Adjustment for inflation, Motherfarker, did you do it?!

The bit about the variety was pertinent, and a lot of those disasters were truly awful, but when costs are compared over a span of 40 years, they had better be adjusted to a common scale.

Not to mention that a bunch of them are "tornadoes that hit cities instead of just running through relatively empty countryside."

Then there's the flood in the upper Midwest and the Mississippi flooding - which were mostly caused or made worse by runoff from the blizzard.

What about the Virginia earthquake?

/never forget

This is surely Obama's Katrina, times 12!!!

Southeast/Midwest...Southeast/Midwest...Southeast/Midwest...Southeast/ Midwest... Gee, if I were a more closed-minded Godly man, I'd think that the people of the Southeast/Midwest have somehow managed to collectively piss off the grand creator.

wow, God must really want to send a message to politicians for spending to much money.

Insurance company cost estimates, no doubt.

/That Home Depot pallisade fence? $50,000.

I see my question about price adjustments over the years has already been brought up.. so..meh?

In re: Flooding.
This is what happens when you replace prairie, forest and wetland with suburban tract homes, strip malls, and highways.

Every single building and parking lot is like covering that area permanently with a tarp; the water runs off into storm sewers, then into creeks and streams and rivers, overwhelming them with volume. The flooding gets worse the further you go down the watershed. All that rain isn't allowed to soak into the ground and become absorbed by the trees and other vegetation.

We control nature, nature controls us back.

/Nature will win, eventually.

HotIgneous Intruder: In re: Flooding.
This is what happens when you replace prairie, forest and wetland with suburban tract homes, strip malls, and highways.

Every single building and parking lot is like covering that area permanently with a tarp; the water runs off into storm sewers, then into creeks and streams and rivers, overwhelming them with volume. The flooding gets worse the further you go down the watershed. All that rain isn't allowed to soak into the ground and become absorbed by the trees and other vegetation.

We control nature, nature controls us back.

/Nature will win, eventually.

Prety much the story around here. They drained all the low areas put up housing and when we had nearly 30 some odd days of rain in 2 months they were baffeld by the flooding in the homes.

Starry Heavens: Adjustment for inflation, Motherfarker, did you do it?!

The bit about the variety was pertinent, and a lot of those disasters were truly awful, but when costs are compared over a span of 40 years, they had better be adjusted to a common scale.

They Did.

Link (new window)

With an almost biblical onslaught of twisters, floods, snow, drought, heat and wildfire, the U.S. in 2011 has seen more weather catastrophes that caused at least $1 billion in damage than it did in all of the 1980s, even after the dollar figures from back then are adjusted for inflation.

HotIgneous Intruder: We control nature, nature controls us back.

/Nature will win, eventually.

True, of course. But if you keep it up, this kind of talk might summon canyoneer... and nobody wants that, man. Not even him.

Starry Heavens:
Adjustment for inflation, Motherfarker, did you do it?!

The bit about the variety was pertinent, and a lot of those disasters were truly awful, but when costs are compared over a span of 40 years, they had better be adjusted to a common scale.

darkscout:
They Did.

Yes, they did. They adjusted for inflation, so they could use a new measure of "disaster scaling" that they never really used before.

Up until this year, it was always "total damage done." That way, they could complain about how "weather is getting worse because disasters cost more." When we didn't have a year with a really huge disaster (like Katrina), they changed the measuring scale to "number of disasters over $1 billion".

For the last couple of decades, the "common scale" was total damage. Now, the "common scale" is changing because they didn't have enough big ones. Of course, the next time we get a big hurricane landfall and not many others, they'll go back to the old one.

It's funny - they tied this news release to a "NOAA needs more money" pitch, while admitting that almost none of the disasters could have been predicted or prevented by anything they could have done - tornado outbreaks accounted for over half, and regular old bad weather (blizzards and tropical storms) were a lot of the rest. And they never could predict droughts at all...

darkscout: Starry Heavens: Adjustment for inflation, Motherfarker, did you do it?!

The bit about the variety was pertinent, and a lot of those disasters were truly awful, but when costs are compared over a span of 40 years, they had better be adjusted to a common scale.

They Did.

Link (new window)

With an almost biblical onslaught of twisters, floods, snow, drought, heat and wildfire, the U.S. in 2011 has seen more weather catastrophes that caused at least $1 billion in damage than it did in all of the 1980s, even after the dollar figures from back then are adjusted for inflation.

Well, there's so much more money now than there was in the 1980s.
That's what, a week's worth of Afghanistan war invoices?

Mr_Fabulous: HotIgneous Intruder: We control nature, nature controls us back.

/Nature will win, eventually.

True, of course. But if you keep it up, this kind of talk might summon canyoneer... and nobody wants that, man. Not even him.

Yikes.

/Intruder ducks under table.
//Quack!

The obvious solution is to outlaw all fossil fuels right NOW and we will never have another natural disaster again.

Gaia is angry. She will reward us for our sacrifice.

A fark classic of "how do you build a house in a flood plain to avoid flooding? And why do you need to buy an SUV to get into your garage?"

cool, I love reading the same stories over and over in different links. It`s why I visit fark. I fear change.

Wait until the hydraulic fracking bill comes due. You ain't seen nothing yet.

cirby: It's funny - they tied this news release to a "NOAA needs more money" pitch, while admitting that almost none of the disasters could have been predicted or prevented by anything they could have done - tornado outbreaks accounted for over half, and regular old bad weather (blizzards and tropical storms) were a lot of the rest. And they never could predict droughts at all...

Looks like their drought predictions for this summer were pretty good: Prediction (new window) Reality (new window)

While you may be correct that they can't predict blizzards months in advance, or tornados more than a few hours beforehand, they do provide advanced warning that not only saves lives but also keeps business moving. Most people don't realize that NOAA and the National Weather Service are actually a division of the Department of Commerce. Why? Because weather and advanced prediction is the largest driver of lost commerce in the US.

-An unpredicted, snowed out pass, closing off freeway traffic? A loss to commerce.
-A closed down airport, due to a blizzard? A loss of commerce (and if not predicted beforehand, a major safety issue for regional air travel).
-Unforecasted freezing conditions for farmers? Lost crops and lost commerce.

Some of the other services they provide include, a non-exhaustive list:
-Hurricane direction prediction.
-Tornado tracking & warnings.
-Lighting prediction and warnings
-Wildfire tracking
-Flood tracking and forecasts
-Volcanic ash tracking
-Marine forecasts (and weather buoys)
-Charting of all US waterways (which are always changing from erosion and silt movement)
-Plus the regular old weather forecasting and NWS satellite & doppler operation

Most people like you chide them for their climate predations, and opt to throw out the whole rest of their operations with non-precise climate models.

Their budget is $5.5 billion a year. That works out to be roughly $18 per person, per year. I don't know about you, but that's a pretty damn good deal for what we get out of them.

MrSteve007:
While you may be correct that they can't predict blizzards months in advance, or tornados more than a few hours beforehand, they do provide advanced warning that not only saves lives but also keeps business moving. Most people don't realize that NOAA and the National Weather Service are actually a division of the Department of Commerce. Why? Because weather and advanced prediction is the largest driver of lost commerce in the US.

...and the science of prediction has basically stalled over the last decade or so, and they have no real way to make it better right now. Which is why keeping their budget stable is one thing, but asking for more? Not until they come up with a plan to actually improve things.

Most of the improvements in short term forecasting have come from (surprise!) private industry. If you want good local predictions, go hang around places like Disney World - they have some short-term models which can tell them exactly when to put out the little carts with raincoats and umbrellas (with Mickey on them, only $29.99).

cirby: ...and the science of prediction has basically stalled over the last decade or so, and they have no real way to make it better right now. Which is why keeping their budget stable is one thing, but asking for more? Not until they come up with a plan to actually improve things.

Actually, at least in my neck of the woods, the Pacific NW, they're making huge leaps in prediction. Before this winter, we only had one doppler radar near the coast, and it is located inland - blocked from the Pacific by the Olympic mountains. Its location was great for talking about 1-2 hour predictions, but when it came to longer-term, it was entirely satellite based and the 2-3 bouys that are still operable off of WA and OR. The problem with this situation is that we'd have storms that would realistically 'come out of nowhere.' A number of these lead to deaths of Oregon fishermen, because they weren't forecast.

They're still doing the final tweaks on it, but the NWS installed the nation's first dual-polarization doppler (new window)out on the coast. Link (pdf, new window) It's already done wonders for our accuracy on 2-3 day predictions, and the NWS is planning on upgrading all of the nation's 160 dopplers in the coming years to dual-polarization. That tech gives a much more clear picture on the speed, direction and size of precipitation (at all levels) within a storm.

Here's one more write-up on it, and the tech behind it. (new window)

cirby: Most of the improvements in short term forecasting have come from (surprise!) private industry. If you want good local predictions, go hang around places like Disney World - they have some short-term models which can tell them exactly when to put out the little carts with raincoats and umbrellas (with Mickey on them, only $29.99).

Care to backup those claims? Because what I find, that's pretty much entirely wrong. Other than some storm chasers, I believe almost all of the nation's weather information (satellite, bouy, doppler, airplane and computer models) are all part of NOAA's systems. Link (new window)

Seeing as my brother is an executive for Disney and lives in Orlando, next time I see him, I'll ask him about their company's weather gathering technology. My spidy-sense is telling me that since they're in lightening ally, they get all their info and warnings from the National Weather Service.

This is because about 15 years ago people stopped questioning big numbers. They hear that something did 2 billion dollars of damage and just accept it.

They hear 53 billion in emergency spending and dont even think to verify for themselves where it is going.

Subby fail. Those were 12 "natural" disasters.

I can't consider someone who wears that much make-up natural.

That disaster in Washington cost a lot more than a few billion dollars.