Hurricanes are forces we can not predict. do you not think its irresponsible to live in the path of them?

Question

every year its the same story. I was in two while i lived in texas. since you know the path or close to it and it happens yearly in Florida Louisiana and Texas wouldn't you think it would be smarter to move out of the way instead of rebuilding year after year. to me that is a waste of tax dollars for us to rebuild something over and over again.

Answer 1

I totally agree with you! It makes no sense to me why people want to live on coastlines in areas that get hit with a lot of hurricanes. For those that live in Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, they should make laws that you can't live no more than a ten mile distance away from the coast. Most homes on the coast and a few miles inland from the coast get totalled from the hurricane. And then, every year, more and more people are stupid enough to move right next to the coastland, and then everytime a hurricane hits, it takes longer and more money to rebuild all of these houses.

At least if nobody lives near the coast, not as many homes won't get totalled. And for the people that live inland, there should be zoning laws so that way an area can't have too many homes so that way there won't be as much damage when a hurricane hits.

Answer 2

I have no problem with someone choosing to live in Hurricane Alley (Tornado Alley, known earthquake fault lines, the flood plains of major rivers).  I lived there for a while myself and went through my first of four, so far.  What bothers me about people who make the choice to live there is the way so many act like they never knew a storm could happen and then sit down expecting "the government" to come and save them from the consequences of their choice.  They don't seem to care that "the government" is really taxpayers who have their own bills to pay and can't afford to pay the costs to rebuild, repair or replace the property of people who CHOSE to live in risky areas.

Answer 3

If the living situation has proved tolerable to some, and even desirable to others, I don't think a hurricane path is enough to deter some (or many, as the case may be) people from wishing to live there.  Sure, many people's homes are damaged by hurricanes, but many people never see any damage, simply by chance, or because they move around often enough, even within the area.  

The other, more obvious point is, where would these people go?  Many of the people who live in harm's way don't have very much money, and are most likely living where they are out of necessity - it's the place they have a job, they have family around, etc.  Maybe it would have made more sense to leave that area of the country undeveloped, if people had only known right off the bat.  As it is now though, I expect you will be hard pressed to convince people to abandon it as a home.  

Answer 4

I guess its one of those things where the benefits outweigh the risks. The southern Atlantic and Gulf states bring in alot of tourism which is a big "cha ching" for the travel industry. They make more money off the vacationing tourists then what they spend cleaning up the mess of the seasonal hurricane and tropical storms. Its not that big of a risk anyway since those states are nice and free of dangerous storms except for 3 short months.

Answer 5

Where would the people go?

Why not just give the land to Mexico then?

Our economy still depends on that area and some storms aren't that bad.  Besides, would you ever leave a place you loved?

Answer 6

yes i agree, i dont think they should build in well known hurricane paths!

Answer 7

Wow, what a genius, you are on to something there!  OK next all of the dummies that live in the north...move!  Haven't you heard of blizzards, white-outs, and power outages that kill people.  While we are at all of you people in the "Breadbasket" or mid-states...time to go!  Didn't you people see the "Wizard of OZ"!  Silly little tornado's could wipe you out!  Luckily Aklam figured this out for us.  Hey you sorry buggers on the West Coast, if the wild fires and earthquakes haven't killed you yet, why haven't you moved!  Wow, I think every is safe now...huh...what is that slamming Hawaii??  It is a volcano; but with any luck the tidal wave heading there will slow it down!  Just when I thought I was safe a meteor landed directly on my fallout shelter and killed me, my ugly inbreed Sister, and burned up all the MRE's I saved up for my 18 youngn's.  Luckily It doesn't matter.  Some dude named Achmed found a nuke and blew up himself.  Unfortunately he was at a Nukular power plant and it went super nova!  

Answer 8

That sounds all well and good.  But, let's look at exactly what this means.  You yourself just said that we cannot predict where hurricanes will hit.  Now, historically hurricanes have hit everywhere from the southern tip of Texas all the way up the eastern coast to as far north as New York.  So following your suggestion would mean permanently evacuating all population within 100 miles of the coast from the southern tip of Texas all the way up the eastern seaboard.  And that would also mean evacuating almost the entire state of Florida.  

To take your logic one step further.  It is also impossible to predict where tornados will hit.  Tornado alley encompasses the entire states of Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska.  It also appears that recently there has been a shift of tornado a little bit further to the east.  So that would be another 3 or 4 states.  So based upon your logic we need to also abandon eight entire states and make them wastelands.  

The only part of your logic that I might accept is New Orleans.  Does it make sense at all to build a huge city in a hurricane prone area BELOW SEA LEVEL?  I would say it would be wise to deny federal funds to anyone that builds a home on the coast below sea level.

And if you are for evacuating areas where we can't predict catastrophies doesn't it make sense more so to evacuate areas where we CAN predict catastrophies.  We KNOW that the western seaboard from San Fransisco to Los Angeles is ripe for a mega earthquake at any time.  So lets evacuate San Fransisco and Los Angeles.   We also know historically that the Mississippi river drainage area has regular and expected flooding.  So let's evacuate all population along the path of the Mississippi river.  Really it just doesn't make much sense now does it?