year siege, and taken or slaughtered the population. That *was* a defensible spot, and some romans had already moved there. So the Romans are sitting around, saying "maybe we should rebuild in Veii. The Gauls might come back." Just then, the ragtag remnants of a legion walk into the burned out central plaza, and figuring this was as good a place to stop as any, sit down and rest. That decided it, and they rebuilt Rome on that spot. Just like every other place has always been rebuilt.

I'll rest my case with this little factoid. Years ago, I had a girlfriend. She was born in the 1960s. In Carthage! ;)

Thanks,

Bill
 
Frank,

It odd how this always comes up, especially since the answer, for thousands of years, has always been the same. There have really only been a couple cases when humans haven't rebuilt their cities: Angkor Wat and the mayan cities... and even in those cases the land around continued to be inhabited, just in a different way.

Perhaps the best story comes from 396 BCE. Brennus has just sacked Rome. The damage is pretty substantial, as you can imagine. Most of the city was burned. The survivors are sitting around in this ruined, indefensible place, wondering what to do. Now, it just so happened that the Romans had sacked Veii six years before, after a ten year siege, and taken or slaughtered the population. That *was* a defensible spot, and some romans had already moved there. So the Romans are sitting around, saying "maybe we should rebuild in Veii. The Gauls might come back." Just then, the ragtag remnants of a legion walk into the burned out central plaza, and figuring this was as good a place to stop as any, sit down and rest. That decided it, and they rebuilt Rome on that spot. Just like every other place has always been rebuilt.

I'll rest my case with this little factoid. Years ago, I had a girlfriend. She was born in the 1960s. In Carthage! ;)

Thanks,

Bill


It must be a human instinct to want to go home. The bad floods in Missouri, Iowa and Illinois along the Mississippi about 15 years ago raised the same questions.
 
Like, should those cities even be rebuilt....
I have no objection to people rebuilding in those areas if they want to take the risk.

The thing I have an objection to is allowing them to purchase flood insurance from the government (at low rates). Areas that will be destroyed when a hurricane comes through should not be eligible for government subsidized insurance.

Here in CA, governor Schwarzenegger wanted to add a surcharge on all home insurance policies to subsidize home insurance for those who live in high fire risk places. That didn't go very far. If people want to live in a high fire risk place, they should pay the price for insurance. Last year, during the fires, many of those people wouldn't even clear defensible space around their homes because they wanted to "live in the forest".

If you choose to build in a place where nature is almost sure to destroy your home, it should be on your own dime.

Mike
 
we spoke to our relatives in Houston today, they had power restored late afternoon today
I hope everyone that took a bad hit from this storm can move on now.
The little cousin was telling us theres good news and bad news from the storm.
He hasnt been in school yet. The bad news is that they are going to have to make it up at the end of the season.
 
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