Vulnerability Reaction

  1. My hometown of Perkasie, PA is located about an hour outside of Philadelphia. From looking and studying the map “Nathan World Map of Natural Hazards” it is a little difficult to decipher any exact natural disasters my hometown would face. In that regard however it appears that the area in which my hometown is located is subjected to moderate to low amounts of earthquakes, tornadoes, and wildfires but is more likely to experience larger or more intense amounts of tropical storms, hailstorms, and also extratropical storms (winter storms). One event that occurred in my area was Hurricane Sandy, my area was lucky enough to not have extreme damages from the storm but my family especially lost power for about a week while others also did not regain power for a long while. I have also experienced some very intense snow storms where it made difficult to travel and do daily tasks. Although neither of these cases would I consider a natural disaster.
  2.  The disaster that I chose off of the Emergency and Disaster Information Service is the environment pollution that is occurring in southeastern region of the US. The Turkey Point Nuclear Generating Station has been leaking radioactive material in to surrounding protected water. My hometown could experience the same type of disaster because of the location of the “Limerick Nuclear Power Plant” it is possible that if radioactive material were to leak from the machines that my area and waters would be affected due to the fact I am located about 30 mins from there. Due to my towns location we are moderately vulnerable to the potential of leaking radioactive material. My hometown is not large with a population of approximately 8,500 people a disaster of this size would be catastrophic to my town and would potentially danger us for years to come. The disaster currently occurring is located near Miami, Fl and so the city has a much larger population with a more concentrated amount of people in a smaller space so the disaster has potential to be very detrimental to this city as well due to the fact of the amount of people it can reach. In order to decrease vulnerability I feel as though there would have to be a relocation of the power plant to avoid the risk of contact with humans as much as possible. My town is especially vulnerable because we are a farming community in which we rely greatly on the local water ways, a contamination to said water way would effect the farming and hurt the town financially along with biologically.
  3.  As I described earlier my hometown of Perkasie, Pa we have not experienced a large amount of natural disasters which I am thankful for. But I also mentioned earlier that we did encounter a Hurricane Sandy which took a toll on my hometown. Due to the heavy rains and winds we lost many trees, branches, and many roads were washed out and unable to use. The loss of branches and trees caused many power outages and due to the length and magnitude of the hurricane it took about a week for everyone on the grid to regain power after the storm. The storm caused many power outages “more than 1.3 million Pennsylvania electricity customers. The majority of those outages were focused in Philadelphia, its surrounding suburbs and the Lehigh Valley.” (1). It also cause some deaths  according to pennlive.com (2) at least four deaths were caused by Hurricane Sandy in Pa.
  4. In order to decrease vulnerability when it comes to Hurricanes I believe the most beneficial thing to do for my town would be to educated them on the proper precautions of what to do when an event like this one can occur. By this I mean where they should go if a storm is coming and they do not have proper shelter and any actions they can take to protect there homes from damage. The town representatives would be the best people to educate the town or maybe to bring in an educated personal to instruct curious town members before hurricane season approaches. Personally I plan to educate myself on precautions I can take to not run into the same problems and issues I experienced in prior years.

 

  1. Resources:

(1)https://stateimpact.npr.org/pennsylvania/tag/sandy/

(2)http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2012/10/hurricane_sandy_the_worst_is_o.html

One thought on “Vulnerability Reaction

  1. Hey Madison! Check out my post here: https://wp.me/p3RCAy-dqd

    Hi it’s Karissa and the aspect of your post that drew me in was the emergency disaster that you chose. I find it both interesting and terrifying that you live in a community with a power plant that could potentially leak radioactive materials. I also liked how you spoke about hurricane sandy and how it affected your town. I too experienced power outages from this storm.

    Great post!

    -Karissa

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