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The weather in the USA...

they don't seem to have got much warning for such a huge storm or did they just ignore it/told to ignore it in the case of the workers?
I've been trying to work this out, and in one article about the prisoners working at the factory, it says:
The Paducah Sun reported in July on a work agreement between the Graves County Jail and the candle factory. Jail officials told the newspaper that the individuals would receive some income but declined to say how much, and that some of the money they made would be returned to the jail.

On Sunday, Graves County Jailer George Workman said those who had been held at the county jail were now split between two nearby jails.

Workman said the work program at the candle factory had just started last week. The program was approved by the Kentucky Department of Corrections as a way to help reduce recidivism, Workman said...

The Graves County Jail was evacuated before the storm, according to a post Saturday on the jail’s Facebook page. A person commented on the post, saying they were worried about a family member at the jail.


The jail responded: “Unless he worked at the candle factory, you can rest assured that he is okay.”
It seems to me like if you have enough advance notice to successfully evacuate a jail, then surely there must be enough notice to let people know they don't need to come to work, or at least to successfully evacuate the candle factory?
It sounds like a lovely place to work, anyway:

Also this year, Mayfield Consumer Products convinced an appellate court to uphold the dismissal of a civil rights lawsuit filed by Armando Rivera Hernandez, a laborer whom the company recruited in Puerto Rico. Hernandez said he was fired for being overweight after the company’s chief financial officer sent out a text message stating: “We are working diligently to clean up the epileptic, obese, pregnant, and special needs issues[.]”

The courts ruled that Hernandez, having signed a labor agreement with the company and having later been returned to Puerto Rico, should not have access to Kentucky courts. Instead, the courts said, he should have pursued his grievance through an employment service office, as his labor agreement required.
 
In the future, I think houses in a lot of places will need to be built underground. Its in the 70s today and its almost Christmas. We're also getting winds up to 75 MPH today and it's just a regular day. They actually closed the schools because of the wind. 75 mph is the equivalent of a small tornado and its shaking the house and rattling the windows. As climate change progresses, the wind speeds will also probably increase too. Buildings will probably go partially underground to stay out of the wind and to maximize energy savings in heating and cooling homes.

<edited to add>
Had a severe weather warning, but it's passed now with just a thunder storm. It was completely dark at 3 in the afternoon.
 
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Wasn't there the Fuller Dome over Manhatten?

It's becoming The Sheep Look Up

I don't recall. In the first part of the book, when he ditches his first identity, he's working as a digital preacher. When he burns that identity, he lets the church deflate.

It is.
 
US snowstorms: California and other western states battered
27/12/2021
Heavy storms have battered western regions of the United States, leaving thousands without power.

Almost 30in (76cm) of snow fell in California over a 24-hour period ending Sunday morning, causing road closures, including a 70-mile (112km) stretch of Interstate 80 into Nevada.

Avalanche warnings are in effect across six states.

Over the weekend, southern California was hit by rainstorms, which saw power lines snap and streets flooded.

In Montana, the NWS warned that "dangerously cold wind chills could cause frostbite on exposed skin in as little as five minutes". Wind chill could make the temperatures feel as low as -48C.

One benefit of the storms in California will be to replenish the Sierra snowpack. It accounts for about 30% of California's fresh water supply and had been at dangerously low levels after weeks of dry weather.

The state's department of water resources reported on Christmas Eve that the snowpack was between 114% and 137% of normal ranges, with more snow expected.
Christmas roast: temperatures soar in Texas and US south-east
Sat 25 Dec 2021
About 200 temperature records in the US may be broken over the next several days as warm air across Texas and the south-east is predicted to bring spring or even summer-like conditions, making Christmas Day likely to be the warmest in 50 to 100 years in some areas.

The temperatures could make this the warmest December on record for many cities in the region including Dallas, Houston, New Orleans, St Louis and Kansas City.
 

People were shivering for 20 hours or more in driver’s seats and truck cabs, watching fuel gauges sink over the sleepless night. State troopers slowly trudged from person to person, helping when they could with supplies. Tow trucks dragged car after disabled car out of the ice.
 
How Greenville, California used to look:

View attachment 282280

The scene last night:

View attachment 282278


California finds PG&E equipment responsible for massive Dixie Fire
Jan 5 2022
Pacific Gas & Electric transmission lines ignited the Dixie Fire in Northern California, which burned nearly 1 million acres and destroyed more than 1,300 homes last summer, according to a new state investigation.

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or Cal Fire, said on Tuesday that its “meticulous and thorough investigation” determined the Dixie Fire was sparked by a tree that fell on electrical distribution lines owned and operated by PG&E. The tree was located west of a dam in Plumas County.
Good long peice ProPublica with The New York Times Magazine. Coastal liberal but worth a read if your interested

California’s Forever Fire
Jan. 3
Forest management is a catchall phrase for a Swiss Army knife of large-format landscaping tools. Relevant to mitigating wildfire risk, those include prescribed fire (burning on purpose, when conditions are favorable, to pay down the fire debt); mechanical thinning (pruning at vast scale); and cutting fuel breaks (creating wide belts of land with few fuels, so fire can’t run across). Increasingly this means partnering with tribes, who have been fighting to reclaim their traditions, as well as their lands.

Toward these ends, the state of California is now investing a lot of money in forest management — $1.5 billion for wildfire and forest resilience over the last two years. Nonprofits are funding community projects. Locals are burning and thinning around towns themselves. The federal Build Back Better package included $14 billion, to be spread across the country over the coming decade, with $10 billion specifically for the wildland-urban interface. We’re talking about a lot of trees here. Tens of millions of acres of California are overloaded with fuels. A recent state-federal agreement aims to treat a million acres per year. But we’re never going to clear out the tree hoard through human effort alone.
 
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I think people underestimate how cold it can get in the US. Here's story from the Canadian/US border. Four people, including a baby, froze to death trying to cross the border. Temperatures were in the -14 F range and the trip was estimated to take 11 hours. That's just too long to spend in that temperature without some heavy-duty equipment.


Closer to home is this gentleman. He got into a car accident about a mile from his house. Rather than stick around for the police, he wandered off in the middle of snowstorm. He didn't make it home:


It's very easy in the middle of a snowstorm to lose your sense of direction, so it's usually better to stay with your car.
 
An old friend of mine lives in Edmonton and he is always laughing at how the UK grinds to a halt at after a touch of winter.
He told us one of his neighbours died one winter a few years back after he ran out of petrol, the police found him next morning frozen to death.
 
I think people underestimate how cold it can get in the US. Here's story from the Canadian/US border. Four people, including a baby, froze to death trying to cross the border. Temperatures were in the -14 F range and the trip was estimated to take 11 hours. That's just too long to spend in that temperature without some heavy-duty equipment.


The United States Attorney's Office for the District of Minnesota said Steve Shand, 47, has been charged with human smuggling after seven Indian nationals were found in the U.S. and the discovery of the bodies.

Court documents filed Wednesday in support of Shand's arrest allege one of the people spent a significant amount of money to come to Canada with a fraudulent student visa.

He should be charged with murder!!!

 
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I think people underestimate how cold it can get in the US. Here's story from the Canadian/US border. Four people, including a baby, froze to death trying to cross the border. Temperatures were in the -14 F range and the trip was estimated to take 11 hours. That's just too long to spend in that temperature without some heavy-duty equipment.
that's -25 C :eek:
 
that's -25 C :eek:

And it gets colder than that. We had a couple of days last winter in the -31 F to -32 F range. That was when Texas froze over, the power went out, and a lot of people died there. According to the New York Times, it was 210:

 
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