sunny wrote:~Floydbuster wrote:sunny wrote:~Floydbuster wrote:I always thought the impact of Ivan, while very destructive was a little bit exaggerated, to a storm like Charley.
Like I said before, when you live through a cane and your life is shattered, it is major. It cannot be over exaggerated.
On the personal level? No it cannot be over exaggerated. For all we know, somebody right now is still upset about Tropical Storm Frances in 1998 in Texas, even though Frances of 1998 is not seen as quite that significant in the general scale of hurricanes. Rita will most be remembered, on the general hurricane history scale as the 4th most intense hurricane ever recorded, and for having a pressure typical of a strong Cat 4 at landfall, even though winds were of a weakening Cat 3.
Concerning Rita:
In total, it is estimated that well over 2 million customers were without electricity. [6] Total insured damage is estimated at $4-6 billion, which means the overall damage will likely be between $8-11 billion. [7]
The reported death toll as of 10 p.m. CDT on October 3 (0300 UTC October 4) stands at 119. Only six of them were direct deaths. One was caused by a hurricane-related tornado in the outer bands, and three others were caused by fallen trees during the storm. The two Florida deaths were both in rip currents on beaches caused by Rita's distant waves.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Rita
I think that is pretty bad.
119 INDIRECT, I believe most of those were caused by the bus explosion in Texas. Bad, but the DIRECT deaths with Katrina are in the thousands. Rita's death toll is about as much as Hurricane Lili and Isidore's. Bad, but not epic.
