Teslinhiker, can you indicate the location? Thanks

News reports indicate that NYU had their generators on the roof, and they evacuated at least one day before Bellvue. So location doesn't matter that much.

In addition to sewage in the flood waters, don't forget that wildlife gets swept inshore w/ the current. Can you imagine trudging to the gas station and a shark or jellyfish brushes past you?

Re: voting. Can't be changed w/o Congress passing a new law, which we know probably won't happen. However, apprarently there's some flexibility in how soon the state has to appoint their electoral college voters. I doubt it's going to ultimately matter as much as we think. A lot of people will have to go to new voter locations, but I have a feeling there's still going to be paper ballots available. Maybe, just maybe, the news channels won't tell everyone that the election is won/lost by 6pm that day.

As for the Comfort, don't count on it. It's big, unmanned, and a converted oil tanker, with only space for 1 helo. The Navy is sending 3 LHA/LHD's right now - they have room for possibly hundreds to thousands of patients, have a (small) medical staff that can be augmented quickly, and the top deck IS the landing pad.

I've been in the medical area of an LHA; it's big, right below the flight deck, and designed for both daily sick call and combat medicine. Three of those will be nowhere close to the capacity of a major city hospital, but it does give you three ER's, three great flight decks which can greatly facilitate moving patients to other facilities, and three bases for logistics while Mayor Bloomberg's staff figures out what to do next. Did I mention that they have outstanding communications capability?

I see these three big decks being used as logistics bases to get NYC's critical infrastructure back in order. Reliable communications, electricity, fuel, and air, sea and land logistics. Besides the flight deck, they have a floodable well deck for boats to move items like trucks.

It will be interesting to see how they are used.

Thankfully my local hospital doesn't have to rely on backup generators, it has its own power station house, which apparently took over 10 years to construct before the main hospital was built.

Ironically, this hurricane may bring out more voters. It's like when you tell somebody they can't do something, often the person who would otherwise sit on the couch gets pissed and wants to do it more than ever. However, I can imagine a situation where people who are ill or disabled have an unusually difficult time getting to the polls. We'll see. Anyway, I voted over a week ago through the mail. I will be voting absentee forever.

When the plan isn't tested anything can go wrong. A hospital near Clear Lake City TX was carefully constructed with ER and surgery etc on the 2nd floor, with nothing needed for emergency operations below. And with the first tropical storm they learned that the elevators all had their control boxes in the basement and underwater.


.. and 1,000 beds, a dozen operating rooms, equipment & stores kept ready for deployment and a staff/crew that is supposedly kept on 5-day call-up status.

I don't know where it is, or if the crew was recalled.

And I bet Comfort is *far* cheaper to keep in NYC than whatever combination of warships they're sending.

New Jersey and New York.

" Every hurricane I can remember there have been hospitals that had generators in the basement, and every time everyone clucks at how dumb that was"
When I entered Clinical Perfusion school at Texas Heart Institute in 1984 (learning to operate the heart-lung bypass pump for open-heart surgery), the program director told us a story how, in 1961, he was participating in an emergency open heart procedure during Hurricane Carla. When the power failed the emergency generators in the basement started. when the basement filled with rain the generators failed and he finished the case using a little hand crank to keep the patient perfused and alive. This is not a new situation.

One thing the LHA/LHD ships have is reliable power.

Piers Morgan was ranting on and on about the hospital losing power,comparing it to The JPMORGAN building (was that the one?) that had blazing lights.

Its one thing to keep lights on there,try powering a hospital,and not all hospital circuits are powered by backup,only the red plugs.

Finally,hosps are on life support as far as money goes,JPM is not,by a long shot. They dont have the money to upgrade infrastructure,much as a lot of the Country has infrastructure repairs needed but no money.