Hurricane Sandy updates

[wfgodot]

Quite a few tweets from runners who've just made it to town, who obviously would have preferred a decision before this point.

Can't say that I blame their being miffed. But hey - you're there, why not VOLUNTEER to assist in the coming days?

 

[wfgodot]

Here finally is NBC News's actual article (they were the first to break the story):

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"The Marathon has been an integral part of New York City's life for 40 years and is an event tens of thousands of New Yorkers participate in and millions more watch," [Bloomberg] said in a statement Friday evening. "While holding the race would not require diverting resources from the recovery effort, it is clear that it has become the source of controversy and division."

"We would not want a cloud to hang over the race or its participants, and so we have decided to cancel it," he added. "We cannot allow a controversy over an athletic event -- even one as meaningful as this -- to distract attention away from all the critically important work that is being done to recover from the storm and get our city back on track."
---

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/11/02/14880084-new-york-marathon-canceled-bloomberg-says?lite

 

[STANDREID]

Yeah, that Obama tout Bloomberg couldn't take the pressure.

 

[elmomom]

So why aren't those who criticized the response to Katrina doing any better? I guess it isn't as easy as it looks, is it?

Complaints do not tell the story. Katrina had folks waiting DAYS in the floodwaters for rescue.

The most notable and memorable complaint I heard thus far was from "brownie". The guy who headed the Katrina response. He complained that Obama acted "too quickly" in response to Sandy. Give me a break.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...298294c-22c8-11e2-ac85-e669876c6a24_blog.html

 

[wfgodot]

Yeah, that Obama tout Bloomberg couldn't take the pressure.

Ouch! lol. He showed no courage with that late endorsement, coming, as it did, in a blue state anyway. I think hizzoner should perhaps just avoid taking any decisions till the turn of the year at least - stay in the basement, that sort of thing. If out in public he might be mistaken for a weasel, or at least a particularly large, tailless rat.

 

[elmomom]

My parents are on the Eastern End of Long Island. They were out for almost 3 weeks after Hurricane Gloria. They got their power back yesterday - much to their amazement! Manhattan street lights go back on tonite, and most of Manhattan will be on by the end of tomorrow. The outer boroughs will take the longest because of downed trees. I hope everyone affected is fairing ok, and hunkering down for the next storm due to arrive here Wed/Thurs next week. Hopefully, it won't be a bad storm since all of our barrier coast is so damaged.

 

[wishuwerehere]

Glad you shared it!

It’s heartwarming to know this guy risked his own wellbeing to help a stranger.

 

[wfgodot]

Reuters Top News ‏@Reuters
Seeing many marathon tweets like this: "I now see a perfect opportunity for 40k volunteers to help in a clean up."

The Marathon Is Cancelled - Finally (Alex Koppelman in The New Yorker)

Why I’m Glad I’m Not Running the Marathon This Year (Nicholas Thompson, also in The New Yorker)

From the Koppelman piece:

Like him or not, Mike Bloomberg has, overall, done a pretty good job as the mayor of New York City. Sure, he has his crusades, some of which are worth supporting, but the job of a mayor, especially here, is far more about administration than politics, and the guy just plain knows how to run things. But in his policies, he’s always favored a certain kind of person—the rich, or at least the upper middle class—over the people who struggle with the costs of living in New York City.

 

[Gardenlady]

‘I remember him when he was just a baby in the carriage,’ Rose Bergin a resident of Mr Candelaria’s building told DNA Info. ‘Now he's a hero who grew up right here in public housing.’

This was my favorite line. I hate to risk getting the thread moved by being somewhat political, but I wish some politicians would remember that public housing isn't just some "drain" on taxpayer money, or an issue to play political football with - its full of just regular folks, and heroes like Mr Candelaria too.

Story brought a tear to my eye - thanks for sharing it, wfgodot!

 

[4Jacy]

I don't care what he says, HE IS A H.E.R.O. There is a special place waiting for him in heaven!!

 

[trigger]

Hi everyone. Hope everyone made it through the storm. My sister lost everything. Her car and her dodge 350 was in 8 feet of water. She only has the clothes she has on. All her neighbors to. Most of the houses in long beach ny are full of sand. If anyone kniws long beach there are no more restarants left. Park ave has cars just floating by. My aunt lost her house in breeze point in queens, ny. due to a fire. Her neighbors houses are gone. My dd family is here. They live in freeport, NY. There house had 6 feet of water on their first floor. Fema arrived. The whole family is at my dd house .

 

[wfgodot]

This was my favorite line. I hate to risk getting the thread moved by being somewhat political, but I wish some politicians would remember that public housing isn't just some "drain" on taxpayer money, or an issue to play political football with - its full of just regular folks, and heroes like Mr Candelaria too.

Story brought a tear to my eye - thanks for sharing it, wfgodot!

That was the other one I had to make sure survived my 10% content edit.

 

[keeponsearching]

Help what? Her babies were washed away in a torrent of water. I would have brought her inside, gave her shelter and a shoulder and called 911. I wouldn't go outside to assist her, the search would have yielded the same result. My child needs his mother, I wouldn't be risking my life to recover her children's bodies.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Tha'ts what I meant by help. Let her in.

 

[HMSHood]

I am utterly confused with the above decription of the boys being red headed and blonde headed as thats not a common color for African American little ones, is it? maybe I am mistaken ..so would someone enlighten me..

Biracial children can have red or blonde hair. I have seen half Black look either Black or not Black at all.

 

[Chewy]

I think the 'everyone knows Staten Island is racist' statement is painting with an unfairly broad brush. How insulting to that community.

Come on, Staten Island is definitely racist and extremely racist in some areas. But obviously not everyone is racist.

 

[JeannaT]

With every new report the story, incident, becomes more and more confusing. Could the homeowner have been confused when he said he saw a man? Maybe the mom's hair was flattened due to all the rain and wind and he thought she was a man...a very small man.

I've heard so many different things about this...first they were in their mother's arms, then they were on the roof of the SUV and now that she had them both in her arms and they were clinging to a tree for hours.

Whatever happened, two little precious boys are gone.

This IS confusing. I don't think it's true that she went to the front of his house, kids in her arms, as the Anderson Cooper CNN video suggests. I just don't believe that. I DO believe she was behind his house, trying to break in to get help searching for her boys after her boys washed away, and the homeowner perceived she was a man (it MUST have been difficult to see during the torrential rain, she was probably covered up) and she was begging for him to come out and help her.

This is an awful story, but I really don't think she approached anyone for help with her kids in her arms. I don't think ANYONE denied her admission to the safety of their home, when she had two little boys in tow. The man in the house looked totally reasonable - it's hard for me to believe he wouldn't open his door to a mother with two preschoolers during the hurricane.

It rings true, to me, what he says. She never approached anyone for help while she had the children in her arms, and I myself wouldn't come outside the safety of my house during that horrid storm to help a stranger. I think people who are judging them for not coming outside have never hunkered down and lived through something like that. Walking out in to it would put their lives in true peril, as the other nearly 100 people who were killed by Sandy experienced.

 

[JeannaT]

Biracial children can have red or blonde hair. I have seen half Black look either Black or not Black at all.

You can look up pictures of them on google images and one has red curly hair, and the other has blonde curly hair. They definitely look bi-racial, but red and blonde hair describes their hair color. Cute cute little boys, BTW.

 

[wfgodot]

EXCLUSIVE: Now that's a booze cruise! Bar blown away by Sandy washes up after SEVEN MILE
voyage intact with fully stocked bar and even tables and chairs in middle of residential street (Daily Mail)

It's a local bar with a difference - the difference being its locality.

Welcome to Sandy's Bar, not at the end of the street but plonked right in the middle.

Just days ago this was The Sugar Bowl, summer hangout at Breezy Point's shore. Until it was ripped from its moorings by Hurricane Sandy and delivered to Gerritsen Beach.

An incredible journey of around seven miles, across the bay and made even more remarkable by the fact that it turned up complete with tables and chairs, shot glasses and an impressively stocked bar.
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Charlie Coppolino, 42, witnessed the bar's arrival: 'I looked out my bedroom window and I saw what looked like a house just flying past. The water must have been five, six feet deep.

'I said, "Ma we're in trouble!' It came in Jamaica Bay and smashed my gazebo, through my gate, ran over a car and just went down the road about five miles an hour like a steamroller.'

Cycling up to where the bar sat askew Lawrence Lowey, a resident of Gerritsen for 17 years joked, 'I told them to park my bar and look where they put it. You can't get the help.'
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much more - have a party? of course they did! - with many, many pictures and a 'booze cruise' map, at link above

 

[trigger]

My daughter is a 911 operator in Freeport, L.I., NY. She got so many calls of people asking for help. They were on their roofs.There was a call of a body floating down the block. There was numerous fires. Boats were floating down the street. Today everyone was helping their neighbors.

Alot of houses are condemned in Long Beach, L.I., NY. FEMA is putting stickers on houses. Green stickers means its ok to return. Yellow means needs work. Red houses are condemed.

 

[wfgodot]

Try this one. Occasionally, the Mail serves up a dead link:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...perstorm-washes-SEVEN-MILE-voyage-intact.html