Time for a rant:
Well, poop. Best laid plans just got shot to hell.
So, Florence is on the way, the governor declared a mandatory evac for the entire SC coast. I do not usually use internet slang (?) but - WTF and OMFG!! That's extreme sarcasm, by the way
1. I started tracking this storm middle of last week. Even then the guidance was for a landfall around the northern part of SC up into NC. With only small variations that has held pretty firm. In the last few days it has tightened and there is absolutely no indication of a late turn or bend south. I feel for the folks in Wilmington, NC but here we are not anywhere close to Storm conditions. In fact the current forecast for Beaufort at the time of Florence landfall is - not kidding - clear skies, winds W to NW at 8 to 11. So mandatory evac for what, exactly?
2. This is a screen shot of a headline a few hours ago:
Seriously? Seriously?? Long ago I lost all faith in the Weather Channel (this screen grab is not from the WC but it's a good example of the utter garbage being reported). It's common knowledge that they jack their advertisement rates way up for named storms. They are in the "scare the crap out of everybody to make more money" business model. I refuse to turn them on. But - read on:
3. I am now questioning what the heck NOAA is up to. I have been looking at the raw data. Satellite, bouys, aircraft and surface observations and I am not seeing anything close to what is being put out by official sources. I will be the first to admit that NOAA has people (supposedly) way smarter than me about weather, but - they are reporting storm info that does not match their own data!
4. I spent most of the day today calming panicked relatives - yes, mom, we are staying. No mom, we're not gonna die. That goes for parents-in-law too. The balance of the day was spent calming neighbors. Disclaimer! - I am not encouraging anyone to stay - if they want to evac, go for it, but the level of sheer panic being generated by the media and govt. is astonishing! I'm flabergasted.
5. Now I will be the first to admit that during Matthew the local and regional PTBs here dropped the ball big-time, but now they are overcompensating and instilling fear as a replacement for information. In my opinion the citizenry deserves better.
Ok, rant off. It's 0200, I can't sleep (still massively upside-down) and I can't even tell if what I just wrote is coherent. All I know is I lost an entire day of boat project time for basically nothing, I'm assuming that all my impending deliveries will now be delayed due to the epic "once in a decade - nope, lifetime, nope, century, nope - millenia, nope - uh, we're all gonna die, Ahhhhhhhhhhh!" storm. Sigh.
I still have parts & pieces to keep making progress this week. Stay tuned!
Cheers,
Mark (impatiently awaiting TEOWAKI)