Chapter 26: Hurricane Camille Hurricane Camille was a disastrous storm with catastrophic damage including the destruction of many towns and lives even after making landfall and weakening. As most tropical systems, Camille began as a tropical wave that moved off the coast of Africa. Camille began to strengthen as it moved across the Atlantic reaching hurricane strength as is approached Cuba. Once Camille entered the Gulf of Mexico, Air Force reconnaissance measured wind speeds of up to 200 mph and a central pressure around 901 mb. Evacuation was strongly recommended for areas along the Gulf from Louisiana to Florida, though some residents refused to evacuate the area.
This left the remaining buildings gutted to the third and fourth story. Gambling barges became effective torpedoes, destroying buildings as they were washed up to 500feet inland by the waves and storm surges. New Orleans On Monday, 29 August, 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans knocked out all power and submerged the low lying city in um to 6 feet (2 meters) of rising water. Katrina tore part of the roof of the roof of a stadium, where many sought refuge. At this point in it's journey Katrina was a category 2 hurricane and brought winds of of 105 miles per hour or 170 kilometres hour.
“Hurricane Mitch was more destructive than Andrew because of a variety of factors.” Mitch is considered to be the most deadly hurricane in the last 200 years in the Atlantic, stronger and more intense than Hurricane Andrew, having caused the most serious material damage in history. In Mitch, 4 countries were affected (Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador and Guaternala) whereas in Andrew only a fraction of South America was seriously affected. In Mitch 10ml people were left homeless without shelter and aid, with mothers washed out to see and thousands trapped, as well as the possibility of more floods. In Andrew hundreds and thousands of people were without food but food and water were provided sooner than they were to the poor countries that Mitch affected. A
The heavy rainfall started falling at midday on the 16th August, and it was recorded that 5 inches fell in 8 hours. The storm was a remnant of the Hurricane Alex, which had carried over the Atlantic. The rain was cause due to warm air picking up moisture - due to residual heat from the Atlantic sea - travelled towards the South West Cornish coast as prevailing winds. Upon contact with the topographically vertical coast, these winds experienced a strong up-drafting force thus causing internal moisture to reach the atmosphere, and consequently cool as a string of storm clouds. With convergence and coalescence, enhanced moisture levels resulted in heavy rainfall on the afternoon of 16 August 2004.
The casualties are what make this hurricane the 3rd most deadly hurricane in history. By the end of this hurricane approximately 8,000 out of 36,000 people died from the destruction it left. To put these numbers into perspective that’s around 1 out every 5 people dead. To imagine the pain of the survivors think of 5 people you care about and imagine if one at random where to die due to such a tragedy. As if the hurricane hasn’t taken enough already there was several million dollars worth of property damage, that comes out of everyone’s pocket to rebuild.
Ike was a huge economic burden to the U.S. and “estimates suggest Ike may become one of the costliest hurricanes on record” (FEMA 10). Hurricanes are known for causing severe structural damage to houses, but also have an effect on many businesses as well. Many people had to evacuate and be out of work for up to two weeks due to power outage and debris. Also, some businesses were damaged by flooding and wind, which caused the loss of crucial business equipment. Businesses were flooded along the Texas coast and lost all of their vital technology such as computers, telephones, and other office equipment.
Because of the devastation of hurricane Katrina many of the United States oil refineries were damaged, causing a decrease in gas supply. The damage to the oil refineries cause them to be shut down. With many of the United States oil refineries shut down, the supply of crude oil was effect and that is what caused an increase in gas prices. Hurricane Katrina resulted in an immediate loss of nearly 1.5 million barrels a day of crude oil from the
Causes and Effect of Hurricanes Hurricanes can do a lot of damage to towns, homes and people. They rip things apart when they come into a city area and there is no stopping them. Weather conditions cause hurricanes and the effect can be devastating. A lot of the cause of a hurricane is the weather at the time and the effect can be devastating. Hurricanes start when warm, moist air from the ocean surface begins to rise rapidly, where it encounters cooler air that causes the warm water vapor to condense and to form storm clouds and drops of rain.
The fires that were a direct result from the main shock and the aftershocks were just as damaging because of the uncontrollable burning from ruptured gas lines. Over 30 fires destroyed more than 25,000 homes on 490 city blocks. Water mains were broken due to the quake which gave the fire department few resources to work with. The Navy contributed to putting out fires by running water lines and providing water to the city’s fire department for their steam engines. International assistance was extremely beneficial because a lot of money was raised and donated to the city for reconstruction.
Residents were without power for up to six months after the storm rolled through. Andrew also caused a great deal of damage to offshore oil facilities as it approached a second landfall in Louisiana, where it caused another one billion dollars in damage. In total, the damage caused by Andrew in both South Florida and Louisiana totaled twenty six billion dollars, the most costly natural disaster in United States history. The social impacts on South Florida were tremendous. You have to take into consideration that before Hurricane Andrew, there was about a generation of South Florida residents who had not experienced a hurricane.