Armageddon?

I guess we won't really know for a few days, but having watched much of hurricane Irma coverage today, I am getting the impression that it did not live up to its breathless forecasts (except in the Caribbean). I really hope so. The words used to describe what was in store for Florida were super superlatives ... biblical, epic, historical, horrendous, Armageddon, a monster storm, etc. Yes, there has been extensive damage and some loss of life ... but, believing the TV coverage, I was expecting a lot worse. Don't get me wrong, this would be a fortunate turn of events.... for which I would be happy.

But it seems that the TV networks vie for viewership by hyping the size and scope of things. "It's now a category 3 hurricane but, when it passes over the extremely warm waters north of Cuba, it is likely to strengthen back to a category 4 or even a 5." "The wind damage has not been too extensive, but we are really worrying about the storm surge that could be as high as 15 feet. This means that many homes will be flooded to their first floor ceilings or even higher." "Many building cranes in Miami are collapsing or in danger of doing so."

It was initially predicted that the hurricane path was  up the east coast or through the center ... which could devastate all of Florida's major cities. Now the western path somehow seems equally onerous. And one needs to distinguish between "wind gust speed" and "sustained wind speed" ... big difference. Often wind gusts were implied to be sustained in order to exaggerate things. And I didn't see one reporter blown over by Irma. Yes, a few signs were blown down and some tree limbs shorn, but I saw no yachts in people's front yards or roofs blown off. Maybe, this was because of more stringent building codes imposed since the last big one, Andrew (a cat 5 by the way), or perhaps the unprecedented preparation by Florida's Governor Rick Scott?

I truly hope that my first impressions of the consequences of hurricane Irma are borne out and that the damage is just a few tens of billion dollars and not over a hundred billion as projected... and the loss of life is minimal. Armageddon? Maybe not. Fingers crossed.