They had more than 24 hours notice, and had they been two miles inland would have been safe. Why were people in range of the storm surge at the time the storm hit? There shouldn’t have been any casualties.
Part of the evolutionary process is survival of individuals who are willing to put in the effort to protect themselves.
It is exactly the same problem illustrated by Katrina. People who live in Hurricane country get used to them. There are even bragging rights for staying in your house during a hurricane. And 9 times out of 10 it works just fine, the hurricane isn’t that big or it glances past or it comes ashore at low tide, etc. But there is another factor as well; it is incredible how many people are stupid and/or woefully uninformed. Many of those stranded in New Orleans were “surprised” at how bad it was. We all watched the TV from hundreds of miles away and heard the warnings but many of these people were watching gangsta TV or American Idol or whatever and never really understood the risk. I have gone through the eye of a cat 3 hurricane just a 100 yards from the gulf coast with no problems except when I went outside I got wet. I have sat at the beach throughout the entire onslaught of a hurricane for 8 hours and all I got was wet. It really took Katrina to convince me the only right choice is to evacuate.
My father used to shake his head over the hurricane parties that took the lives of so many when Camille struck. His father was credited with saving many lives during a hurricane in Central America, by using his radio transmitter to warn the locals and getting them away from the coast.
Nagin could have saved many lives had he only listened to the warnings he was given. I will never forget the pictures of the parking lots of submerged school buses he could have used to transport those who had no transportation. Had I lived in the lower ninth ward, I would have walked out if necessary.
People who pay rent and taxes get lazy. They think it is always someone else’s job to take care of them. One more reason why I hate cities, and moved out here many years ago.
Mortality figures may in fact be as low as 2500, it seems.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-24920250
24 hour rolling news demands 24 hour rolling hysteria.
I’ve known to get out since September 22, 1989
I left Charleston as well.
People needed to move, but where could they go?
As GWTW notes and survivors of the typhoon have said, they’ve been through these storns before, head indoors, batten down the hatches, you may lose a few tiles, but you won’t get wet.
This time, The Big Bad Wolf did blow the house down.
“Part of the evolutionary process is survival of individuals who are willing to put in the effort to protect themselves.”
It used to be, until the rise of the progressive agenda, which put all this into reverse. Now big government will take care of everything for you, and you don’t need to think (or worse) act for yourself. You just have to feel.
I remember after the bush fires in Canberra about 10 years ago, a TV reporter was interviewing a distraught group of people standing in the smouldering ashes – and all they had to say was: “Nobody told us what to do. We kept waiting for someone to tell us what to do.” Mind you, this is the Peoples’ Democratic and Autonomous Republic of Canberra we are talking about here – but it illustrates the point.
As it currently stands, there is zero future for the human race – I’m not sure where it currently stands on the extinction list, but it must be inching closer to the top by the day.
I don’t believe we are heading for extinction; man has always learned the hard way, and learning is the point. But all the hardheads ARE leading mankind towards war.
The more hysteria you can create, the more viewers you have and the higher your ratings. Hence, you can charge higher prices to the advertisers. This is how modern media works. The truth is of little interest when maximizing your earnings is the only goal.
At 18, I was forced to ride out Carla in 1961 with my family on the northeast side of Houston. Amidst thee East Texas pines, we boarded up our windows and laid in supplies. The sound and fury were incredible even though winds had subsided somewhat from Category 4 speeds 35 miles from the coast. As it came in we lost the roof tiles off one side of the house, the eye past over, and we lost most of the roof tiles on the other side. I watched through cracks in the boards and saw objects zooming down the street at incredible speeds. The trees protected us from impacts, I guess. One news shot I have never forgotten showed a cabin cruiser perched on someone’s roof miles inland.
The death toll was low, 43, because there was little population along the coast and most people knew to get out of there. Today, that would not be the case. Cities have sprung up there and many would probably look like Tacloba.
The news reader for channel nine here in Australia opened with the words ( apocalypse now) I said to the misses I din,t see any horses sarc/ a typhoon in the Philippines’ is the end of the world fair go.
“Part of the evolutionary process is survival of individuals who are willing to put in the effort to protect themselves.”
#realscience #politicallyincorrect
Bullshit. For these people riding out the storm was their way of protecting themselves. If you abandon your dwelling in a shanty town not only are you sure to lose all of your possessions (and essentially your future, as whatever small material you have accumulated accounts for your ability to leave a life of poverty), but you are also entering into a very dangerous situation, especially if you are with children. There was no government evacuation plan for these people, so there was no shelter for them to leave home and seek refuge in. Further, it is exactly the kind of “government intervention in life” that you deplore which could have potentially saved thousands of lives here; that is, were structures in place to house fleeing citizens and security forces deployed to dispel looters, people surely would have left their dwellings. Instead, they did all they were capable of doing, which was standing their ground and trying not to lose the little well-being they had. For you to characterize these victims as unintelligent and falling prey to natural selection is hugely inaccurate and also immoral. Here’s a comparable situation that maybe you can better relate to: you live on a lake. The lake is going to flood, so you’ve heard, however you don’t know exactly how severely or when exactly. Do you abandon your shed, where you store your countless assault rifles, scores of climate change denying articles, that special bat you use to beat homosexuals, that less special one you use to beat your wife, and the one your granddad used to beat blacks a few decades ago? Or do you ride it out, as these items constitute your livelihood? I bet you wouldn’t go.
Clearly the dysfunctional social state there is due to excess CO2.
Or maybe it’s due to the influence of post-globalization corporations that benefit from a constant global underclass that loves nothing more than to work in a garment factory for 2 Dollars a day. Maybe it’s due to the long-term effects of American Imperialism in the region that haven’t allowed the nation to develop independent of western interest. Even more, maybe it’s because they’re all brown people, so they must be stupid, right? That’s why manifest destiny was carried out so flawlessly was it not? They might not even believe in Jesus! Or maybe they don’t salute the rebel flag every time they see it on the cover of a country music album! This tragedy is merely god responding to their horrible sins against the divine xenophobic values of the GOP!
Now who sounds full of shit.
People born without an understanding of sarcasm normally become spam here very quickly.
You tolerate a lot worse than a lack of recognition of sarcasm when you agree with the point.
Conscious Citizen, two points to make. First, If had a “dwelling” in a shanty town. I would probably have no problems gathering all my “riches” and fleeing inland two miles to avoid the storm surge. Second, you can have all the Government you want and it wont make a damn difference. A number of years back there was a storm called Katrina. Despite all the warnings days before the landfall there was a sizable group of idiots who knowing they live in a city that should technically be underwater decided to stay. Then idiots like yourself blame GWB and not your shitty local leftist government.
“There was no government evacuation plan for these people”
That isn’t true. Philippines evacuated over 800,000 people ahead of the storm. Many of those who stayed had the option of evacuation. That city isn’t THAT third world. The area around Biloxi is more backward than Tacloban city.
You might just lock the door and padlock it, and then you walk 2 miles to safety. Bring the wife and kids.
Try reading actual accounts of this typhoon. Local government and military vehicles were used to place people at evacuation centers. The death toll for Tacloban was actually pretty low for that large a population center. The biggest problem most have is there is nothing to return to. Meanwhile, they do have cell phone and internet service being restored and many carried away their prized cell phones and other gadgets. There is video showing people using phones while standing in food and water lines and wandering the streets. I also noticed signs advertising wifi, including a sign on the front of a bus.
To get to the current 2,200 you have to add up casualties from all over the group of islands there. In major catastrophes in the U.S. there are also those who insist on staying. In some cases they never find the bodies of these idiots.
The real problem is in getting help to this population because the infrastructure has been heavily damaged. We haven’t done any better after hurricanes run over population centers in the U.S. Let’s see how we deal with the next Cat 4 or 5 hurricane to make landfall. Assuming that we get one in the next 15 years, people will have forgotten the lessons we older people have learned and many will lose their lives by ignoring history.
Well, lets not forget these are shantytowns. no TV. no Internet. Likely no radio. I suspect many weren’t aware. However, the Govt could have easily sent out town criers to warn the public. And surely some would ignore the warning.
The proponents of AGW want the maximum number of casualties possible.
And shantytowns.
Actually most, if not everyone, in the Philippines has at least one TV and several radios. Many also have Internet and cellphones: Twitter and Facebook are quite big there among the youth.
If you live in a shantytown, and you leave your “house” for an extended period of time, you have a good chance of returning to an empty “house”. So you stay, and risk it.
Cuba has been remarkably successful at dealing with hurricanes (typically a handful of deaths when neighboring countries might have hundreds or even thousands): 1) there are evacuation centers that are built with concrete; 2) evacuations are mandatory; 3) looters risk being shot on sight.
India was also successful in dealing with the recent Cyclone Phailin:
http://devconsultancygroup.blogspot.ca/2013/10/washington-post-major-disaster-averted.html
A further post about Cyclone Phailin in India. Villagers were strongly encouraged to move at least 10km from the coast.
http://devconsultancygroup.blogspot.ca/2013/10/meet-hero-of-ganjam-eye-of-cyclone.html
Interesting, not a single response to the one logical argument made here.
You are absolutely right. It is better to die than lose your few worthless possessions.
Steve, you ever even been to a developing country beyond a port of call or brothel ,or is it unpatriotic to live there for awhile? You don’t have a clue what life is likeout side your lilly white, lucky born cocoon.
Conscious Citizen, you got my attention. Nice to see some literacy here. Check out my comment just below. Nice to see I am not the only one here turning the kitchen light on once in a while to break up the party.
Perhaps you two highly intellectual people can convince each other that drowning was the right choice for those Filipinos.
I am planning on going to Margaritaville for Thanksgiving, but don’t plan to advise the locals to stay on the beach during major hurricanes.
What argument? A hurricane is coming, they chose to stay and try to hold onto their stuff. For some, that wasn’t a very good choice, as Steve notes. We all make choices, and we all live and die by them.
It sucks for them. I wish it hadn’t happened to them. Maybe next time, some will make a judgement that their life is worth more than their shanty. I really fail to see why you’re attacking Steve over this. Are you people upset that Steve understands they had warning? Are you upset at the Philippine govt? Are you having a Bush flashback? No evac plan? You think that was the first ever typhoon to hit there? What is it that you’re so upset about? Is Steve not rending his shirt and crying to Gaia for forgiveness enough?
Steve, yesterday you were making an issue of the high body count being nothing unusual compared to the past. Can’t have anyone getting away with suggesting that a high body count might be a hint of global warming. Today you get in a whack of your Tea Party politics saying the high body count was due to stupid people being too stupid to get out of the way of the storm. Now that the body count seems to be down considerably, maybe a retraction is in order that there weren’t as many stupid people as you first presumed.
For me as an American, I was proud to know the U.S Navy was there in force providing a great deal of aid. You probably think that is a waste of American taxpayer money.
Is you mind really as disordered as you pretend it to be?
See what I mean about war? The wearing of itchy, scratchy hair shirts, and blaming others, seems all the rage now.
Well, it is not so complicated. Steve did not call them stupid, or say they were dumber then anyone else The sad and simple fact is, the next time, if it happens within ten years or so, they will leave. however if there are 15 more warnings, and each time no one who stays dies, then warning will be more and more ignored.
So this natural, non CAGW disaster happens, and people once again die who ignored the warnings. Steve makes a post pointing that out, so that maybe some readers will, if they are ever in a similar situation, leave, or warn friends in such a situation to leave.
And two leftist political ideologues scream insensitive tea baggers, make blind and not relevant assertions about how dishonest the Filipino society is, and insult anyone who disagrees. Sadly they then compliment each other on their brilliance.
Most of this story is a “Wag the Dog” diversion to focus attention away from Odumbo and his lies.
Those who build on the beach in a known hurricane zone are just asking to have their home or business washed away. I have an old friend who’s family has had a beach shack on the outer banks since the Civil War. Its a shack because ever decade or two a hurricane comes along and cleans off the beach. They go build another shack. Now the neighbors all own large expensive modern homes and will expect the government to pay when the hurricane comes and cleans them off.