Hurricane Sandy

October 30, 2012 — Hurricane "Sandy" tore up the east coast from Florida to Maine yesterday, leaving devastation in its wake, over 40 deaths, and billions of dollars in damage. Millions were left without power. New Jersey, where it made landfall, was particularly hard-hit, especially Atlantic City where the famous boardwalk was ripped up and much of the city left underwater. In New York City, subways were flooded, the city brought to a standstill, and the stock market was forced to close two days in a row because of weather for the first time since 1888.

The huge, record-breaking storm spread out and brought several feet of snow to the mountains of West Virginia. Its effects were felt as far west as the Great Lakes. In New England, the south coast incurred considerable damage from wind and storm surge. Boston was hard-hit, and power outages were widespread.

Here in southern New Hampshire, high winds and rain prevailed from mid-afternoon into the night, this on the first anniversary of last year's early snowstorm that took out power for some, myself included, for over three days. I had visions of that happening again and had psyched myself up for it. Around 9 p.m. I was using my computer when suddenly the monitor went blank and the lights went out. I thought OK, this is it, I won't see the lights again for a few days. But it came back on in about five minutes and never went out again.

Today, there's a mix of sun and clouds, the temperature is near 70 and there's no wind. It's as though nothing happened here in southern New Hampshire, but for points south, lives are going to be disrupted for many days.