Hurricane Irene

[mplevy]

There are whole towns that were wiped off the map in the Catskills and Schoharie River valley. Come on up here where there was localized amounts of 13 inches plus of rain. Tell those affected that it was "just a tropical storm" You sound very naive, my friend. Pay less attention to the news that tells everyone it was no big deal, and more to the fact that there are still people who cannot find their homes. At all. I think that comparing damage amounts like this reeks of classlessness. There is no way that the total will be that low. They can't even get to certain spots to estimate damage. There are literally 5 state roads within 10 minutes of me that are either closed, completely decimated but still in use, or gone. Meaning start over from scratch building them, gone. And I don't live where the damage was too severe.

100% agree. My area (within a 10-mile radius of me, I'm just North of Albany) got off easy from this. Many of us in my area were VERY lucky to get away with ONLY power outages and minimal water damage, but we're also at ~300' ASL and outside the main river valleys. Down by the rivers is just destroyed. They're still talking about a possible dam failure (Poestenkill dam in Troy, NY) a week later. The main interstates between Albany and Syracuse (I-90 directly to Syracuse, I-88 to Binghamton) were closed until Wed., the Mohawk river canal system is closed until further notice due to debris and lock/flood control gate damage, Champlain canal is closed until further notice and much of the eastern section of the Adirondacks is inaccessible or too dangerous to go into and is closed as a result.

This was certainly nothing to sneeze at for many people, as some are trying to say. What bothers me is that FEMA had to stop taking new claims for Katrina damage to be able to help those in need up here. Katrina was, what, 6 years ago and people are STILL making NEW claims? No wonder FEMA can't help everyone trying to make claims now, they're still helping people from 6 years ago that haven't made a claim yet.

A locally-based supermarket chain (Price Chopper, run by the Golub corporation) is raising money to help the Red Cross help those put out by this storm and is matching the first $10,000 (already met). This same company did a similar thing for the earthquake in Haiti, Katrina in NO and for 9/11 before that. Is anyone else seeing this in their area? Would be nice to know if they are, this area steps up to help others, would be nice to hear about a little reciprocation when we have people going through the same thing.

 

[330D]

For all those non believers. This is about 40 miles from Albany. It is a thruway bridge underpass for state route 5s. A man died here. The schoharie creek is a half mile away and the water was about 10 feet deep at it's highest. This is just the first emergency repair job I have been sent to. The bridge is closed because the abutment is just about gone.