Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Pat on June 28, 2012 at 7:26pm

Southern Illinois here. On Leap Day this year, Harrisburg, Illinois, had an EF4 tornado go through and flattened the city. I live less than an hour's drive from there. In addition, I live in the New Madrid earthquake fault zone, which was the largest earthquake recorded in the contiguous 48 states in 1812. The Good Friday earthquake in Alaska in 1964 was larger, but by comparison to where I live, the San Francisco earthquake of 1906 was smaller. I've been in several earthquakes and about 3 tornadoes.

Should I move? OK. But please find a location for me on our geologically active planet where there is no violent upheavals or weather. Where I live, I need not worry about tsunamis, volcanoes, hurricanes, landslides, or monsoons. Drought, blizzards, floods - been there and done that. So, where do you move to avoid nature?

Permalink Reply by Loren Miller on June 28, 2012 at 7:32pm

I'm told the moon is pretty devoid of weather, and no noxious neighbors, either ... but it's probably a pretty serious commute to work!

Frankly, I still like Cleveland, snow and all.

Permalink Reply by Pat on June 28, 2012 at 7:40pm

Hmmmm, Mare Tranquillitatis. Can I phone in or email my reports. Been looking for a place to be a hermit. Then again, there are meteoroids. Awww, crap. Guess I'll stay where I'm at. Besides, the "all you can eat" catfish dinners with hush puppies are pretty good here.

Permalink Reply by sk8eycat on June 28, 2012 at 8:44pm

You're absolutely right.  This planet is "alive," and maybe the moon has no weather, but it does have quakes.  (Ask Loren to tell you about Heinlein's short story titled "Gentlemen, Be Seated." It's a classic.)

Oh, and commuting via email has a 3-second round trip speed-of-light time lag.

Permalink Reply by Ruth Anthony-Gardner on June 28, 2012 at 11:27pm

Most locations have some hazards. You get it from the sky and below. *cringe* Yellowstone is a supervolcano that's been rising. If it blows more than half the country goes with it. At least you're not sitting on that too.

Permalink Reply by Lillie on June 29, 2012 at 9:01am

If the Yellowstone volcano goes off, we are all doomed.

Permalink Reply by booklover on June 28, 2012 at 8:34pm

Yep.  Northern IL.  We go into the basement quite often with our pets, meds, and flashlights.

Permalink Reply by Peter Nothnagle on June 28, 2012 at 10:28pm

Here's a picture I took after a tornado ripped through my town, Iowa City, Iowa, in 2006. 

Permalink Reply by Ruth Anthony-Gardner on June 28, 2012 at 11:32pm

That must have been a scary experience. Here in eastern PA people don't take tornado warnings seriously enough. We go into our basement with a radio and flashlights until the all clear, but almost everybody else just goes about their business as if nothing is happening. But then sometimes I see the public just ignoring fire alarms too, as if they have no brains. It's happened twice at our gym. People just keep exercising, as if they won't take it seriously unless they actually see smoke, by which time it may be a tad late.

Permalink Reply by Peter Nothnagle on June 28, 2012 at 11:47pm

The thing about fire alarms is, surely 99% of the time they are false.  I often wonder if on a strictly cost-benefit basis, when a fire alarm goes off, maybe the fire department should just send one truck "normal response", instead of three trucks going lights-and-sirens.  Almost every time, that would be more than an adequate response, and much safer!

But here, at least, the tornado warnings are activated manually at the county emergency communications center, and when one sounds, you know that there really is a tornado in the vicinity.  But even then, it is extremely unlikely that a tornado that might have been seen or detected on radar somewhere within 30 miles will actually hit my house.

In that 2006 storm, we actually had a number of tornadoes go through the town -- the first time in history -- but all that I got at my house was some little bits of pink fiberglass insulation that ominously dropped out of the sky.  Quite a few houses and major structures were damaged or destroyed, however, as well as a lot of trees.  Since then, I've gotten very conscientious about watching the weather!

Permalink Reply by Ruth Anthony-Gardner on July 1, 2012 at 9:53am

I wouldn't count on "watching" for a tornado when there's a tornado warning. Unlike Hollywood portrayals, in real life by the time people actually see the funnel it may be too late to get to shelter, because they move so fast. I lost the article which described waiting to see the tornado as a chief cause of tornado fatality.

Permalink Reply by Ruth Anthony-Gardner on July 1, 2012 at 11:40am

A false alarm rate of 10% is considered high.

But the high number of false alarms means that about one in 10 of the emergency calls from monitored fire alarms is a waste of time, according to Denver Fire Department reports going back to 2001 obtained through a Colorado Open Records Act request.

High Rate of False Fire Alarms Plagues Denver

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