الأسبوع الوطني للتأهب للأعاصير

We're going to continue with our weather coverage. But, from bit of different angle here. This is some future preparation as we approach hurricane season. Craig, what are we looking at? Yeah, so this is the time to prepare for the upcoming Atlantic hurricane season. It is literally hurricane preparedness week. Now, this isn't just Virginia thing or or Hampton Roads thing. This is national hurricane preparedness week. And the reason that they are doing this now, you're saying, "Well, we're not quite into hurricane season." We're not yet. That starts June 1 and it runs through the end of November. So, now is the time to start preparing your home. These are the things that the hurricane center and emergency managers are really stressing. Prepare your home now. Make sure you have your flood insurance in place. did myself. went back, made sure everything was paid up last month. And keep in mind, while the official start of hurricane season is June 1, doesn't always, you know, hurricanes don't always follow, you know, the calendar. And over the last decade or so, don't have the numbers in front of me, but we have had some early season tropical development where we've had tropical systems in May. And there was some discussion at one point of even starting to expand with climate change little bit, expanding that hurricane season in the Atlantic basin little earlier. Now, remember what was one of the big things we talked about few weeks ago, before went on vacation. Something going on in the Pacific. You remember me talking about an ocean temperature shift. Spanish name. El Niño. El Niño. Yes. Which is Spanish for the Niño. love that joke. That's an old SNL gag. no, for the child or the baby boy, right? The El Niño represents an abnormal warming of the sea surface temperatures in the eastern Pacific. First noted around the coast of Peru, and we noticed that, and this has been going on for centuries that we've been aware of. But, this is something that this this pattern shift with the weather, when we get into these El Niños, which it's believed we're going to have strong El Niño later this season and through the winter and into next spring, potentially. If we get it, kind of historically, the global pattern shifts tend to suppress or reduce the hurricane development in the Atlantic basin. That's great news for us. Now, those hurricanes can bring some needed tropical rains to the southeast US. So, you have to weigh the good and the bad, but the bottom line is, while the hurricane forecast for the upcoming season is little bit lower than it has been for the past several years, you still need to be prepared. You know, it doesn't matter. You only need one tropical system to wreak havoc and make it the worst hurricane season on record where you live if that hurricane hits your location. So, what the Department of Emergency Management, what NOAA, the National Hurricane Center, what all of the officials are saying is take the time now to prepare your home. So, what can you do? Make sure your insurance is in place. You can't wait until Hurricane Dorothy is bearing down on you because at that point the insurance company is like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, we're not going to do this now because, you know, the system's coming in. That's bad risk for them." You know, there's waiting period before it goes into place. Make sure you've got it now. The other thing is know your zone. You can go to the VA Department of Emergency Management. If you do Google search on know your zone, you'll be able to follow the links there. It's great resource, and they have all of Hampton Roads broken down into different flood zones and risks and evacuation zones. it's interesting. live very close to the Chesapeake Bay on one of the inlets, on Little Creek. And my house, specifically, is in flood zone But, across the street, literally across the street, the drop-off is significant enough that it's flood zone So, when you take look, you can zoom in little bit here. can show you some of the different examples here while this is up. Let me show you some of the areas. This is great. I'm glad we can do this live. This is why love live impact news. Sarah's like, "Wait, Craig's taking over the controller." That's zooming out. Here's zooming in. Okay, for instance, you take look, let's just pick this area here around Little Creek Inlet, okay? And as we zoom in, you see all these yeah. Okay, we're going to get here. That'll fill in the colors here in just second. You see all those areas in flood zone Okay, these areas here where the cursor is, these would all be so prone to flooding, okay? But, you can see like East Beach is in flood zone On the other side of Little Creek, you head over this way and you've got flood zone right there in this orange color right along the coast, over to the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel. parts of the areas around the Lesner Bridge, on the west side of the Lesner Bridge, flood zone But, then you get over here on the east side or the ocean side of the Lesner Bridge, it's flood zone Then you get over towards Fort Story, you get these areas that are high, you know, you can literally break it down where you are. And when the Department of Emergency Management calls for an evacuation, they may say flood zones and need to go. If you live in flood zone you're okay. But, you also have to know what your vulnerabilities are. You know, you look at this, okay? You've got 64. This is route out. You can see the Willoughby is under an Naval Station Norfolk, flood zone You get into some of these communities there in Norfolk, flood zone Same thing, you look around the Elizabeth River, you can see the various zones. So, this is great resource, and it's just important that you know what your vulnerabilities are and your risk. forgot, walked away from the microphone. Sarah, you're so great. She's like spinning the mic towards me trying to get me back. rogue on me, okay. she's like, "Where's he going?" Got to be ready for anything when we got Craig here. puts baby in corner." That's it, you know, that's it. You just get out and do my thing. You escaped your corner with no issue whatsoever. You were out and about. It's also amazing how specific those zones are drawn. They clearly put lot of effort into it. my point though. wanted to zoom in and show you that it can literally be street to street depending on where you are, what your vulnerabilities are. So, highly recommend if you've never spent time, and it's honestly something that before purchased my homes, you know, when first came here and brought young family here, we wanted to be in one of the highest points in Hampton Roads. Well, we've since, in the last 25 years, said, "Well, we want to be closer to the water." And we understand what the risks are, but just knowing, you know, "Hey, I'm okay with being able to up and go." If you are not able to move, you might want to, you know, consider getting place that's less vulnerable to the flooding. Do those zones impact your insurance policies and your rates? Absolutely. mean, some places you're not required to get flood insurance, some areas it's highly recommended that you are. and depending on what your vulnerabilities are, you know, insurance companies will will carry different rates. So, it's all good information to have, and that's again what the Department of Emergency Management says, this is how, you know, we go about it, and understanding which areas are most susceptible to potential flooding. In addition to that, okay, think about tree limbs. maybe dead trees or, you know, think about trees that may be kind of on their last leg or shallow root systems or whatever. You might want to take limb. What's that? Their last limb. They're on their last limb, literally. you might want to, you know, take the time before anything is even threatening us to prune those things back. You just want to make sure your property is good to go. And again, understand the risks from storm surge, understand if your area is really susceptible to freshwater flooding. You know, like we've got some storm drains that are really back up quickly in heavy rain. So, while we're good as far as an elevation, don't worry so much about the the storm surge, am very concerned about extremely heavy rain cuz that can create other issues. So, just understanding that, having plan in place, and making sure your insurance are up-to-date, that's what's most important and and why they have hurricane preparedness week. It's that medical term, right? Preventative care. If you do these things now, in the long run, it'll be helpful for your safety and those around you. Okay, Craig, always helpful, and we can rest assured there will be plenty of hurricane coverage as we approach that June 1st date. Every single different angle you could imagine to protect yourself in the event of disaster like that will be covered. And don't look now, but that's less than month away. Yeah, it's coming up. And again, hopefully we won't have as active season due to this developing El Niño. If all this plays out, maybe we'll get little bit less stressful season. But, can promise you, our team will not drop its guard. We're watching everything. And again, even if you only have two hurricanes in season, if one of those impacts Hampton Roads, it's all we're going to be talking about for months. Okay. So, yeah, we just have to be ready and understand that if anything does happen, we'll keep you updated. Very good. Craig Moller, ladies and gentlemen, back in the studio again after well-deserved week of vacation. Now,