Is this hurricane about to hit New York?

DENVER (AP) - The military's efforts to help the East Coast recover from the floods and disruption caused by Hurricane Irene could test the Pentagon's new plan to avoid the chaos that plagued the response to Hurricane Katrina.

National Guard officers were appointed over the weekend as "dual-status commanders" to direct both active-duty troops and guardsmen assisting civilian officials in New Hampshire, New York, North Carolina and Rhode Island.

Normally, active-duty personnel and state-level guardsmen report up separate chains of command to the president on one side and the state's governor on the other. That division was blamed for some of the delays, duplications and gaps after Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in August 2005.

The military began training high-level Guard officers last year to command both types of troops so they can call on each side's specialties and quickly get help where it's needed.

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I hope to hear from them that they got home safely.

I hope you hear soon!

CinnamonGirl wrote: Vermont devastation widespread, 2 confirmed dead, 1 man missing

They found 143 dead in one Vermont cemetery alone...

We are approaching 1000 views on this informative and timely thread. Keep up the good work.

The contest is over, I won

Contest??

My kids/grand kids finally made it home....they saw a lot of flooding and damage on the way and had to take a 2 1/2 hour detour in Mass. But their co-op in greenwich village was fine and they are happy to be home..
I'm happy they are all OK

Great news, archer!

Good to hear archer. I heard Vermont was flooded bad, glad they made it out. Vermont is a beautiful state, I was there in 2004.

I have family and friends in upstate NY, and all have reported in ok with news of minor flooding, trees/branches down, power outages, soggy, but nothing too serious.

Hurricane Irene will hit insurance companies' bottom lines, but property and casualty insurers' stocks were up Monday on the sentiment that things could have been worse.

"Irene's impact on insurers will be minimal," said Loretta Worters, a spokeswoman for the Insurance Information Institute, an industry trade group. "Losses from this storm are likely to be between $2 billion to $5 billion, far less than the $45 billion, in 2011 dollars, from Hurricane Katrina."

I'm not sure that is a good thing, based upon this from later in the article:

In some past disasters, the losses suffered by insurers, homeowners or governments turned into gains for other industries such as construction and cleanup, said Chuck Watson, Kinetic research director.

"Irene is potentially different in impact, given the weaker state of the overall economy, especially for small businesses and homeowners that can't handle another shock to the budget," he said in a report. "Their reserves are lower than normal, insurance won't be covering as much, government budgets are stretched, and there is a question mark as to if banks will want to loan money to cover repairs or cover operating losses in vulnerable areas."

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In a bad economy, things just keep getting worse for the average person, it seems.