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| The 8-Bit Guys house in Texas |
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| VK3DRB:
Texas definitely has weird weather. This one was a doozer, compounded by privatisation of energy supplies. Two weird experiences when I lived in Austin: I was about 5km from home when I called my wife using phone patch via the W5EBJ repeater to tell her it was snowing. She said it was not snowing at home. A couple of sandbaggers called in to say it was not snowing where they were either. That was the only snow I saw in Texas in the winter of 1992/93 and it seemingly only snowed in a very small area. We did a day trip to Senora. On the way back it rained ice (not snow). The helical antenna on top of the car became a big block of ice. The doors were thick and heavy with ice. But when we got back to Austin, I never saw any other car caked with ice. I got looks from various people as I drove into town and was queried at out local Texaco petrol station as to where I had been. There had been no precipitation in Austin. |
| Zero999:
--- Quote from: bdunham7 on February 21, 2021, 05:56:04 pm --- --- Quote from: JohnnyMalaria on February 21, 2021, 05:18:22 pm ---Most of those "freeze" events would have been for about an hour or two before sunrise - not enough time to freeze pipes. This recent event is different. Prolonged and extreme low temperatures will freeze pipes quickly. --- End quote --- A hard freeze may be rare, but not unheard of. There have been enough similar events in the past few decades to give sufficient warning. It's analogous to earthquake protection here in SoCal--severe earthquakes are 'rare' but can happen anytime, so building codes and other policies have been adapted to be ready for them. Where I live there would also be devastation if we got weather like Texas just had. The difference is that the area has never, ever had such weather as opposed to having it once a decade. --- End quote --- I wholeheartedly agree. Buildings and infrastructure should be designed to withstand once in a lifetime events. Take Cambridge, England, for example. Typical of Western Europe, the average temperatures for the warmest and coldest months are fairly moderate, but the record hot and cold temperatures are more extreme, although not to the same extent as many places in Texas. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge#Climate We have had problems in the UK with infrastructure being inadequate for temperature extremes, more so with hot, than cold in recent years. Of course we need to accept that sometimes bad things will happen, due to the weather and there's nothing that can be done about it. Note that in Cambridge the record February high is close to the average high for late-May/early-June, which has also recorded freezing temperatures. Both extremis can completely destroy crops. A late frost in June will kill an entire grape crop and record warmth in February can cause plants to grow far too early, only to be frozen later. |
| JohnnyMalaria:
As a former resident of Melbourn, Cambs., and College Station, TX, and now NC, I can honestly say the climate extremes in the UK are nothing like here. Some once-in-a-lifetime events just cannot be accommodated without changing the entire way properties are built. For example, I don't think any typical house in the US could survive a direct tornado hit. However, most are engineered to withstand at least Cat 1 hurricanes. But as current events in the UK show, flooding is the major issue. As I stated previously, the mentality to construction is different here compared to the UK (at least). |
| coppice:
--- Quote from: JohnnyMalaria on February 23, 2021, 07:55:40 pm ---As a former resident of Melbourn, Cambs., and College Station, TX, and now NC, I can honestly say the climate extremes in the UK are nothing like here. Some once-in-a-lifetime events just cannot be accommodated without changing the entire way properties are built. For example, I don't think any typical house in the US could survive a direct tornado hit. However, most are engineered to withstand at least Cat 1 hurricanes. But as current events in the UK show, flooding is the major issue. As I stated previously, the mentality to construction is different here compared to the UK (at least). --- End quote --- That's because Texas exports its heat to the UK, and we are very thankful for it. At least until the Day After Tomorrow. :) |
| Renate:
I concur that there is a sharp contrast between the best of European building practice and the worst of American. Let's add to that the risk of fire. It's easy to total an American house in a fire; a concrete European house is not so vulnerable. Quick, cheap and shoddy is an American standard. |
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