Actually, Irene was under-hyped
Light posting yesterday because I was riveted to the twitter trying to get news about what was happening in western MA and Vermont. The teevee was no help. All the news orgs were replaying the same footage on a continuous loop, mainly from New York and New Jersey. Meanwhile, Vermont and WMA was being rapidly destroyed by horrific flash floods.
I have friends all up and down the East Coast, but the great majority of them live in these places, so to say I was irritated by the lack of attention and the notion the hurricane was being overhyped while towns were drowning, would be significantly understating it. I even told some smug west coaster to F off for complaining about over-hyping instead of badly focused coverage. Which I never do.
Coverage is a little better today, but the internets still do it better. And since I collected all these links anyway, here's what you probably didn't see on the teevee.
In my old home town, Northampton, MA. The Mill River, Smith College's Paradise Pond dam. The water here is usually so far down into the ditch that you could break your neck if you fell down the hill.
Franklin County was hit worse. Not even old timers remember the water at the Shelburne Falls at Bridge of Flowers being this high. A slightly wider view and this appears to be when the river was cresting and took out a building on the main street.
Not so devastating, the Falls at Mt. Toby in Sunderland aren't usually so vigorous this time of year.
But the really horrifying impact was in Vermont. The entire state is pretty much destroyed by tiny streams that morphed into raging rivers in mere minutes. This was not the only car floating down river. This one was in Bennington VT.
And if I didn't still miss him so much, I would be glad my old friend Dave Shapiro didn't live to see his Village of Grafton being washed away. Guess I am glad he didn't have to live through it though.
But this was probably the one video that almost made me sob, even though I have no personal connection here. The Lower Bartonsville Covered Bridge washing away before our eyes. This bridge has been standing since 1760. It belonged to history. Now gone forever. RIP.
Finally, the latest videos of Vermont devastation are all just as sad. I know and love so many of these towns.
Meanwhile, in the Big Apple, where the jaded were blissfully unaware of the suffering up north and making jokes about all those emergency supplies they stood in line to buy and then never used, they enjoyed a remarkable post-hurricane sunset in NYC.
I have friends all up and down the East Coast, but the great majority of them live in these places, so to say I was irritated by the lack of attention and the notion the hurricane was being overhyped while towns were drowning, would be significantly understating it. I even told some smug west coaster to F off for complaining about over-hyping instead of badly focused coverage. Which I never do.
Coverage is a little better today, but the internets still do it better. And since I collected all these links anyway, here's what you probably didn't see on the teevee.
In my old home town, Northampton, MA. The Mill River, Smith College's Paradise Pond dam. The water here is usually so far down into the ditch that you could break your neck if you fell down the hill.
Franklin County was hit worse. Not even old timers remember the water at the Shelburne Falls at Bridge of Flowers being this high. A slightly wider view and this appears to be when the river was cresting and took out a building on the main street.
Not so devastating, the Falls at Mt. Toby in Sunderland aren't usually so vigorous this time of year.
But the really horrifying impact was in Vermont. The entire state is pretty much destroyed by tiny streams that morphed into raging rivers in mere minutes. This was not the only car floating down river. This one was in Bennington VT.
And if I didn't still miss him so much, I would be glad my old friend Dave Shapiro didn't live to see his Village of Grafton being washed away. Guess I am glad he didn't have to live through it though.
But this was probably the one video that almost made me sob, even though I have no personal connection here. The Lower Bartonsville Covered Bridge washing away before our eyes. This bridge has been standing since 1760. It belonged to history. Now gone forever. RIP.
Finally, the latest videos of Vermont devastation are all just as sad. I know and love so many of these towns.
Meanwhile, in the Big Apple, where the jaded were blissfully unaware of the suffering up north and making jokes about all those emergency supplies they stood in line to buy and then never used, they enjoyed a remarkable post-hurricane sunset in NYC.
Labels: Linkfest, Media, mother nature
posted by Libby Spencer at 3:34 PM
2 Comments:
my reaction to the comments about over-reaction by the media is that Yep, I sure hope it is. Otherwise, you're seeing irreparable damages like the ones you've show us, for which thanks, Libby.
Really Ruth. Better to be over-hyped than under prepared for these things. And coverage wasn't really so much over-hyped as it was overly repetitive and skewed towards only certain places. If they had moved around more to show the places were suffering damage rather than standing on the same damn piers showing what little damage there was, nobody would be bitching about over-hyping.
Also, too, thanks for the link at the Big Blue. One of these days I'm going to get that new computer and be able to hang out over there again. At least in the mornings where the AM crew still remembers me.
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