this post was submitted on 05 Oct 2024
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[–] [email protected] 205 points 2 months ago (11 children)

Saw an article yesterday interviewing a couple who says they’ll now have to rebuild their beachfront house for the third time, and that their second rebuild wasn’t even finished when Helene sent their house surfing down the street. That their insurance won’t cover it.

I’m flabbergasted that anyone would even consider rebuilding there. You’re lucky to even have insurance – most insurance companies have been fleeing the state.

Here’s a radical idea: don’t rebuild there. This is only going to get worse.

[–] [email protected] 69 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

I built it all the same! Just to show em!

It sank into the swamp...

So, I built a second one! That sank into the swamp...

So I built a third one! That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp!

But the fourth one stayed up!

Same mentality...

[–] [email protected] 42 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (24 children)

Huston is one of the most populated cities in the US and it’s built on a swamp. Everyone acts super surprised when it floods semi-annually, like it’s some kind of tragedy as opposed to basic physics.

Next thing you know Arizona will start complaining that they’ve run out of water. I mean, yes? You’re in the desert. Your choices were to fix the climate, move, or die. Instead you’ve built a gigantic parking lot of a city.

There should be no aid whatsoever for natural disasters that strike predictably on a regular basis. Human beings aren’t dumb animals. We can communicate. Also Florida, Louisiana, and Texas literally voted for global warming. They got what they voted for so what is the issue?

Actions have consequences. We failed to act for a century. That’s how long we’ve known with absolute certainty that the climate was fucked. We put people on the moon, and we went to war with Iraq, but heaven forbid people stop eating meat, driving their precious cars, or taking pleasure cruises. Zero. Pity.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Arizona will start complaining that they’ve run out of water

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jan/27/arizona-scottsdale-water-cut-off-rio-verde-foothills-drought

Little community refused to connect to the public utility grid. Wanted to live the libertarian, no government, get eaten by bears ideal. Local government they were mooching off for water said "Hey, we actually need this for our community. No more mooching." They could fix the problem by incorporating, but instead they went to the news media.

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[–] [email protected] 39 points 2 months ago (5 children)

Or more to the point. If you have the money to build a beachfront house, why are you not building it to be virtually indestructible? Like one of those indestructible monolithic dome homes.

We can build concrete structures that will laugh at hurricanes. We can build them with their living areas raised well above the ground so water can simply flow underneath and around them. Sure, it's more expensive to build this way, but it can be done. And really, I would argue that if you can't afford to build such a home, you simply cannot afford to live right on the beach.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 months ago (5 children)

I always wonder what's going on in the heads of Americans when they go to an area notorious for being hit by hurricanes or tornadoes and then decide they should build their house out of basically toothpicks with some plaster. Here in Switzerland, pretty much everything except for maybe a garden shed is poured concrete, and I guarantee that if the folks in Florida or Oklahoma did the same the "devastation" would be comparatively tiny.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 months ago (9 children)

Europeans never understand why houses are made out of "flimsy" materials in the US.

The simple answer is that your brick and mortar houses would also be completely destroyed by a hurricane or tornado or earthquake.

They're just way more expensive and take longer to rebuild.

The scale of natural disasters in the US is and always has been such that we expect buildings to be demolished by nature from time to time. Europe is a very stable place. The US is not.

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (9 children)

How arrogant of you.

Florida is a little different than Switzerland, not least due to weather and poverty. There indeed ARE fully concrete and hemp-crete type homes (many styles of homes), but they are unpopular (but becoming more popular) because they trap damp (Florida is extremely humid, unlike Switzerland), grow mold, don't breathe, and cause sickness. Since 2005, all newly built homes are required to have concrete and rebar at certain areas including windows and doors.

https://www.etr-aw.com/full-concrete-homes/

They also are prone to cracking due to shifting. The lower blocks can absorb water, either through these cracks or cracks in waterproofing like paint, and then leak with every heavy rain. Cement (a component of concrete) is one of the largest CO2 emitters in its production, and cement dust is carcinogenic. Concrete houses that are flooded (eyewitnesses report up to 25-50feet of water height) will have to be gutted and possibly torn down anyway once flooded, since the flooding itself ruins everything and makes it unsafe. Since you'll have to gut the whole thing anyway, may as well use wood which can be replaced more easily.

Tornados (since you mentioned Oklahoma) can punch a 2x4 board through a concrete wall. Concrete isn't a Kevlar vest house against all weather types and it isn't an ideal material either for building in every climate.

If the people who were flooded had stayed because they had concrete houses, even more would have died, but instead drowned in a concrete box. This was a storm that needed evacuation.

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[–] [email protected] 38 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I was just driving around the beaches of Pinellas County (Tampa Bay area) today. Entire neighborhoods are destroyed. Beach front condos, restaurants and stores, also destroyed. In many areas, anything ground level got flooded/wrecked by storm surge. I saw several boats in places there are not supposed to be boats.

If Tampa Bay takes a direct hit right now it's going to be really fuckin bad for a lot of people.

What's also scary is that right now everyone has been piling up debris, ruined appliances and all manor of belongings outside for disposal. Piles ten feet high along every street. All this shit is about to be flying around in hurricane force winds and storm surge. Is a recipe for disaster.

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 2 months ago (3 children)

They also had sunk all their savings into that rebuild. How do you think about trying a third time when you have nothing to even work with?

[–] [email protected] 44 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

this might be a shock, but: in florida there are a lot of stupid people with a lot of money but don't know what the fuck they're doing with money

these people likely also bought spray painted gold sneakers not too long ago

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[–] [email protected] 23 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, I don’t get it, except the couple I saw (maybe you saw the same interview, there seem to be several of these) acted like this is just a bad year for weather and they ‘don’t want to think’ about climate change. They at least seem the type who don’t think it’s real.

I feel for rescue units who can’t leave, and who will likely be rescuing these stubborn cunts when the next massive storm of the year hits them.

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[–] [email protected] 29 points 2 months ago (3 children)
[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 months ago

Sunk Coast Fallacy

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[–] [email protected] 28 points 2 months ago

I don’t know if this is the case for that couple, but a lot of insurance requires that you rebuild on the same location. We need to change laws so that this isn’t the case anymore. It is a massive problem.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (12 children)

I mean, you can probably build a house that can reliably survive the conditions there. It's just gonna be really expensive and may not look all that pretty.

It's gonna have to handle water up to a certain height and wind-blown debris smashing into it.

Like, think of a lighthouse or flak tower or something.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse

Sometimes a lighthouse needs to be constructed in the water itself. Wave-washed lighthouses are masonry structures constructed to withstand water impact, such as Eddystone Lighthouse in Britain and the St. George Reef Light of California. In shallower bays, Screw-pile lighthouse ironwork structures are screwed into the seabed and a low wooden structure is placed above the open framework, such as Thomas Point Shoal Lighthouse. As screw piles can be disrupted by ice, steel caisson lighthouses such as Orient Point Light are used in cold climates. Orient Long Beach Bar Light (Bug Light) is a blend of a screw pile light that was converted to a caisson light because of the threat of ice damage. Skeletal iron towers with screw-pile foundations were built on the Florida Reef along the Florida Keys, beginning with the Carysfort Reef Light in 1852.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flak_tower

With concrete walls up to 3.5 m (11 ft) thick, their designers considered the towers to be invulnerable to attack by the standard ordnance carried by RAF heavy bombers at the time of their construction.

The Soviets, in their assault on Berlin, found it difficult to inflict significant damage on the flak towers, even with some of the largest Soviet guns, such as the 203 mm M1931 howitzers.

After the war, the demolition of the towers was often considered not feasible and many remain to this day, with some having been converted for alternative use.

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[–] [email protected] 70 points 2 months ago (4 children)

It's not climate change. There is no mention of climate change anywhere in Florida law.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 months ago (2 children)

It was a pleasant surprise to hear the Meterologist on the video in that article specifically explain warming oceans from carbon are causing the increased frequency/intensity.

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[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 months ago (1 children)

This happened in 2005 as well, except with 3 hurricanes; Francis, Ivan, and Jeanne. I doubt climate change has gotten better since then.

[–] [email protected] 59 points 2 months ago (1 children)

It's gotten WAY better. There is no longer any mention of climate change in Florida law. Ron DeathSentence solved climate change

[–] [email protected] 29 points 2 months ago

Yup, just like cheeto in chief said. Stop testing and the cases go down!

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[–] [email protected] 63 points 2 months ago (1 children)

as if you didn't have enough reasons to get the fuck out of florida already. leaving that shithole state was the best thing i've ever done, not just for my mental health, but apparently physical safety also

[–] [email protected] 35 points 2 months ago

My moving date was literally scheduled for this upcoming Friday… I pick up the u-haul on Tuesday, and my lease in Colorado starts on Tuesday of next week. This thing is trying to keep me here in hell.

[–] [email protected] 57 points 2 months ago (13 children)

Shit, it’s headed right for where I live.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 2 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 19 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I need $4200 to ditch this place and get back nyc (my home), but I just can’t seem to get it together. This place is like a black hole.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 months ago (22 children)
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[–] [email protected] 56 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Originally they thought that Helene would be a cat 3, too.

But the Democrats aim with the Hurricane machine proclaimed by MTG is getting better. Maybe the third try actually turns Mar-a-Lago into a pile of rubble.

[–] TheRealLinga 21 points 2 months ago (3 children)

I'm on the team running the weather machine this time. We are very excited for this run!

After gathering so much data from the last several storms, we finally have the power to call hurricanes and tornadoes exactly where we want them to go!

We'll be feasting on the fetuses Boden personally hands us after this run, fellas!

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[–] [email protected] 49 points 2 months ago (4 children)

FWIW, The Weather Channel says something slightly different:

M​ost of the new computer guidance suggests that a Category 3 hurricane will develop, though some models have a stronger storm than this. Residents should prepare as if a Category 4 or 5 hurricane is anticipated.

https://weather.com/storms/hurricane/news/2024-10-06-milton-major-hurricane-threat-florida-gulf-coast

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[–] [email protected] 44 points 2 months ago (11 children)

Maybe if they stopped voting for fucking Republicans and start fixing the climate they wouldn't be all kinds of fucked as climate change causes insurance companies to say fuck these southern states.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 2 months ago

Im from Florida and it's so frustrating that we are always just 1 or 2 percent away from voting out these morons but we all have to suffer because the old people vote their shriveled asses off.

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[–] [email protected] 43 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Climate change is a bitch, huh, Republicans who've spent thirty years denying it? (My heart goes out to all the people in the southeast who actually didn't spend decades denying its existence and hampering efforts to slow it.)

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[–] [email protected] 40 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Wow that GOP rep that said democrats created the hurricane is going to have to start working overtime to sell the argument again. At some point the people in the red states must start to wonder why it’s so coincidental that the predictions from the left (science) keep coming true.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 2 months ago (1 children)

You presume that that information reaches them and that they're willing to consider it.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 months ago

Even if the info doesn’t reach them, looks like the hurricane will.

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[–] [email protected] 31 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Maybe if all those sinful woke communist homosexuals would leave Florida, God wouldn't have to keep sending hurricanes to punish all the good God-fearing patriots for tolerating their iniquities! /s

[–] [email protected] 27 points 2 months ago

Mother Nature is speedbaggin' North America's penis.

Bet it's gonna be a 4 because of how hot the water is.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 months ago (7 children)
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[–] [email protected] 18 points 2 months ago
[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 months ago (4 children)
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