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Great show, as usual.
One thing that has always made me wonder, is why the USA always evacuates when there is a hurricane.
In 1987 I experienced my first hurricane, with wind speeds over 130mph. The news didn’t know it was coming, so I just went to work as normal, except the train was held up, because of a tree on the line, so I got a lift from the station to Portsmouth Harbour Station, a railway station on a pier, with in a Royal Mail high sided van. It was only when I got to work that I found out we had a hurricane.
In 1991 we had the next one, again, no one really knew it was coming. I was working in a pre-fab hut, built during WW2. The walls were flexing a bit, but it remained safe. In fact, we were thinking of evacuating to the new data center, but as we looked out the window, the roof lifted off the data center and landed in the middle of the car park, so we had to run over and evacuate the people from the offices on the top floor. But, other than that, we’ve not really had any problems.
In the early 2000s I was driving to the UK, I’d gotten about half way from Bavaria to the Calais in France for the ferry, when the radio started issuing warnings to not leave the house unless absolutely necessary… As I was already half way to my destination, I couldn’t really go back (4 hour drive in good weather), so I pushed on. There were a few overturned lorries and the ferry was cancelled when I got there, so I had to drive another half an hour to the tunnel.
These days the authorities generally say we shouldn’t leave the house unless absolutely necessary. But I’ve never seen people evacuated for a hurricane - generally, you are safer staying in your house than being out on the road.
Rivers flooding is the only one that really gets people moving. Sand sacks along the banks of the river and in doorways and cellar windows and people in the affected area told to seek higher ground, but for wind, we stay in our houses.
Why is America so different? In Europe the houses have been built to withstand hurricanes for centuries, in fact, some of the 400-500 year old houses are among the sturdiest in a storm. Yet in America the houses seem to be made out of flimsy materials and they just blow away and you build a new house where the old one was, before it got blown down the street and out of the county…
Even when we get tornadoes, it is often a case of “in such-and-such village a tornado rages through, pulling up sapplings and removing roof tiles,” yet in the USA whole settlements just disappear, because of the flimsy house building.
So, why don’t most people build houses to withstand storms in the USA? In Europe it is generally in the building codes that the houses have to withstand high wind speeds (130+mph).
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Two words: storm surges.
I was listening to this episode today and kept getting frustrated with a lot of what I was hearing. Just before I got out of the car, the question was raised asking if Google could appeal the ruling in the Epic lawsuit based on the ruling in the case against Apple going differently. Leo said “tough luck”. I’m pretty sure that one of the ideals of the law in the US is that the law applies equally to everyone. While we know that doesn’t happen in reality, it should still be the goal and if it is the goal, then why wouldn’t apply here? I realize the two cases aren’t quite identical so maybe there are intricacies in the cases that would mean that what applies to Apple doesn’t apply to Google, but to hear the crew just blow it off like it’s no big deal just seems like they don’t care. If that’s the case, why discuss it at all.
Just before that when they were discussing the topic of people being able to do what they want with their devices that they bought, I think it was Leo that said that on no other platform or device was it so restricted that the device maker controlled what could be installed. My first thought was, what are you talking about? Game consoles do this. Can anybody develop a game for the Switch or the PS5 without going through Nintendo or Sony? How about Roku, can you install 3rd party apps on that? How about my smart oven or smart fridge? Can I install whatever I want on those? There are so many devices and appliances that we can’t just install whatever we want on them that this statement was just ridiculous.
Hearing Leo make sweeping statements like this has become a recurring theme on a lot of the TWiT shows lately. I cringe every time I hear him say something that starts with “nobody” or “everybody” because there is almost nothing in the world today that everyone agrees on so by saying everybody wants something or nobody wants something just makes him sound stupid.
Having lived on the coast, I understand tidal surges, but it doesn’t answer the question about in-land houses being built to blow or wash away in a storm, instead of being resistant to a storm, like in Europe. I was interested in why the US is so divergent from many other countries in building a lot of “temporary” homes, whereas in Europe, for example, houses are built to last hundreds of years and hold up to high winds and floods.
Flooding is common here too, just look at the Ahrtal disaster from a couple of years back or the annual flooding of towns and cities along the European rivers.
The cars get washed down the street, but the houses stay put and people just dry them out and replace damaged furniture. Sometimes the water erodes the ground around the house so badly that the foundations collapse, but that is fairly rare, like in Ahrtal.
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Heh. Things that are “affordable” here such as houses are not built with the highest of standards. A previous company I worked for was a homebuilder. Beautiful homes, but the walls were paper thin. No privacy from room to room. Made me wonder about the rest of the build materials. The older homes in my opinion are were better build of materials other than lead pipe. But those “resilient” homes on the coast probably won’t sell because of pricing. Heck the pricing for the homes that get destroyed there now are pretty pricey. Particularly because of the location/land.
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Yes, our flat was built in the 1920s, it has high ceilings, so stays naturally cool in the summer, plus thick stone walls, so it takes longer to heat up in the summer, meaning we don’t need AC.
The house we are selling is expensive, I agree, we are hoping to get around $275,000 for it, but it is solid and well insulated and has survived countless storms and 2 floods as a result.
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I’ve been in FL a couple of times during a hurricane. The last one was Nicole when we were both isolating with Covid, that was fun 
Both times we weren’t in the evacuation area.
It’s much more organised in places such as FL where they have predetermined evacuation zones, and to Leo’s point a stronger house isn’t going to help much when you get a 15-foot storm surge at 3am.
I thought we weren’t allowed to call them hurricanes here? Has to originate in tropical seas or something.
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I was thinking more inland, like North Carolina, for example Graham or Burlington
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Each country has its own construction culture. Usually adapted to match local environmental conditions and local materials available. In Greece most houses are build using reinforced concrete because of the earthquakes, so there is never an issue with high winds.
In Scotland I have lived in flats build in 1800s the construction has changed a lot since then, where people used to use stone, today they use timber and bricks. As a result the modern materials might provide better insulation but they don’t last as long and their mechanical strength is not great either. It’s basically a step towards the US construction style.
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