2017 Catch All thread

[Balta1701]

Hope that you have a pump and sand bags ready.

 

Do they have many homes with basements in Texas?

Virtually no one in this area has a basement due to high water tables. I'm pretty far uphill from the ocean and away from the main drainages, so i don't think my place is going to be in real jeopardy even from 20+ inches, but this will be a good test about whether or not I need to buy flood insurance.

 

The scariest model run I've seen came out this morning - it has the first landfall tonight, followed by the storm being pushed back out over the unusually warm waters of the Gulf where it re-intensifies into a category 3 and then makes a second landfall in Houston as a Category 3. Houston is your disaster waiting to happen - years of unchecked development, inadequate flood control systems, every time someone paves an area to build a parking lot it makes the next flood worse, huge amounts of exposed infrastructure, plans for $10 billion+ flood control levees sitting on people's desks after Hurricane Ike waiting for someone to pay for them.

 

I've got enough colleagues down in Houston that if it came to it I could offer rooms for them while fleeing. I'll also get to see if I keep internet and power this weekend, if so I'll chime in to say hi now and then.

[Balta1701]

I can't recall anything like this one before. They have had much bigger storms go through, like Ike about a decade ago, but if things stalls like it being forecast they are going to be in big trouble with the sheer amount of rain.

Ike came ashore only slightly stronger in sustained winds than where Harvey currently is and was about a $30 billion disaster. Ike also missed the main Houston ship channel enough to keep it alive. A category 2 or 3 that hits the main estuary is a potential Sandy level disaster.

[knightni]

Virtually no one in this area has a basement due to high water tables. I'm pretty far uphill from the ocean and away from the main drainages, so i don't think my place is going to be in real jeopardy even from 20+ inches, but this will be a good test about whether or not I need to buy flood insurance.

 

The scariest model run I've seen came out this morning - it has the first landfall tonight, followed by the storm being pushed back out over the unusually warm waters of the Gulf where it re-intensifies into a category 3 and then makes a second landfall in Houston as a Category 3. Houston is your disaster waiting to happen - years of unchecked development, inadequate flood control systems, every time someone paves an area to build a parking lot it makes the next flood worse, huge amounts of exposed infrastructure, plans for $10 billion+ flood control levees sitting on people's desks after Hurricane Ike waiting for someone to pay for them.

 

I've got enough colleagues down in Houston that if it came to it I could offer rooms for them while fleeing. I'll also get to see if I keep internet and power this weekend, if so I'll chime in to say hi now and then.

We had a heavy rain a few years ago that even though we were miles from water, it saturated the ground so fully that it leaked right into our home.

 

Hopefully, with no basement, that, you should be safe from any damage.

[Balta1701]

We had a heavy rain a few years ago that even though we were miles from water, it saturated the ground so fully that it leaked right into our home.

 

Hopefully, with no basement, that, you should be safe from any damage.

House sits on a concrete slab. We don't get water until the entire drainage pond near us overflows.

[southsider2k5]

Ike came ashore only slightly stronger in sustained winds than where Harvey currently is and was about a $30 billion disaster. Ike also missed the main Houston ship channel enough to keep it alive. A category 2 or 3 that hits the main estuary is a potential Sandy level disaster.

 

I actually rode out Alica in 1983. Supposedly Alica and Rita did nothing compared to what Ike did. On a recent trip through that part of the state I was shocked how much of the Bolivar Pennisula was abandoned, and even how much of Galveston never got rebuilt.

 

Alica and Ike both hit a bit further south, while Rita more more towards the LA state line. This storm will be well south of all of them for landfall.

[Balta1701]

I actually rode out Alica in 1983. Supposedly Alica and Rita did nothing compared to what Ike did. On a recent trip through that part of the state I was shocked how much of the Bolivar Pennisula was abandoned, and even how much of Galveston never got rebuilt.

 

Alica and Ike both hit a bit further south, while Rita more more towards the LA state line. This storm will be well south of all of them for landfall.

Assuming there is only 1.

[southsider2k5]

Assuming there is only 1.

 

It would be pretty crazy to get it to go out to deep enough water and repower enough to push a storm surge again and have it then turn back around again towards the Galveston area. I know the rainfall amounts are going to be crazy from the storm stalling, but as of earlier today Jim Cantore made it sound like only the European model pushed it back out to the Gulf far enough to regroup, but that it would make landfall much further (like west LA) east the second time.

[southsider2k5]

Just spotted my first funnel cloud in real life. It was short lived and never hit the ground, but wow what a rush!

[knightni]

Hurricane Irma out in the Atlantic is already a category 3.

 

Looks to be heading toward the Eastern Seaboard.

 

 

 

[Middle Buffalo]

My 2nd Generation iPod Nano finally died. I've had it since shortly after it was released (I think I got it in '06 or '07). It didn't hold much (4GB), but it was a great device for a long time. I can't even begin to estimate how many miles I walked and ran or how many hours I played songs and podcasts on the thing, but I definitely got plenty of return on my investment.

[bmags]

Hopefully nobody works at 77 w wacker. There is a chlorine gas leak. My wife was just evacuated. 6 people are hospitalized.

[Middle Buffalo]

Two things I can always count on when I click on the comments below any article I read online:

1) No matter the subject, race will immediately be injected into the conversation;

2) Someone will type "your" stupid, a moron, an idiot, etc. Gotta love the internet.

[RockRaines]

This storm has cause a little seepage under a wall in my basement. Anything I can do or just fans and call someone later?

[smalls2598]

This storm has cause a little seepage under a wall in my basement. Anything I can do or just fans and call someone later?

When I lived in Westchester, I would always get seepage in my basement on the south side of the house. Since we wanted to sell that house, we had US Waterproofing come out to look at it, and they found a few cracks that needed to be filled. I think it ended up costing us something like $3000, which sucked, but I wanted it done properly because we were selling.

 

If you are interested, I can look up the name of the guy who I worked with at US Waterproofing. They were super nice and not pushy at all.

[Jenksismyhero]

This storm has cause a little seepage under a wall in my basement. Anything I can do or just fans and call someone later?

 

The obvious: make sure you've got good grading away from your house on that side. Less obvious: make sure your downspouts or your sump pump discharge pipe are pushing the water away from the house (if you have anything like that on that side). Even if the grade is good, if there's enough water being discharged at one spot near the house, it could seep in that way, especially if the earth gets really saturated.

 

When we first moved into our place we would get some seepage in our basement right below the main sewer line going out of the house. It would require a massive storm like this weekend or a particularly rainy spell, like 3-4 days straight. It took me a while to figure out, but basically our sump pump ejected the water outside in the same area as the sewer line. The prior owner had buried a drain pipe to go out a few feet from the house, but when I dug it up I found that 1) it was only like 3 feet long and 2), it was cracked. So basically the sump pump would spit out water and it would just pool right there next to the house. Putting a longer drain on it fixed the problem.

 

[RockRaines]

Yeah I’m thinking I need to pull he down spouts out of the ground over on that side when it rains that bad.

[bmags]

How will your neighbors feel about that?

[Soxbadger]

http://amp.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/201...lawyer_dog.html

 

Police are trying to argue when defendant asked for "attorney, dog" he meant "attorney dog" as in an actual dog that was an attorney.

[RockRaines]

I hate people referring to stuffed pizza as "chicago style". If you want chicago style I can show you cracker crust, tavern style, pan, deep dish and finally stuffed. And I guarantee the stuffed will be your least favorite.

[Jenksismyhero]

http://amp.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/201...lawyer_dog.html

 

Police are trying to argue when defendant asked for "attorney, dog" he meant "attorney dog" as in an actual dog that was an attorney.

 

Even though I know not every Judge is the smartest person in the world, i'm consistently amazed how smart people make really stupid decisions.

[bmags]

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/07/obituari...dies-at-96.html

 

What an obit.

[Brian]

Aaron Swartz would have been 31 today. May he RIP.

 

That documentary on him was great

[iamshack]

Aaron Swartz would have been 31 today. May he RIP.

Thanks for mentioning this.

 

Will definitely check out the documentary.

[Jose Abreu]

Portillo's delivers now!

[soxsoxsoxsox]

Portillo's delivers now!

 

5$ fee + driver tip though