(OPINION) It is just one thing after another. When times were normal in this country, there would be a major disaster every once in a while, but now we have reached a stage where there is literally no pause between them.
Authorities are still trying to assess the damage from the historic wildfires that we just witnessed in Hawaii. We are being told that they were the deadliest wildfires in the entire history of our country, and now suddenly more wildfires are burning tens of thousands of acres in western portions of the state of Washington.
At the same time, the state of California is bracing for an extremely rare disaster. According to AccuWeather, the impact that Hilary is going to have on the state “has the potential to be an extraordinary event”…
AccuWeather meteorologists say that a life-threatening flooding disaster is unfolding in some of the desert areas and mountains in Southern California to southern Nevada, where more than a year’s worth of rain could fall.
“The impact from Hilary has the potential to be an extraordinary event, one that is rare and unprecedented,” AccuWeather Director of Forecasting Operations Dan DePodwin said.
This is not something that happens every day. In fact, if Hilary is still considered to be a tropical storm when it hits California, it will be the first time this century that something like this has happened…
If Hilary is still categorized as a tropical storm over California, that would be the first time that happened in almost 26 years, since the former Hurricane Nora tracked near the Colorado River in California as a tropical storm in Sept. 1997.
Norman and Kathleen, in 1978 and 1976, respectively, brought impacts to Southern California, but neither officially made landfall as a tropical storm.
There were only two times landfalls happened prior to 1950, including a Sept. 1939 tropical storm in the L.A. Basin and an Oct. 2, 1858 hurricane, which tracked from San Diego to Long Beach.
But no matter how it is categorized, everyone agrees that that there is going to be an extremely unusual amount of rain. In fact, meteorologists are warning that we are likely to see “dangerous to catastrophic” flooding…
Historic Hilary − downgraded from a hurricane to a tropical storm but still carrying the potential for “dangerous to catastrophic” flooding − made landfall in the Mexican peninsula of Baja California on Sunday while churning north toward the U.S.
Hilary was 115 miles south-southeast of San Diego when the National Hurricane Center released its latest update at 2 p.m. Pacific Time, warning of “catastrophic and life-threatening flooding likely over Baja California and portions of the Southwestern U.S. through Monday.”
The flooding has already begun in some areas of California as I write this article. Authorities are warning that extremely heavy rainfall will trigger landslides and mudslides, and this is especially true in areas that have recently experienced wildfires.
High winds will be an issue as well. San Diego County has already seen gusts of up to 84 mph, and Yuma, Arizona has already seen gusts of up to 62 mph.
California Governor Gavin Newsom has officially declared a state of emergency, and Nevada Governor Joe Lombardo has done the same.
This crisis is going to play out over several days, and it is going to hit a population that is largely unprepared for such a storm. Once residents of southern California began to realize what was about to hit them, thousands upon thousands of people descended upon local grocery stores to stock up on needed supplies…
But panic buying has set in and some supermarket shelves in San Diego and Los Angeles were stripped bare of essentials such as water and tinned food.
Videos of people panic buying at grocery stores started emerge from California, with one tweet making jest of the ‘essentials’ being bought by people in Los Angeles.
‘A sign you’re in LA and not the southeast US during hurricane / tropical storm preparation: WHITE BREAD is left at Trader Joe’s!!! Focaccia – all gone!!! But even during storm prep, Angelenos ain’t bringing home the white bread!’ the post read with a picture of empty shelves and around seven loaves of white bread. (READ MORE)
