The below clip is jaw dropping. HT to Grist for finding it. It shows damaged wind turbines as well as island wide destruction. EOS had reported, prior to the storm, that wind turbines are unable to withstand a category five hurricane.
Many studies have been conducted about offshore wind speeds during a hurricane, but very few have occurred at turbine hub height (~100 meters above sea level). Reconnaissance flights flown directly through storms often gather measurements but can’t safely descend to the height of most wind turbines. To make up for this, Worsnop et al. used a computer model of atmospheric eddies to estimate gusts of wind at that height in the most damaging part of a hurricane, the small eye wall bordering the storm’s low-pressure center.
The eye wall makes up only a fraction of a hurricane’s total area, the team points out, and category 5 hurricanes are relatively rare, with most years having one or no category 5 hurricanes forming in the Atlantic Ocean. But previous studies have shown that an eye wall can span 20 kilometers—large enough to encompass an entire wind farm in the event of a direct hit. The new study could help wind developers improve the design of offshore turbines and consider financial tools like insurance to mitigate the risk of building wind farms in regions where category 5 hurricanes can occur. (Geophysical Research Letters, https://doi.org/10.1002/2017GL073537, 2017)
This drone footage is by the National Weather Service for a risk assessment of the island. But it stands on it’s own as a testament of the calamity that Irma and Maria brought to the island of Puerto Rico. This is why we need the full attention of the US Government and this is why a humanitarian crisis is unfolding.
x xYouTube VideoThere was a health crisis in Puerto Rico even before the storms hit. We do know that many people with chronic conditions, such as asthma, diabetes, bronchitis, cancers, the elderly, very young are all very vulnerable when it comes to sporadic access to healthcare, lack of electricity, clean water and healthy food.
Below are stories on two populations that do not make the headlines as the stigma of their health conditions are more complex in a disaster of this magnitude. Where is the military response to this disaster? They should be evacuating as many people as possible to the mainland before there is a humanitarian crisis of epic proportions. Tick Tock.
David Ovalle of The Miami Herald writes on how Puerto Rican drug users are getting less help. The piece is titled:
People think we’re the lowest: Puerto Rico drug users get less help after the storm
Instead, the workers, from an organization called Mountain Point, brought packets of clean syringes, mounds of antibacterial wipes and rolls of gauze from a dwindling supply. In the wake of the storm, their goal is to keep opioid users — Puerto Rico has a long-running addiction crisis — free from deadly diseases they could get from injecting drugs. Toward that aim, the trio even brought tiny disposal aluminum cups — clean ones — that are commonly used to cook heroin to shoot up.
At 34, Rivero has already lost his left leg to diabetes. His body is covered in ulcers from countless injections over nearly two decades. Tucked between his fingers was a syringe, its brownish liquid a mix of water, heroin and cocaine — un speedball, on the streets.
snip“It’s been so hard,” Rivero said, slurring, when asked about conditions after Hurricane Maria, which struck the island Sept. 20. “I have no money. I have to beg.”
Moments later, as fellow users were collecting used needles from the trash-strewn floor to be given to Mountain Point for disposal, Franco slowly pierced the skin of his left hand, just above the knuckle of his middle finger. The process was slow and unsettling — the needle would not cleanly enter his vein. Drops of bright red blood rolled down his fingers and splashed on the foot rest of his wheelchair.
The toll of Hurricane Maria has added another layer of misery for the tens of thousands of opioid users who dwell in Puerto Rico’s underbelly — and for the small number of dedicated groups who try to help them get clean, stay safe and emerge from the shadows.
For Mountain Point, which serves the poor towns west and south of San Juan, conditions post-Maria mean employees have scaled back their trips and the number of needles they give out. They have only enough to last two more months, and no new shipments have arrived from the mainland. Fuel is expensive and the budget is stretched to the breaking point. Vials of sterile water, usually given out so users can cook the drugs without contamination, ran out after days after the storm.
“In Puerto Rico, right now, most of the water is contaminated,” said Vicente “Panamá” Alba, a Bronx-raised outreach worker for Mountain Point. “If it’s not safe to drink, it’s certainly not safe to inject yourself.”
snipBecause so many addicts inject drugs, Puerto Rico has one of the highest HIV/AIDs rates in the country, with nearly 40 percent of those infected suspected of contracting the virus from intravenous drug use.
In contrast to many U.S. states with similar epidemics, Puerto Rico still has few options for treatment, with only about a dozen detox centers and about 4,400 beds in residential treatment facilities, with few offering drugs such as methadone and buprenorphine to wean users off heroin.