Long Island: The Southern Coastlands: On the Subropical Margin

Long Island has a few things in common with the first one being Hurricanes. Long Island is in the Hurricane Hazard Zone as shown by the National Hurricane Center:

Most people do not relate Long Island to hurricanes but they do follow the coast northward and Long Island has been hit in the past by these monster weather formations. In 1985 Gloria hit Long Island, if you are not from the area you probably didn't think much about it at all. I was there at the time and remember it all too well. I lived on Southern Long Island along the coast, not right on the water but less than a 1/2 mile from it. People were scared, talking about the great hurricane of 1938 and that they were worried because of all the development that has taken place since then, there were alot more houses and people to get damaged. Back in 38 my hometown was mostly farms, and not totally developed like in the 80's. There has been alot of debate over Gloria, it was originally a Category 3, but in hindsight it was downgraded to a Category 1 which is the smallest of hurricanes.

Despite this downgrade, where I was had winds in the Category 2 range with winds up to 110 miles per hour. If you think that is not bad think again. Thankfully Gloria hit at low tide so the flooding was minimized, but I will never forget looking out the front windows (before being promptly yelled at to get away from the windows) and seeing the street, and front yard totally underwater. My dad then told me to go open the basement door, and I took 1 step down into the dark, we had no power, then on the 2nd step my foot was totally underwater! The eye was the most exciting part, we got to go outside and see the neighborhood, there were cars crushed by trees and giant branches.

The aftermath of the hurricane was totally great I thought as a kid, we did not have school for a week, and there was all this chopping and cutting of wood to do. In retrospect not having power for 2 weeks must have totally sucked for my parents, I fondly remember it though as 2 weeks of fall BBQ out in the backyard.

Of course this is nothing compared to what the Southern Coastlands gets but we get a taste every once in awhile. In my indtroductory post to Long Island, Irene was hitting the area and I posted a few pictures of my hometown if you want to take a look.

The following link has soem great pictures of past hurricanes on Long Island:

http://www.businessinsider.com/past-hurricane-new-york-pictures-2011-8?op=1

Here are some pictures of the aftermath of Gloria in 1985.