Posted by Organizations helping black flood victims only on Thu, 31 Aug 2017 12:05 | #

Colorlines.org, “How to Donate Money and Other Aid to Communities of Color in Houston”, 29 Aug 2017:

A list of charities and organizations working to keep immigrant, Black, Latinx and other populations safe after Hurricane Harvey. 

Four days after Hurricane Harvey made landfall in Texas, people in the southern parts of the state remain in dire need of help. Nine people have been confirmed dead and at least another foot of rain is expected to fall before the end of the week. Today (August 29), CNN reports that two levees have been breached in Brazoria County, south of Houston, and officials tweeted a warning that read, “Get out now!!” Houston police have rescued at least 3,400 people in the city, which has already had more than 30 inches of rain as a result of Harvey.

Yesterday (August 28), former President Barack Obama tweeted his appreciation to everyone taking part in the rescue efforts and suggested that concerned people donate to the American Red Cross.

But the Red Cross—an organization that provides disaster relief and emergency assistance—has a controversial track record regarding how donations are used following natural disasters.

Per a previous Colorlines article, “an investigation by ProPublica and NPR in 2015 claimed the agency built only six homes with the $500 million it received in donations after the 2010 earthquake which devastated [Haiti].” And last year, after people in Louisiana were displaced by flooding, Colorlines reported that at a Baton Rouge Red Cross shelter, “volunteers had to pay for baby formula out of pocket—even though Red Cross received a truckload of it as a donation that could be distributed to the majority-Black population being housed there.”

Fortunately, there are organizations whose focus is to provide assistance to communities of color and other groups that are disproportionately vulnerable in times of tragedy. Here, a partial list.
Organizations Focused on People of Color

The Black Women’s Defense League is a Dallas-based organization that is working with Houston activists to determine what underserved communities need. Click here for a list of supplies that can be donated; head here to donate money.

RAICES, a Texas-based nonprofit legal advocacy group, has been working with Texas shelters to find housing for woman and children stranded by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) after being released from detention centers. To send clothing, toys and toiletries to these woman and children, mail boxes to the Collins Garden Library in San Antonio.

ICNA Relief, also known as Muslims for Humanity, is a nonprofit that has committed aid to residents of Southern Texas after the devastation of Harvey.

BlackAmericaWeb.com Relief Fund benefits individuals and families who are victims of publicly declared disasters. Tom Joyner founded it following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, and he has donated $20,000 to it in the wake of Harvey.

Living Hope Wheelchair Association serves populations with spinal cord injuries and other disabilities, and the bulk of their members are immigrants and low-wage workers. The organization has also been conducting direct rescues since the hurricane made landfall.

SHAPE Community Center says its organization aims to “improve the quality of life for people of African descent (all people) through programs and activities, with emphasis on unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity and faith.” Since the storm made landfall in Texas, it has mobilized to help the people of Houston stay safe and find shelter.

South Texas Human Rights Center is committed to keeping immigrant families intact and preventing migrant deaths along the Texas-Mexico border through community initiatives. The border—and those living on it—were in the direct path of Hurricane Harvey.
Organizations Helping Other Marginalized Communities

Hurricane Harvey Relief Fund was created by the mayor of Houston, Sylvester Turner, as a direct response to individuals and corporations asking how they could help the city. On Monday (August 28), Turner who is also a lawyer, announced in a press conference that he would personally represent any undocumented people who faced deportation as a result of seeking help because of the storm.

The Way Home works to end homelessness in Houston, Harris County and Fort Bend County. It has partnered with a network of area shelters to achieve this. Donate directly to The Way Home or to its partners.

The Transgender Foundation of America has created a relief fund in the Houston-area for trans and intersex people, two groups who are often turned away from shelters during disasters.

Portlight assists people with disabilities who have medical needs or require shelter as a result of Hurricane Harvey. 

Texas Diaper Bank provides emergency diaper kits (which are not distributed by relief agencies) for babies, seniors and people with disabilities.

The Homeless Period Project of Austin distributes tampons, pads and other period-related items to those displaced by the storm.

Posted by Harvey aftermath on Fri, 01 Sep 2017 03:42 | #

Hurricane Harvey Aftermath: 100,000 Homes Destroyed, A Million Vehicles Ruined And Bottled Water Being Sold For $99 A Case

Harvey Has Dumped 15 Trillion Gallons Of Water On Texas And May Be The Most Expensive Natural Disaster In U.S. History

Hurricane Harvey Will Render Some Parts Of Texas ‘Uninhabitable For An Extended Period Of Time

Posted by Irmina gathering, maybe worse than Harvey, Katrina on Sat, 02 Sep 2017 06:34 | #

The Economic Collapse, “Category 6? If Hurricane Irma Becomes The Strongest Hurricane In History, It Could Wipe Entire Cities Off The Map”, 1 Sep 2017:
       

Meteorologists have been shocked at how rapidly Hurricane Irma has been strengthening, and they are already warning that if it hits the United States as a high level category 5 storm the devastation would be absolutely unprecedented.  Of course we are already dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, and many experts are already telling us that the economic damage done by that storm will easily surpass any other disaster in all of U.S. history.  But there is a very real possibility that Hurricane Irma could be even worse.  According to the National Hurricane Center, at 5 PM on Friday Irma already had sustained winds of 130 miles per hour.  But it is still very early, and as you will see below, next week it is expected to potentially develop into a category 5 storm with winds of 180 miles per hour or more.

I suppose that it is appropriate that such a powerful storm has a very powerful name.  In old German, the name “Irma” actually means “war goddess”…

  The name Irma is a German baby name. In German the meaning of the name Irma is: Universal, from the Old German ‘irmin’. War goddess.

Irma began forming on Wednesday, and it intensified at a faster rate than any storm that we have seen in nearly 20 years…

  Hurricane Irma formed early Wednesday in the warm waters off the coast of West Africa — and took just 30 hours to strengthen to a Category 3. That’s the fastest intensification rate in almost two decades. By Friday afternoon, the storm had also grown noticeably larger in size with a well-defined eye, a classic sign of a strong hurricane.

  Though Irma poses no immediate threat to land, the outlook is ominous: In the Atlantic, Irma is expected to pass through some abnormally warm waters — the primary fuel source for storm systems. The official National Hurricane Center forecast says it will remain at major hurricane status for at least the next five days, and, in a worst-case scenario, Irma could eventually grow into one of the strongest hurricanes ever seen in the Atlantic.

So how powerful could Irma eventually become?

According to Michael Ventrice of the Weather Channel, Irma could easily become a “super typhoon” with “sustained speeds of over 180mph”…

  Veteran USA forecaster Michael Ventrice posted the track model on Twitter overnight and warned it looked like the storm could be a “super typhoon”, with sustained speeds of over 180mph.

  He wrote: “These are the highest windspeed forecasts I’ve ever seen in my 10 yrs of Atlantic hurricane forecasting.

  “Irma is another retiree candidate.”

The scale we have right now really never envisioned storms that powerful.  In fact, some have suggested that we need to add a “category 6” to describe the kind of “super storms” that are now developing in the Atlantic.

One of the reasons why Irma is so unique is because it is a “Cape Verde hurricane”…

  There are a few factors that worry hurricane forecasters more about this storm when compared to the myriad other tropical storms and hurricanes that tend to form in the Atlantic.

  First, it’s a so-called Cape Verde storm, having formed off the west coast of Africa. These storms tend to be the ones that go on to affect the U.S., after gathering strength for many days during their march across the ocean. For example, Hurricane Andrew, which was the most recent Category 5 storm to hit the U.S. in 1992, was a Cape Verde-type storm.

  Because they begin at a relatively low latitude and move west rather than northwest, it can be harder for upper level winds blowing across North America to pick up and steer these types of storms away from the U.S. coast.

Let us hope that this storm does get steered away from our coastlines at some point, but so far that is just not happening.

Many hurricanes are often weakened by wind shear, but that isn’t happening to Irma either.  In fact, CNN is reporting that “Irma will remain in a low-shear environment for the next several days”…

  A strong high-pressure ridge to the north of Irma, over the Atlantic, is steering the storm to the west and limiting the wind shear in the upper levels of the atmosphere, which has allowed the storm to grow so quickly. Wind shear is like hurricane kryptonite, and prevents storms from forming or gaining strength.

  Unfortunately, Irma will remain in a low-shear environment for the next several days, so there isn’t much hope that Irma will weaken any time soon.

Basically, conditions are nearly ideal for a “super storm” to develop, and if Irma does make it to the U.S. the destruction that it causes could be absolutely off the charts.

Of course at this point there is no guarantee that it will ever reach the United States.  But if it does, and if it is still a category 5 storm when it arrives, we could be facing an event unlike anything that we have ever seen before.

Do you remember Hurricane Katrina?  Well, scientists now know that when it hit New Orleans it had already been downgraded to just a “low category 3” storm…

  To put this all in perspective, Katrina was a Category 5 hurricane out over some hot spots in the Gulf. But when it hit New Orleans, scientists now know, Katrina had winds at a low Category 3, and much of them Category 2, including the “left side winds” that then came down from the north and pushed the surge-swollen waters of Lake Pontchartrain over and through NOLA’s levees. (Hurricanes spin counterclockwise in the northern hemisphere, so when Katrina came ashore just east of New Orleans, its winds hit the city from the north.)

  Only three Category 5s have come ashore in the United States in the past century — the 1935 Labor Day Hurricane, Camille in 1969 and Andrew in 1992.

And Hurricane Harvey was just a category 4 storm.

If Hurricane Irma were to make landfall as a category 5 storm with sustained winds of 180 miles per hour, it would rip buildings and everything else in its path to shreds.

Next week we shall find out what happens.  Let us hope for the best, but let us also get prepared for the worst.

Michael Snyder is a Republican candidate for Congress in Idaho’s First Congressional District, and you can learn how you can get involved in the campaign on his official website. His new book entitled “Living A Life That Really Matters” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.

Posted by 1,400 people killed in Asian floods on Sat, 02 Sep 2017 17:44 | #

More than 1,400 people have been killed across India, Nepal and Bangladesh as the region suffers the most devastating flooding in a decade.