The cavalry ain't comin' to the destroyed Bahamas quickly enough

[NW-Bound]

Bahamians are not as lucky as the Hawaiians with high mountains.

Perhaps they still have enough land for them to scrunch together, but I dunno.

All the islands are low and flat, with ridges that usually rise no more than 15 to 20 m (49 to 66 ft).

 

[RAE]

I don't believe it's a fact that sea level will only ever rise and not stabilize or fall. I mean where do you begin to get that idea?

It's been rising for a while now, and the rate of rise is actually accelerating, compared to earlier projections. See article at the link below. I hope we are not going to get into a debate about climate change, and whether it's real or not..........



https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2680/new-study-finds-sea-level-rise-accelerating/

 

[RAE]

It will be hard for many Bahamians to relocate elsewhere. When you are broke, have no work, and with no assets, what countries will take you in?

Oh, I agree. Most of them will probably have to just stay and do their best to survive this, although it is going to be a long, difficult, ugly ordeal at best. But I do understand the feeling of wanting to just be transported somewhere else, to start over.

 

[NW-Bound]

Yes. If I were in their shoes (if they have any shoes left), the only thing in my mind would be how to survive till next day.

Then, once I make it to the point where I do not think about where the next meal comes from, I will figure out how to move to another place.

But I suspect a lot of people will simply resign to the fact that they are stuck. Such hopelessness feeling would be terrible, seeing no opportunity to get out of your situation despite no wrong doing of your own.

 

[Souschef]

On the plus side, a number of boating and private pilot organizations are gearing up to help the Bahamians by delivering aid

 

[LOL!]

There are totally 3000 islands, cays and islets in The Bahamas. There are over 30 big islands, 700 tiny islands and many islets in the area. New Providence is the principal island of The Bahamas.

I'm sure some of the islands are not appropriate, but there should be places for the Bahamians to go within their own country.

A news article states that some of the Bahamas was not affected that badly by Dorian, so I imagine that tent cities will pop up in those places for awhile along with port-a-toilets. It will just take a while and some planning.

OTOH, some of the freshwater wells have been polluted by saltwater.

New jobs in debris removal and disaster relief are sure to be created.

The aftermath of this will become a case study of what to do better the next time.

 

[Midpack]

A news article states that some of the Bahamas was not affected that badly by Dorian, so I imagine that tent cities will pop up in those places for awhile along with port-a-toilets. It will just take a while and some planning.

OTOH, some of the freshwater wells have been polluted by saltwater.

New jobs in debris removal and disaster relief are sure to be created.

The aftermath of this will become a case study of what to do better the next time.

From what I've read the most severe 'catastrophic' damage was on The Abacos and Grand Bahama, the northernmost part of the Bahamas. According to the Nassau Paradise Island website, they've been spared, so presumably most of the Bahamas south of Nassau/Paradise Island fared much better, though some less populated.

Although Nassau Paradise Island has been spared the devastating effects of Hurricane Dorian, our hearts and prayers go out to our neighbors in Abaco and Grand Bahama Island, and all those affected on the East Coast of the United States.

https://www.nassauparadiseisland.com/hurricane-dorian-update

 

[dixonge]

It's been rising for a while now, and the rate of rise is actually accelerating, compared to earlier projections. See article at the link below. I hope we are not going to get into a debate about climate change, and whether it's real or not..........

https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2680/new-study-finds-sea-level-rise-accelerating/

Most tide gauges show around 2.5-3mm rise for the last 50-150 years. That's around 9 inches by 2100. Hopefully that's enough time to adjust infrastructure.

 

[mpeirce]

Hopefully that's enough time to adjust infrastructure.

Tell that to my ancestors who were pushed out of Doggerland a "few" thousand years go...

 

[aja8888]

Tell that to my ancestors who were pushed out of Doggerland a "few" thousand years go...

Doggerland was an area of land, now submerged beneath the southern North Sea, that connected Britain to continental Europe. It was flooded by rising sea levels around 6500–6200 BC.

How did you trace your ancestors back that far?

 

[Brat]

Absolutely the day will come when the west coast from about Cape Mendocino to Vancouver Island will experience a devastating tsunami as a result of the Juan De Fuca plate slipping along the Cascadia Subduction Zone. Notwithstanding the New Yorker article, the tsunami will be constrained by the Coast Range of mountains. Time to seek higher ground coastal residents... minutes, I expect 10s of thousands to die.

Inland will get quite a rattle but I doubt that there will be general devastation of structures. It will be get-even time for Clark County (WA) residents who refused to participate in the replacement of the I-5 bridge between Oregon and Washington a few years back.. that old rusty bridge will fail. The bridge further east on I-205 will likely survive because it is relatively new. Two I-5 bridges over the Willamette are similar to the bridges in Oakland that failed but they have been reinforced. I put the odds on those bridges surviving at 50%. Most of the local bridges in the Portland area are old and will likely fail.

Old brick buildings along I-5 from Salem to Bellingham will shed their facades killing pedestrians.

The Tohoku, Japan earthquake generated a tsunami in Gold Beach, Oregon. The west coast also experienced a Cascade Subduction Zone tsunami in about 1700 that also produced a tsunami in Japan.

All in all that event will not be as devastating as Hurricane Dorian.

 

[RAE]

Most tide gauges show around 2.5-3mm rise for the last 50-150 years. That's around 9 inches by 2100. Hopefully that's enough time to adjust infrastructure.

The article I linked to projects a rise of about 26 inches by 2100, and they say that is "almost certainly a conservative estimate".

 

[Marc]

The article I linked to projects a rise of about 26 inches by 2100, and they say that is "almost certainly a conservative estimate".

Sounds like they are using the (discredited) hockey stick.

 

[Markola]

The housing insurance companies are the ones with their dollars actually on the line and they can’t afford to cherry pick data that agrees with their politics for the sake of arguing on the internet. They don’t think sea level rise on the east coast is a theory and are making it increasingly harder to buy policies in certain vulnerable places.

 

[Winemaker]

The article I linked to projects a rise of about 26 inches by 2100, and they say that is "almost certainly a conservative estimate".

There hasn't been an accurate forecast regarding climate change in 50 years.

 

[Jeffman52]

The Bahamas will be fully dependent on outside help for a number of years. They have no industry outside of tourism which means they have no industry. So that means no paying jobs unless someone outside is funding the work. For those that are not able to do that kind of hard work and construction, they will be even harder hit by this. I don't even know if any beaches are left there, so those might need rebuilding as well.

400K people is alot of people that are living without structures or clean food and water. They have not even gotten a good start on clearing streets and finding bodies. There will be disease and more will die.

Its tragic on so many levels and aid has to get there fast to minimize this as much as possible.

Edit to add - And the hurricane season is just beginning. That will make rebuilding just that much harder.

 

[Midpack]

The housing insurance companies are the ones with their dollars actually on the line and they can’t afford to cherry pick data that agrees with their politics for the sake of arguing on the internet. They don’t think sea level rise on the east coast is a theory and are making it increasingly harder to buy policies in certain vulnerable places.

As they should. If you choose to live in a higher risk area, you should shoulder-share all the above and beyond costs IMO.

 

[Midpack]

The Bahamas will be fully dependent on outside help for a number of years. They have no industry outside of tourism which means they have no industry. So that means no paying jobs unless someone outside is funding the work. For those that are not able to do that kind of hard work and construction, they will be even harder hit by this. I don't even know if any beaches are left there, so those might need rebuilding as well.

400K people is alot of people that are living without structures or clean food and water. They have not even gotten a good start on clearing streets and finding bodies. There will be disease and more will die.

Its tragic on so many levels and aid has to get there fast to minimize this as much as possible.

Edit to add - And the hurricane season is just beginning. That will make rebuilding just that much harder.

St Thomas and USVI, also very tourism dependent, got similarly pummeled by Irma in 2017, I wonder how their recoveries have gone?

 

[Bir48die]

Most tide gauges show around 2.5-3mm rise for the last 50-150 years. That's around 9 inches by 2100. Hopefully that's enough time to adjust infrastructure.

I thought this wasn't going to turn into a climate change discussion. Everybody has facts and figures no matter what side your on.

 

[JustCurious]

400K people is alot of people that are living without structures or clean food and water.

I don't mean to minimize the impact of this horrific tragedy, but your numbers are off. 400k is the total population of the Bahamas, an archipelago of many islands that stretches hundreds of miles with hundreds of islands and dozens of populated islands. Hurricane Dorian primarily impacted the northernmost populated islands of Abaco and Grand Bahama with estimated populations of 50k and 20k respectively. It's true that those islands were devastated with most people living on those islands living without structures or clean food and water, but that amounts to an estimated 70k, not 400k. Most of the other islands in the Bahamas were not severely impacted or not impacted at all.

"Bahamas death toll rises as 70,000 residents left homeless by Hurricane Dorian seek food and shelter."

The death toll, now at 43, is expected to rise drastically, officials said, as hundreds remain missing, buried under rubble on Grand Bahama and the Abaco Islands by the strongest hurricane ever to hit the archipelago nation.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/07/us/hurricane-dorian-bahamas-saturday-wxc/index.html

 

[JustCurious]

As they should. If you choose to live in a higher risk area, you should shoulder-share all the above and beyond costs IMO.

For people who live in the U.S., I agree with you because the U.S. is a large and diverse country. But those people who were born in the Bahamas or other vulnerable islands did not choose to be born there, and most of them do not have a choice but to live there.

 

[RAE]

The housing insurance companies are the ones with their dollars actually on the line and they can’t afford to cherry pick data that agrees with their politics for the sake of arguing on the internet. They don’t think sea level rise on the east coast is a theory and are making it increasingly harder to buy policies in certain vulnerable places.

+1. Not to mention coastal cities around the world now starting to make major changes to infrastructure, etc to try to cope with rising water levels.

 

[ncbill]

St Thomas and USVI, also very tourism dependent, got similarly pummeled by Irma in 2017, I wonder how their recoveries have gone?

The resort where we honeymooned in the BVI was totally destroyed by Irma & AFAIK still has not reopened.

 

[ncbill]

Where I am, the only likely disaster is loss of electricity due to equipment malfunction in the summer. I do not know if it is possible to have a large-scale blackout as it did happen in New York in 1977. Even then, here it should not be lethal as long as I can get gasoline to drive up to my high-country home to escape the heat. On small-scale power loss, people just drive to the nearest hotel no differently than they do when their AC fails.

And now that I have my solar array plus the lithium battery bank that can run a mini-split AC, I feel better although I did not install them for disaster preparation.

For a long-term outage, I would still need a generator to assist the solar panels in recharging the battery. I can use a long power cord to run from the genset in the RV to the equipment shed in the backyard, but have to be able to get gasoline for the RV. I cannot keep the 55-gal tank of the RV topped off for emergency as it would go stale.

Food-wise, my wife hoards food in such manner that we can survive for months. Green vegetable might be a bit sparse if we have only the stuff we grow to feed on.

When everything is submerged like what happens in flooded areas caused by hurricanes, I don't know how you can survive. Stuff that is on the ground is lost to flood, and what is kept high may be blown away by 200-mph wind. You are doomed!

There are plenty of fuel stabilizers available that can treat gasoline so it remains useable for up to 2 years:

https://www.carbibles.com/best-fuel-stabilizer/

 

[Jeffman52]

I don't mean to minimize the impact, but your numbers are off. 400k is the total population of the Bahamas, an archipelago of many islands that stretches hundreds of miles with hundreds of islands and dozens of populated islands.

"Bahamas death toll rises as 70,000 residents left homeless by Hurricane Dorian seek food and shelter."

https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/07/us/hurricane-dorian-bahamas-saturday-wxc/index.html

I stand corrected on the numbers. Still, 70K people and no telling how many dead. Its going to take a number of years if not a decade to rebuild. Until then, many of those will need years of basic assistance.