Hurricane Sandy On Way To New York - RIOC Advises Roosevelt Island Residents, Mayor Bloomberg To Provide Update At 3 PM

You Tube Video Of Hurricane Sandy Threat From ABC News

Received the following Hurricane Sandy advisory from the Roosevelt Island Operating Corp (RIOC) yesterday:

The latest weather forecasts are tracking Hurricane SANDY to reach the New York City area on Monday, October 29th. In preparation for the storm, we would like to inform the Roosevelt Island community of the following:

- ALL PARKS will be closed beginning Monday, October 29th. A further notice will follow regarding when the parks will re-open.

- The Sportspark facility will be closed Monday, October 29th & Tuesday, October 30th.

- Commuters should anticipate possible delays and disruptions to the Red Bus and Tram services.

We have provided some useful links below for residents to stay informed in the days ahead:
Federal Emergency Management Office: http://www.fema.gov/
NYS Emergency Management Office: http://www.dhses.ny.gov/
NYC Office of Emergency Management: http://www.nyc.gov/html/oem/html/home/home.shtml

In addition, please continue to monitor the storm's progress on The Weather Channel (weather.com), your local news station or at the National Hurricane Center (including maps, projected paths and storm surge probabilities): http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/#SANDY

Please feel free to call 3-1-1 for non-emergencies and 9-1-1 (or 212-832-4545) for emergencies.

Sincerely,

Roosevelt Island Operating Corp Advisories Group

Also from RIOC:

We are urging all Roosevelt Island residents to sign up for Notify NYC to receive free up to date emergency notifications, as well as information regarding important City services & steps to take to prepare for hazardous weather.

To sign up & learn more about Notify NYC and OEM, visit www.nyc.gov/notifynyc

Sincerely,

Roosevelt Island Operating Corp Advisories Group

During Hurricane Irene last year, RIOC and its the Public Safety Department experienced phone and communication outages. Hope that is fixed for Hurricane Sandy.

Mayor Bloomberg reviews Hurricane Sandy preparation by NYC.



Roosevelt Island is in Hurricane Evacuation Zone B. According to the NYC Office of Emergency Management (OEM):

... Residents in Zone B may experience storm surge flooding from a MODERATE (Category 2 or higher) hurricane....

According to Marketwatch:

...Mayor Michael Bloomberg planned a press conference at 3 p.m. Eastern to update New Yorkers on preparations for Hurricane Sandy, with the storm's maximum sustained winds at 75 miles per hour, according to the latest advisory from the National Hurricane Center, issued at 11 a.m. Eastern....

Here's some images of Hurricane Irene's visit to Roosevelt Island last year.

 Image From Michael Girard

 Image From Michael Girard

Image From Eric Schwartzman

 More on the aftermath of Hurricane Irene including lessons learned by RIOC from earlier posts.

Be prepared.

UPDATE 10/27 - Latest from Mayor Bloomberg.



Text of Mayor Bloomberg's remarks here. An excerpt:

... What our expectation is for during the day tomorrow that there would be – it would be windy, maybe a little bit of rain, but not much during the day. Then the storm would start getting worse on Sunday evening, tomorrow into Monday. And we want to make sure, then I’ll go over what we’re going to do with parks and the beaches and that sort of thing. But don’t get lulled tomorrow when there’s not a lot of rain and not a lot of wind. This is a dangerous storm, and I think we’re going to be okay, but if it were to strengthen unexpectedly or change its expected path it could do a lot of damage, and you could be at risk.

“So if things are the way it’s planned and if everybody does what they’re supposed to do, we will get through this very nicely and look back on it and say maybe we can offer some help to other parts of the area upstate or below us, south of us, which might get hit a lot harder.

“The trajectory says that the storm will hit a little bit south of us, the Maryland/Delaware area....

and:

... Let me tell you first we are not ordering any evacuations as of this time for any parts of the city. We’re making that decision based on the nature of the storm.

“Although we’re expecting a large surge of water, it is not expected to be a tropical storm or hurricane-type surge. With this storm, we’ll likely see a slow pileup of water rather than a sudden surge, which is what you would expect with a hurricane, and which we saw with Irene 14 months ago.

“So it will be less dangerous – but make no mistake about it, there will be a lot of water and low-lying areas will experience flooding. The City’s Departments of Transportation and Environmental Protection will be deployed throughout the city to address flooding conditions.

“And as I said yesterday, there are 6 hospitals and 41 chronic care facilities in the area that we designate as Zone A – the low-lying coastal areas that are most at most at risk for flooding.

“Health Commissioner Tom Farley has been in touch with all of those facilities. All of those facilities have cancelled elective admissions and discharged all patients who do not need to stay there.

“Chronic care facilities will not evacuate patients in general, but as State Officials indicated earlier today, ventilator-dependent patients in these facilities will be transferred to a safe location by 5 pm Sunday....