Y’all in the American SW and west Mexico better check the national hurricane center and your weather for this weekend and next week.
Hurricane Hilary is about to make landfall and that whole desert area is supposed to get a years worth of rain or more. Death Valley is supposed to get twice the annual rainfall. Severe winds, massive flooding, and landslides are all strong possibilities.
This is gonna get ugly. Please spread the word. This is a majorly anomalous event and people may be unaware of the threat headed their way.
Flash floods are definitely gonna kill people, so here’s your regularly scheduled PSA:
Desert soil does not absorb a significant amount of water. It reaches maximum saturation very very quickly, and all the rest of the water rushes downhill. Even if you can’t tell that the ground is not perfectly flat, the water can. And it will move. Quickly. No, faster than that. Nope, still faster. If you try to cross moving floodwater, you will get swept downstream and probably die.
Do not try to wade in/cross flood water that is any deeper than the thickness of the sole of an average athletic shoe, no I am not kidding, the water will get deeper literally while you’re standing in it.
This goes for cars, too. I’ve seen entire vehicles getting swept downstream in flash floods because the driver thought they could cross the “puddle” and Found Out.
Stay safe, y’all.
also if you’re going into water intentionally (cleanup, obviously as things RECEDE), PROTECT YOUR EYES. Flood water is NASTY AS HELL and you will be getting a tetanus booster right off the bat if you end up in the ER for any reason.
Related to the above: After wading in the water, get somewhere with clean water and wash every inch of your body. The water being nasty means: There can be gases, oils, other harmful/irritating contaminants, there can be sewage (probably will be tbh), and then (And I’m sorry for this) animals will be dead in the water around you. Things like squirrels, birds, etc. They will be decomposing in there. You’re basically wading in a soup of the nastiest shit you can imagine. So, post clean-up in the water: Shower, then GET YOUR FRICKIN’ TETANUS BOOSTER.
Also, if you have a vagina, be extra careful. If you think yeast infections are nasty, they’re nothing compared to contact dermatitis of the vulva, and the vulva is EXTREMELY sensitive along with the vagina. (Source: Me. I had an allergic reaction to a laundry detergent and it was the WORST experience of my life, I can’t imagine how much worse it’d be in THAT kind of water.)
There can also be EXPOSED LIVE POWER LINES UNDER THE WATER. You legitimately have no idea what is in flood water, what is being carried, what kind of debris is at the bottom. If you can at all avoid going into the flood water, DO NOT GO INTO THE FLOOD WATER.
it’s very clear from some communists’ visions of future city-planning that they expect disabled people to just shut up and die, lmao
- some disabled people need door-to-door transportation. public transportation will never work for everyone, no matter how much you emphasise that it is “accessible” to some
- if any part of your plan involves disabled people needing to “request” exceptions or “prove” that they are an exception or be questioned or tested or navigate any level of bureaucracy to become a Certified Exception, some people are going to be denied things they need & some of them are going to die
If you don’t mind me adding:
3. Some folks dream of the perfect commune where everyone contributes - specifically with labor. If a disabled person not contributing labor isn’t welcome in your community, you are just repackaging the capitalist “labor = worth” mindset
I also get this from climate activists who are heavily focused on eliminating cars, including electric cars with no emissions. I have been wildly attacked for simply pointing out that for some of us, our cars are mobility devices that are critical to our ability to participate in the world.
They love to share concept drawings of imagined high density communities, high rise buildings ringed with walking paths, retail and businesses on the lower floors and apartments above. They also love sharing photos of existing places, usually in Europe, where streets have been closed to vehicle traffic, and turned into pedestrian walkways, or green spaces.
There is never anyone in those images who is noticeably disabled. There aren’t even elderly people with canes.
They declare these spaces to be future that we should all want.
The message is being sent loud and clear.
Not arguing with the point being made here, I completely agree, but I do want to set one thing straight: I live in Europe, and I’ve been to many streets that are closed to vehicle traffic, and I see visibly disabled people and people with walking aids in those places all the time. Always have. I’ve walked around those places with someone who uses a cane. Just because they aren’t in whatever photo you saw doesn’t mean they don’t exist.
It’s not a climate thing. Pedestrian-only streets are necessary in towns that were built before cars. They are usually the main shopping street(s), where having cars drive through is dangerous in more than one way - especially for disabled people and children. The streets and footpaths are too narrow for the level of traffic we have now. If you let cars through there, you’d make the main shopping street inaccessible or at least super dangerous for elderly ladies with walking aids, people in wheelchairs, people with babies in buggies, etc. Not ideal. Pedestrianised places are accessible for those people, the important thing is making sure they can get there. Which, in those photos, you probably also aren’t seeing the car parks that are usually right next to those streets, often underground.
I think maybe this is a case of people trying to apply a European solution 1:1 to the US, and you can’t. First of all, you don’t even have the same problem. Pedestrian-only streets in a German town are imo more comparable to a US shopping mall. You don’t drive around inside those, either, right? Even if you are disabled, you leave the car outside. Same thing here.
Also: the European problem is that medieval towns weren’t built for cars. The streets are tiny. So you have to adapt them, using one-way systems and pedestrian zones. They don’t just close a street, they plan this out to make sure everything’s still accessible. You can still drive around it, park next to it, get there by bus, etc. It’s a matter of adapting a medieval town to modern needs, including the needs of elderly and disabled people.
Anyone sharing this as some kind of climate-conscious car-banning thing doesn’t know what they’re talking about.
@iverna listen, I don’t have the answers for how to adapt 100% of areas for 100% of people and suspect that that’s not necessarily feasible (certainly in the short-term), but I will say that you are completely ignorant of the range of ways in which human beings can be disabled.
it’s an unfortunate aspect of the fact that “disabled” can mean such a huge range of things that a lot people will have frankly irrelevant responses, such as this one, to criticisms of inaccessibility—as though there is only one way to be disabled, such that if some physically disabled people can access something, then that means that all physically disabled people can access it.
the physically disabled people that you see out and about are the ones who have a relatively large amount of mobility. this is what allows them to be out and about on the kinds of streets you’re describing. the people who have less mobility, who are ‘more’ disabled, who need completely level ground to walk even with a mobility aid or to move their wheelchairs over, who are bedridden, these are the people you are not seeing, because they are not able to navigate these kinds of streets. they are largely isolated, at home and ignored.
I can’t emphasise enough how incredibly—ignorant, as I’ve said, but also disrespectful and just plain cruel—it is to say things like “what do you mean this is inaccessible? I’ve seen [SOME] disabled people use it.” this is to use some disabled people as bludgeons with which to discredit and dismiss other disabled people. I hope that you learn from this and don’t say something like this to anyone else.
My art refs be like: “rabbits are plantigrade, never stand on their toes and move by hopping”
-Rabbits not giving a shit about your “laws of science”: