Ian just exploded.

[DarthSailor]

Gross generalizaion: up North it's what you know. Down South (and especially Louisiana), it's who you know.

And we have Charlie Golf as another shared history--Long ago, I was a Coast Guard Jag-type after finishing law school, Direct Commission, stationed in Boston. Then a chance to extend my active duty and take a transfer elsewhere, in my case New Orleans, in the Marine Inspection Office. The rest, as they say, is history, got a good position thanks in large part to the Coast Guard experience I had. I stayed in the Reserves and learned from them, and retired with 20.

And respect to the Auxiliarists, they are often the "brains" benefiting the local Station Coasties, since they have the local knowledge and contacts ("who you know" again). And a willingness to serve, as do also the active duty Chiefs and Petty Officers they liaise with.

I was born in Boston, mom from there, summers at grandma's in Ipswich/Gloucester/Rockport, MA then back in NOLA/Slidell for the school year. Lots of generalized differences in the two parts of the country. My dad retired as the head of exploration for Mobil but may have been more proud of his CG work after. (retired means he took the payout when Exxon bought Mobil)

 

[nolatom]

Geezum.

Were we separated at birth??

Born in Salem, raised in Marblehead, college in Boston (BU, sailing team in "Love that Dirty Water". Back Bay, Cambridge, Acton, then transferred south.

 

[Chris in Santa Cruz CA]

Weather gal and condom reminds me of that John Ritter movie and the dancing condoms. Anybody got that clip?

Glow in the dark condoms! Skin Deep was the movie. First time I realized Ritter was actually a very good actor.

 

[Rasputin22]

Pretty somber compilation from Ft Meyers...

https://scontent-iad3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/308554578_10225957670661777_3408961735345486495_n.jpg?stp=dst-jpg_p235x350&_nc_cat=107&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=AxTNbTVb7KIAX_C5Wo_&_nc_ht=scontent-iad3-1.xx&oh=00_AT8S9ZEeRiA7ngR-rW-pF_RWUTMCbwaSLlPEEhRIhi4spw&oe=633ACAB1

 

[[email protected]]

closing one's eyes, and remembering better times. View attachment 543710

SCOTW

 

[Raincoast]

Pretty somber compilation from Ft Meyers...

View attachment 543796

https://scontent-iad3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/308554578_10225957670661777_3408961735345486495_n.jpg?stp=dst-jpg_p235x350&_nc_cat=107&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=AxTNbTVb7KIAX_C5Wo_&_nc_ht=scontent-iad3-1.xx&oh=00_AT8S9ZEeRiA7ngR-rW-pF_RWUTMCbwaSLlPEEhRIhi4spw&oe=633ACAB1

Maybe this is the year which puts the final nail in the insurance industry, if not it certainly can’t be far off…

 

[Rasputin22]

I saw rumors of the lighthouse at Sanibel getting blown down. Just BS and it still stands proudly although the surrounding buildings are gone. I love these old cast iron and steel structures and proud to see it still on its feet.

Once I uploaded this before and after, I noticed that the lighthouse is now missing the lower left hand corner leg and it is surprising it is still up!

 

[floater]

So umm , is development still going ahead at pace in low lying areas ?
Over here local Govts and insurers are backing away from ticking off and paying out on flood prone coastal zones

100 year storm.

 

[kent_island_sailor]

Maybe this is the year which puts the final nail in the insurance industry, if not it certainly can’t be far off…

BEFORE this happened my insurance would triple if I moved to Florida. I may have dodged a bullet, the boat I was going to buy didn't work out and my boat is long since paid for, I could drop to just liability if I have to.
House insurance is going to be a vastly bigger issue, you can sail your boat north for hurricane season, a house not so much.

 

[Raz'r]

100 year storm.

should barrier islands be rebuilt?

 

[Parma]

That's an interesting question. Can't they just raise premiums to cover projected losses?

And I thought that several states passed fairly rigorous hurricane oriented building codes; can't they just extend those to docks/moorings/storage? I suspect that any structure built where an old one got wiped out by a hurricane will be required to be re-built to withstand that same force (or greater) hurricane. Is that not so?

In California it took several VERY large wildfires & a few very damaging earthquakes for the state to realize it needed to strengthen building & fire codes to the point where any new house built here today is pretty much earthquake & fire proof. Even extended retrofit standards in some situations. Makes it expensive to build but helps hold down insurance costs, lessens the budgets required for natural disasters & emergency responders and lowers the overall financial impact of such events. Plus the consumer gets a superior product.

Always wondered if someone might vastly over-insure their boat and then park it or even move it to where a hurricane is going to hit.

 

[DarthSailor]

Were we separated at birth??

Born in Salem, raised in Marblehead, college in Boston (BU, sailing team in "Love that Dirty Water". Back Bay, Cambridge, Acton, then transferred south.

Maybe.... found out three years ago I was adopted by my Dad, mom had me sans husband and won the lottery with getting hitched to the man that raised me. I found some paperwork that led me to believe this was the case when I was 14/15 but they lied and said it wasn't the case.

So two things happened I gave the wrong medical history my whole life and Dad getting disowned wasn't because mom was Catholic it was dad's mom considered mom a, what is the word? oh, whore. Mom was a very good liar with a number of accomplices(aunts, uncles, cousins, grandmother) when I was growing up. My oldest was married at Boston city hall and I needed a new copy of my birth certificate and to my surprise it didn't match my 'birth record' that I used my whole life, the clerk apologized as they should have given me the post adoption one but gave me real one instead. Dad was dead and mom had rapid onset dementia when I asked about this. She is now in a home for real dementia and I have some real anger issues about the whole deal. Real dad was from that area as well don't think he is with us any longer but I will keep his name out of this for no other reason than he did not impede me being adopted by a stellar human being. Other than this situation I don't know of any other time my Dad lied, see accomplices above. So anyone I could be mad at is dead or not mentally capable of understanding my anger and disappointment.

 

[Raz'r]

That's an interesting question. Can't they just raise premiums to cover projected losses?

And I thought that several states passed fairly rigorous hurricane oriented building codes; can't they just extend those to docks/moorings/storage? I suspect that any structure built where an old one got wiped out by a hurricane will be required to be re-built to withstand that same force (or greater) hurricane. Is that not so?

In California it took several VERY large wildfires & a few very damaging earthquakes for the state to realize it needed to strengthen building & fire codes to the point where any new house built here today is pretty much earthquake & fire proof. Even extended retrofit standards in some situations. Makes it expensive to build but helps hold down insurance costs, lessens the budgets required for natural disasters & emergency responders and lowers the overall financial impact of such events. Plus the consumer gets a superior product.

Always wondered if someone might vastly over-insure their boat and then park it or even move it to where a hurricane is going to hit.

given the federal backup for nat disasters, they should have some requirements (like in fire, flood and earthquake zones) for codes. Friends down there have recently built homes above the surge zone and they have some down trees and small damage.

 

[kent_island_sailor]

Always wondered if someone might vastly over-insure their boat and then park it or even move it to where a hurricane is going to hit.

I know of an airplane that got flown out of Florida for Andrew by the professional crew and then the irate owner then got in it and flew it back and parked it outside.
I also know an insurance adjuster that was furious when he found every nice car in a beach area near us parked way uphill from the beach and every shitty car parked in the beach parking lot before Isabel hit.
I have never heard of a boat being set up in this way, but I have seen a shit-ton of them just left to random chance.

 

[DarthSailor]

should barrier islands be rebuilt?

If the insurance was FEMA backed then the building cannot be rebuilt for like 99 years if insurance paid off for the house. That is how they are trying to control the development. If the insurance is private then I am not sure they can stop the rebuild other than make it too costly to insure. But with a 100 year storm a 6000 dollar yearly premium means the insurance company has 600,000 dollars to invest against the next payout. Somebody will figure out a way to make money off that scenario. It also depends on how the adjuster rules on the claim, a wind event is usually covered better than flooding. A ton of people in Katrina were hosed because the damage was due to flooding and most policies don't cover that. My folks had FEMA flood insurance so they got paid for the house but the lot was off the books for building back. My family owns a very nice lot on the north shore of lake pontchartrain that we are planning to build a house on stilts in the year 2105.

 

[limerunner]

Having lived in both places, what most people miss is that the West coast of FL hasn't been hit with the frequency of say Pensacola to Lake Charles. Its not the lack of codes, its that they haven't had the storms to clear out the old construction the way the upper gulf has. Look at the homes (& YCs) in that region and you will see a profile of structures dramatically different that it was even 20 years ago. Structures built to code & up out of the surge hold up quite well. If Tampa/Sarasota ever takes a direct hit like this it will be this destruction x10.. There are still a ton of old structures with no upgrades in structure in 40 years...

Now as for building in low lying areas, thats another topic. Once you get off the beach they are building slab homes every day in areas that have flooded at least once in the past 5 years. It's insane, but thats a rant for another day.

 

[Raz'r]

Having lived in both places, what most people miss is that the West coast of FL hasn't been hit with the frequency of say Pensacola to Lake Charles. Its not the lack of codes, its that they haven't had the storms to clear out the old construction the way the upper gulf has. Look at the homes (& YCs) in that region and you will see a profile of structures dramatically different that it was even 20 years ago. Structures built to code & up out of the surge hold up quite well. If Tampa/Sarasota ever takes a direct hit like this it will be this destruction x10.. There are still a ton of old structures with no upgrades in structure in 40 years...

Now as for building in low lying areas, thats another topic. Once you get off the beach they are building slab homes every day in areas that have flooded at least once in the past 5 years. It's insane, but thats a rant for another day.

too bad humans bury their heads and think "it'll never happen"

Of course, even in Cali you don't have to retrofit. My house is only up to current earthquake code (bolted foundation, etc) as we had a remodel in the last 20 years.

 

[Glenn McCarthy]

Simple question, complicated answer

PART 1
Insurance companies follow the same tax laws as everyone else, plus other laws.
As hurricanes happen seldomly, to save enough money for this rainy day (pun intended) it is not so simple to do.
A. An insurance company can apply saved money against KNOWN losses which reduces their income, and hence reduce their income tax at year's end. These are called "Reserves," the claim isn't paid out yet, but will be over time as the reconstruction occurs.
B. If they set up some sort of catastrophe/hurricane fund it would have to happen with income put into a "profit column" and it taxed. As they set aside billions of dollars year after year awaiting the big one, the income earned off this fund would be taxed.

PART 2
After Hurricane Andrew hit just south of Miami crossed the State obliterating everything in its path, State Farm the U.S. biggest insurance company said if that Hurricane hit 7 miles north of where it did, they would have gone bankrupt. Every insurance company woke up, added up how much they had insured in buildings and contents, both personal and commercial, temporary housing expense and business interruption in each zip code and gasped at how that would impact their companies.

This led to insurance companies either leaving Florida, or greatly reducing the number of insureds they had per Zip Code through non-renewal notices.

Insurance became expensive with the reduced competition, and because as mentioned in PART 1, they can't for a rainy day, but need to have lots of cash on hand in case a big one hit each year.

What happened next is.....the people complained to their politicians how expensive their insurance became. Uh oh.

The politicians started a State Owned insurance company called "Citizen's Insurance Company." At first they underwrote, used actuaries to do the mathematics, statistics, etc. to determine pricing. But the people of Florida kept complaining. They threw out actuary underwriting, and started using political underwriting - drop the price so the politicians stay in office. Citizens is the #2 insurer in the State.

Should Citizens not have enough money to pay the claims from Ian, the taxpayers of the State are the backstop by law. Look for an extra tax bill in Florida in the coming years to make up for political underwriting and "cheap premiums" those people got.

That's an interesting question. Can't they just raise premiums to cover projected losses?

 

[floater]

should barrier islands be rebuilt?

it's nice to be near the beach and all - but perhaps its worth noting that the shoreline is in a period of rapid advance.

two ways to look at it. not often geologic time overlaps with human time. so, we're either lucky to witness the changes. or not.

 

[nolatom]

Maybe.... found out three years ago I was adopted by my Dad, mom had me sans husband and won the lottery with getting hitched to the man that raised me. I found some paperwork that led me to believe this was the case when I was 14/15 but they lied and said it wasn't the case.

So two things happened I gave the wrong medical history my whole life and Dad getting disowned wasn't because mom was Catholic it was dad's mom considered mom a, what is the word? oh, whore. Mom was a very good liar with a number of accomplices(aunts, uncles, cousins, grandmother) when I was growing up. My oldest was married at Boston city hall and I needed a new copy of my birth certificate and to my surprise it didn't match my 'birth record' that I used my whole life, the clerk apologized as they should have given me the post adoption one but gave me real one instead. Dad was dead and mom had rapid onset dementia when I asked about this. She is now in a home for real dementia and I have some real anger issues about the whole deal. Real dad was from that area as well don't think he is with us any longer but I will keep his name out of this for no other reason than he did not impede me being adopted by a stellar human being. Other than this situation I don't know of any other time my Dad lied, see accomplices above. So anyone I could be mad at is dead or not mentally capable of understanding my anger and disappointment.

That's a lot to have come through, Darth, my upbringing was much less complicated and stressful. Hope it's mostly in your rearview mirror now and not your windshield. Maybe diving is good therapy, for both of us Bay Staters.