From Hurricane to Hype

For the last few days the news of the super-storm "Hurricane Sandy" has been polluting the airways and folks on the East Coast have been preparing all week in preparation for its arrival.

U.S. President Barack Obama made a public announcement on 28 October from the White House and urged East Coast residents to follow the instructions of their State and local authorities in order to maintain safe preparations for the storm. City Mayors and State officials worked together to turn off certain utilities as mentioned in the previous blog, the American Red Cross has built up preparations for possible medical devastations, the mass media has been covering the storm as "Breaking" at all hours of the day and night, and even humor-filled creators shared several fake photos dramatizing the storm where social media members passed them around all day to share in the "awe." Both the U.S. Stock Exchange and the federal government are closed pending further official notice.

Although the total death toll has reached double digits with 69 deaths in the Caribbean and 13 deaths stateside, the National Hurricane Center posted a memorandum dated 27 October detailing "Hurricane Sandy" to be demoted down to a Post-Tropical Storm when weather stations reported Sandy as a Category 1 hurricane on the same day. The issue with this is that the mass media did not mention anything about this reclassification until today, mind you two days later after the memo had been published online.

The rumor going around is that "Hurricane Sandy 2012" was actually another drill from a 1997 bulletin naming the National Weather Service Station in Miami, Florida as its originator. The purpose of this drill was to ensure federal government agencies worked in tandem with State and local government authorities to ensure cooperation from the affected communities and that rebuilding public facilities would take no longer than 6 months following the storm.