The past few days have for some along the East Coast, been tragic. Hurricane Sandy, the much vaunted superstorm that developed right along the Pacific has more than lived up to it’s alleged destructive hype. Much of New York has been affected; subways are submerged, people trapped in their homes and awaiting rescue, buildings internally destroyed due to flooding, and an untold amount of property damage due to the storm force winds of the Hurricane. New Jersey isn’t looking any better, the damage is set to be record setting in it’s estimated cost, and all of this seems to serve one underlying thought, we must always remember to respect the power of nature.
Now what I mean to say is that in our technologically fueled world, where we brace ourselves for an onslaught of terrorist bombings, wars, and endless cyber attacks, we simply must remember the power and force that nature itself wields. Take the aforementioned New York for example, this is a city that see’s danger and destructive violence on what would seem to be a daily basis. Think back to the failed Times Square bombing little more than a year ago, or even back to the tragedy of 9/11; these instances while tragic in some cases, as a whole did not deal out nearly as much damage as Sandy is doing right now. This is an astonishing thing to think about, this tropical storm turned Hurricane has toppled buildings and shutdown progress where our nations greatest enemies could not, that is a profoundly illuminating notion. Concerning simple progress for our nation’s economy think back to merely a year ago when the massive coldfront of February snowed in large portions of New York including JFK airport. Thousands of flights were shutdown, not to mention small businesses and corporations, these things take a serious toll on our economy!
The point of all of this is the say that we as a nation must be more prepared for these large scale occurrences. Evacuations, infrastructure that is equipped to withstand not only bombs, but salt-filled tidewater, quick and concise relief work must be available to deal with downed power lines/structures and to rescue trapped citizens. And while we cannot stop nature, we can however gird ourselves, our businesses, buildings, homes, and way of life to be better equipped to ride out the storm, rather than just survive it.