2012年11月23日星期五

Hurricane Sandy

         Firstly, let's see a video about the Sandy:  
                                               < Hurricane Sandy's Intensity Fluctuates, Threatens East Coast States  >
 
 

 
    The Sandy was formed at October 22,2012 and dissipated at October 31, 2012.
 
 

How it move ?

      Hurricane Sandy began as a low pressure system which developed sufficient organized convection to be classified as a tropical depression on October 22 south of Kingston, Jamaica.It moved slowly at first due to a ridge to the north. Low wind shear and warm waters allowed for strengthening, and the system was namedTropical Storm Sandy late on October 22.[Early on October 24, an eye began developing, and it was moving steadily northward due to an approaching trough. Later that day, the NHC upgraded Sandy to hurricane status about 65 mi (105 km) south of Kingston, Jamaica.At about 1900 UTC that day, Sandy made landfall near Kingston with winds of about 80 mph (130 km/h). Just offshore Cuba, Sandy rapidly intensified to winds of 110 mph (175 km/h), and at that intensity it made landfall just west of Santiago de Cuba at 0525 UTC on October 25.
 
 
                                              
 
 
 
 

Some tables show the datas from Sandy

 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

How Will Hurricane Sandy Affect The Internet ?

 
     Hurricane Sandy is threatening the Eastern Seaboard, and meteorologists are predicting no mercy from the Category 1 storm’s rain and winds. Apart from the water and wind damage, hurricanes have a history of knocking out the tech that keeps us going.
     Datacenters are most critical. Housing hundreds of computers that power sites like Netflix and Dropbox, Amazon, Apple and Google all rely on these server farms. And we all rely on the cloud services they provide — Amazon’s cloud is powering at least one percent of the entire Internet.
     The servers, housed largely in Virginia and other high-intensity storm zones, have had a history of being taken down, but companies are feverishly working to fortify their centers before Sandy strikes.
     So if all goes well, those pinned down by the storm can keep busy on Pinterest and Reddit until Sandy blows away.




Full Impact of Sandy Not Yet Known


     Sandy more than justified the intense media hype in a shocking and growing list of ways that are still being measured.
     The storm was downgraded from hurricane status to cyclone by Tuesday morning, but it’s still causing damage and destruction across a wide swath of the mid-Atlantic and New England. President Obama declared parts of New York and New Jersey “major disaster areas,” which allows those states to get extra disaster relief funds. Video and photos of violent shorelines, flooded streets, inundated tunnels, and storm-related explosions and fires are only the first hints of the extent of the physical and financial toll, but the true magnitude of the storm’s impact won’t be known for weeks or months. At least 26 deaths in seven states have been attributed to the storm, and an estimated 60 million people have been or will be affected in some way by the time Sandy dissipates on its slow path north.
The numbers are terrifying and the images are shocking.
     More than fourteen million people throughout the affected region are without electricity so far, power outages are still rising, and it could take weeks to return service to all areas, according to supplier Con Edison. All of Manhattan below 40th Street lost power after a sub-station on 14th Street exploded. It’s the largest non-blackout outage in the history of Con Ed, according to the utility. Subway tunnels between Manhattan and Brooklyn are flooded, and it could be a week until New York’s subway system is back up to full service, said MTA chairman Joseph Lhota. “I can say unequivocally that the MTA faced a disaster as devastating as it has ever faced in its history,” he said. Coney Island looks like a flooded post-apocalyptic movie scene. Cities and towns all over New Jersey suffered extensive damage, and much of Atlantic City was underwater, its famous boardwalk torn apart. As of Tuesday morning, there’s no way for people to get out of Staten Island, although that was slowly changing by the early afternoon. In Queens, thousands of people needed to be rescued from their homes, including people in the Breezy Point and other sections of the Rockaways who live in some of an estimated 100-150 homes that burned in a few different neighborhoods, with fires spread unstoppably by the winds. The photos resemble something from a World War II reel.


Fire tore through parts of the Rockaways in Queens. Breezy Point looks like a war zone.


     “I’ve been listening to the Queens FDNY radio. They say that multiple homes have burned down on my old block,” said an off-duty firefighter, who requested anonymity because he’s not authorized to speak to the press. He doesn’t know if the house he grew up in is still standing. “They can barely report on what’s happening. The fire department units couldn’t even make it in. They pretty much gave up on some of the houses at one point – they don’t have enough rigs down there to get to them all.” NBC News posted a dramatic video of the fires that gives a sense of the scale of the devastation.


Remnants of a destroyed church in Breezy Point, in the Rockaways.


     One area where the impact has been felt not only nationwide, but worldwide, is air travel. Almost 14,000 flights were cancelled on Monday and Tuesday, and throughout the rest of the week – 15 percent of domestic air travel – leaving hundreds of thousands of travelers stranded or delayed, and resulting in a possible $600 million in lost revenue in business travel alone, according to some industry estimates. United, Delta, American, Jet Blue, and US Airways have all shut down their East Coast operations, according to ABC News. This all comes at a time when air travel costs are at record highs.
     “My flight just got cancelled again – I was originally supposed to leave Monday morning,” said Hephzibah Strmic-Pawl, a sociology professor at the College of Charleston, South Carolina who is stuck in Brooklyn at her brother’s home. “I have no idea how long I’m here for. It took my six hours to even get put on hold, then I was on hold for an hour and 45 minutes. I’m not looking forward to spending another day trying to get through.”
Some travelers were more fortunate than others. “I’m stuck in San Antonio,” said Dr. Yair Devash, who owns a biotech company in Princeton, New Jersey. But Devash, who grew up in Israel, decided to make the most of it, and took the opportunity on Monday to visit the Alamo. “I’m now going to the roots of America – and I know now that I will never shoot until I see the whites of their eyes. I’m happy I’m here instead of in Princeton.”
     He’s lucky as well. Simply put, Sandy is the worst storm to ever hit the tri-state area, and we don’t yet know quite how bad it is. Unfortunately, according to most climatologists, this may be the new normal, and it’s clear we’re unprepared.
     “I’ve been governor less than two years, and I’ve already had more extreme weather than my father had in 12,” said New York Governor Andrew Cuomo in an interview with WCBS radio Tuesday morning. “This is a new phenomenon. These are challenges that we have not faced in the past. It is the new reality.”