ysabetwordsmith | The Big One

Hmm yeah.. they're both a disaster of about the same magnitude.

Although, if it happens anytime soon, given how fragile America is right now, it'll shatter the country I suspect. I mean, it would be hard to cope with that level of destruction and displacement of people at the best of times. The way things stand now, with the Spray-tan Don at the helm, I'd expect the rescue services and the economy to be very quickly overwhelmed, and Washington D.C to essentially abandon the West coast to their fate, with little or no help, the same as they did to Puerto Rico.

I'd imagine that wouldn't go down well, might be the final straw that breaks the camels back, or rather, the Union.

>> Although, if it happens anytime soon, given how fragile America is right now, it'll shatter the country I suspect. I mean, it would be hard to cope with that level of destruction and displacement of people at the best of times.<<

America is in no way equipped to handle a disaster of that magnitude, even if people were acting in concert. All the infrastructure connections -- roads, bridges, pipes, docks, etc. -- will be severed. We don't have enough cargo aircraft to supply the number of survivors. We don't have enough shelters to put them in. We don't have a system for swiftly transporting refugees out of a disaster area and settling them in houses and jobs elsewhere. America has performed very badly in previous examples such as the Dustbowl and Hurricane Katrina; this will be many times worse. In fact, the West Coast still uses Okie as a slur. It makes me wonder if Oklahoma will show them how it's supposed to be done ... or turn them away, laughing "Now it's our turn."

>> The way things stand now, with the Spray-tan Don at the helm, I'd expect the rescue services and the economy to be very quickly overwhelmed, and Washington D.C to essentially abandon the West coast to their fate, with little or no help, the same as they did to Puerto Rico. <<

There is one critical difference: the West Coast provides a vast amount of America's food supply, and all or nearly all of many categories of produce. Few people in power know that, but it would come to their attention very quickly. But there's nothing to be done about it. You can't raise crops in a disaster area, especially with the waterlines all cut. If people expended maximum effort, they might save some of the perennials like grapevines and almond trees, but everything else is a total loss. Either it dies on the vine because people are busy surviving, or it gets eaten by locals because there's little food coming in and no way out. That means the rest of the country takes an instant hit to the food supply that won't recover for at least a year, and serious impacts would last much longer.

>> I'd imagine that wouldn't go down well, might be the final straw that breaks the camels back, or rather, the Union.<<

I wouldn't be surprised.

>> But there's nothing to be done about it. You can't raise crops in a disaster area, especially with the waterlines all cut. If people expended maximum effort, they might save some of the perennials like grapevines and almond trees, but everything else is a total loss.

Given how much water and care almond trees require I'd write them off. They really shouldn't be grown in that part of California.

A lot of things shouldn't be grown where they are. But if we write off the ones currently there, then we lose that crop for years to come. Almonds aren't like lettuce you can restart in a few weeks. They take about 5 years to start producing, and longer to a full crop. California produces 80% of the world's almonds and 100% of the United States’ commercial supply. Lose those trees, and effectively lose commercial almond production globally for at least 5 years. That is not a good thing at all. And it's not the only crop where that's true.

California alone produces 25% of America's food and 40% of its fruits, vegetables, and nuts. If we lose the West Coast food production, the rest of America goes hungry about 3 days later and many other countries take a bad hit also. We can in theory raise many foods elsewhere -- most of the same vegetables will grow in the South or Midwest -- but farmers there aren't equipped for that. T-America managed a big shift quickly, but they were both lucky in timing and much better prepared. We couldn't do that here even with the same timing.

If this distresses you, the best thing individuals can do to fight it is eat local. The more we do that, the higher the demand for farmers to diversify, so that more produce is grown locally instead of shipped from California. That will slightly reduce the damage and greatly improve the recovery, because it's much easier to expand an established farm than to start from scratch.

I actually meant that I don't think the infrastructure will survive to maintain them. They are already part of the water crisis going on.

That's true too. However, if we moved out the rest of the crops, there might be enough left for the few that would be difficult or impossible to move elsewhere. You can grow tomatoes anywhere; not so with almonds, olives, or even grapes.

It's likely that in a disaster, it won't be possible to salvage anything. But if it is, eat the annuals and try to save the longest-lived perennials.

The Big One

no subject

Thoughts

Re: Thoughts

Re: Thoughts

Re: Thoughts

Re: Thoughts