On hurricanes, weather sites, technology - and what we can, and can't see.
I am a bit of a weather geek - have been since I was a child, loving those snowstorms that closed school, thunderstorms - and over time, watching the Weather Channel (when it reported weather pretty much all day, before the various specials), then delighting in computers, weather websites, and radar.
The first time this was personally impactful was 1996, when Fran made landfall near Cape Fear River on the NC Coast. We were in Raleigh at the time - we lost power pretty early in the evening, and there were no smartphones - so we had no idea Fran would hold together and hit Raleigh with 75 mph winds - somehow no tree hit our house, but our back woods was pick up sticks, and there was damage that no one thought was coming all around.
Each year, weather radar becomes easier to find - just like we in the US could watch wars happen overseas in the comfort of our home, we can tune in to weather radar - taken to the limit, you get Ryan Hall Y'all, with radars and stormchasters and flashing lights. For those of us not in the path, we watch.
But - once again I realized that radar scans tell but a fraction of the story, and storm chasers just a bit more than that fraction. I was watching Ian approach the Florida coast - at one point you could see Captiva in the map in the eye. The eyewall didn't look all that intense. The pics of the storm chasers showed wind and rain. One can get lulled into a sense of "that radar picture doesn't look so bad" or "they are calling for 12 foot storm surges and 145 mph winds, but the pics on the screen don't really show that".
Then the next day the pictures come in - the utter destruction. It is another reminder that being in the path, being on the ground, has no relationship at all to what is shown on radar or by stormchasers. The reality is indeed devastating - widespread, tragic destruction.
I recall pondering this the first time with Katrina - really, all hurricanes that we can now "watch" hit coastal areas on weather sites. The ghastly, spinning eye indicates what may be happening beneath, in reality, in those locations. But we can never truly know - we can never be ready - once the true destruction and loss of life and home start to appear on the news the following days.