old people you’ve never met will shake your hand and say ‘you’ve got a lovely soft sweet hand. never shake hands with an orthopaedic surgeon’ like ok thanks amanda i’ll bear that in mind
Y’all in the American SW and west Mexico better check the national hurricane center and your weather for this weekend and next week.
Hurricane Hilary is about to make landfall and that whole desert area is supposed to get a years worth of rain or more. Death Valley is supposed to get twice the annual rainfall. Severe winds, massive flooding, and landslides are all strong possibilities.
This is gonna get ugly. Please spread the word. This is a majorly anomalous event and people may be unaware of the threat headed their way.
Flash floods are definitely gonna kill people, so here’s your regularly scheduled PSA:
Desert soil does not absorb a significant amount of water. It reaches maximum saturation very very quickly, and all the rest of the water rushes downhill. Even if you can’t tell that the ground is not perfectly flat, the water can. And it will move. Quickly. No, faster than that. Nope, still faster. If you try to cross moving floodwater, you will get swept downstream and probably die.
Do not try to wade in/cross flood water that is any deeper than the thickness of the sole of an average athletic shoe, no I am not kidding, the water will get deeper literally while you’re standing in it.
This goes for cars, too. I’ve seen entire vehicles getting swept downstream in flash floods because the driver thought they could cross the “puddle” and Found Out.
Stay safe, y’all.
also if you’re going into water intentionally (cleanup, obviously as things RECEDE), PROTECT YOUR EYES. Flood water is NASTY AS HELL and you will be getting a tetanus booster right off the bat if you end up in the ER for any reason.
all of this is good info. i’d like to tack on some additional tips that i haven’t seen floating around.
first, RIGHT NOW, go find a room in your dwelling that has neither external walls nor windows. don’t have one? then find a room with no windows that has the smallest amount of external wall. this location is going to be your storm room. make it comfy! our “storm room” in my childhood home was the hallway, since we didn’t have any windowless rooms; during hurricane charlie, we piled up blankets and pillows in the hall & ate up all the ice cream in the freezer so it wouldn’t melt when we lost power.
in addition to making it comfy, you are going to want to collect all of your important documents, put them in a water-tight container of some sort, and keep them with you in the storm room. it’s not impossible to replace stuff like your birth certificate or social security card, but it IS a pain in the ass.
now, during the storm, there are two things that will happen. you will lose POWER and you will lose CLEAN WATER. the former will absolutely happen before the latter, and if you are experiencing flooding, you will almost certainly lose clean water. i’ve seen a lot of hurricane shopping lists floating around, but i haven’t seen much in the way of explanations for each item, so i have provided some of my own.
for loss of power, you need:
-light sources that are either battery-powered or completely analog. candles are a classic, but since they are also literally an open flame, they can make your dwelling warm & without AC to cool it off, you ought to have alternatives. flashlights are another classic, alongside a good ol’ battery-operated radio lamp.
-speaking of a radio, you should probably have one of those as well. if your phone dies you’ll need some way to access the news, so you can hear updates about the storm. since y'all are expecting extreme flooding, this is even more important.
-speaking of PHONES, you’ll almost certainly want one of those portable battery pack/charger things. charge your phone and other devices all the way and avoid using them for non-essential shit once the storm hits.
-if you have a generator, make sure it’s in good working order & get some fuel for it. you should also fill up your car’s gas tank if you can. you won’t necessarily have access to a working gas station after the storm is gone.
-shelf-stable food that does not need to be cooked or heated in order to be edible (and enjoyable). most canned food can be eaten at room temperature, but remember that you will not be able to cook ANYTHING once your power goes out, unless you have a gas-powered stove, and those are becoming increasingly less common. choose food that you know you can and WILL eat lukewarm.
-i also advise that you get some perishable food items that don’t need to be refrigerated. hard fruits like apples, or fruits with a peel like oranges and clementines, are good choices here, but as long as you know you’ll eat it before it goes bad, you’re definitely in the clear. and in the days before the storm hits, make sure to cook and eat as much of your refrigerated and frozen food as you can! it’s a double-whammy; you’re avoiding food waste AND giving yourself a delicious meal before a scary storm :)
for loss of clean water, you need:
-bottled water. if you can’t drink the tap water, even with a water filter, you’ll need an alternate source.
-i’ve seen some folks recommend that you also fill up your tub with clean tap water before the storm, and use that water for non-drinking purposes, such as bathing. definitely do this, especially if you aren’t able to get bottled water or are concerned about the duration of a water outage! (you can use other liquid receptacles as well – fill up all your reusable water bottles with filtered water.)
-but i also recommend that you also get skin-safe cleaning wipes and hand sanitizer, so that you have the freedom to use your water supply sparingly for non-drinking purposes. the last thing you want is to run out of water before you have access to clean water again.
Make sure you’ve got shelf-stable food and water for everyone in the house, including pets. The rule of thumb is a gallon per person per day. Freeze water bottles if you want cold water.
Make sure you have enough meds!
Make sure you have batteries, candles, flashlights, and a manual can opener.
Make sure your electronics, including backup batteries, are charged. Unplug things you don’t want fried in case of a power surge.
Don’t tape your windows, it doesn’t help and you’ll just be stuck scrubbing goo off of them later.
Put a mug of frozen water in it in your freezer with a quarter on top of it. If your freezer defrosts, the ice will melt and the quarter will sink and tell you you need to throw things out.
Get everything that’s not nailed to a foundation out of your yard. That dead branch hanging on by a thread? Time to get it down (it was probably time to do that three days ago, but now’s better than never).
Park away from powerlines and trees if you can. Rain makes the ground soft and then trees fall over.
Have an evacuation plan to a shelter. Evacuate if they’re telling you to.
If you start to flood, don’t go in your attic. You’ll get trapped if the water rises too high and you can’t hack through your roof. This happened to a lot of people in Texas and Louisiana. Get ON the roof.
Be safe, be well <3
What the fuck?
???? WHAT???
Ngl, “tropical storm in death valley” was not on my 2023 bingo card.
Drainage on our roads is shitty in SoCal, don’t attempt to drive through water deep enough to touch your bumpers and don’t attempt to walk across moving water, water only as deep as your ankles can knock you down and sweep you away.
Predicted wind speeds are similar to strong Santa Anas, so lock things down like you would for that, though keep in mind that yeah the combination of heavy rain and wind leads to more felled trees than just wind.
Take photos of the inside of your home now; flood insurance fucking sucks here and if you’re in a possible flood zone you want as much documentation of your home and belongings as possible in case you need to make a claim.
Freezing water bottles also means you’ve got a lot of ice in your freezer if power goes out, and safe potable water once it thaws, so freeze bottles of water to have something to keep your fridge and freezer cool and store more water regardless of if you want cold water.
did you refer to your high school as just “*name* high” like they do in the movies like “east high” or “sky high” or did you always add “school” to the end of it
Apparently the first hurricane since 1939 is expected to make landfall in California this weekend. It’s expected that an entire year’s worth of rain will fall in 24-48hrs. Don’t you love climate change?
It’s expected that the hurricane will weaken to a tropical storm before making landfall in Southern California.
Still, as someone who lives in LA, this is deeply concerning. Anyone who lives in Los Angeles knows that the city is DEEPLY unprepared to handle any amount of rain, let alone a TROPICAL STORM. The tiniest amounts of rainfall cause floods in LA, because the city has no drainage systems in place. I’ve seen DRIZZLES cause floods. It takes so little rain to flood LA.
If a tropical storm truly does make landfall in LA, it will have a devastating effect on the city’s very large unhoused population. LA (along with NYC) has the biggest unhoused population in the United States, and these people will be stuck on the flooded streets.
*has video game open* hm i dont feel like playing this right now actually *closes it* man i wish i was playing video game right now *opens it again* hm i dont feel like playing this right now actually *closes it
