}

Sunday, March 16, 2014

Lusi in disguise

I don’t always remember to follow-up things I’ve posted about, so here’s one now: Cyclone Lusi was no big deal for Auckland. In fact, it wasn’t as bad as some ordinary storms.

Lusi was deadly when it hit Vanuatu, but by the time it reached New Zealand it was downgraded to a category 2. Yesterday it was classified as a tropical depression.

We had almost no rain. We did get some very strong gusts of wind, but this was actually a good thing: It would've been very muggy without it. We also had no damage to speak of, apart from some leaves and rubbish blowing around, that sort of thing.

So, not a big deal for Auckland at all. This is good.

Weather is still largely unpredictable, at least, specifics of weather are—like, if a certain thing will happen or not. This leads people to become complacent about weather warnings, assuming a predicted storm won’t happen.

I’m a little more cautious. I know that no cyclone over the past 18 years that I’ve been in New Zealand has caused trouble for Auckland—in fact, various weather bombs have been far worse, like the one that damaged our house, or the one a year later which was bad, but didn’t damage our house.

But what if one day there's storm that's as bad as they predict—or worse? Our “Get Thru” kit will see us, well, through. It’s always good to be prepared for emergencies, whether they ever happen or not.

Next time, the cyclone may not come disguised as a really windy day; next time it could be a very big deal.

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