Hurricanes are incredible things — here’s an analogy

Looking at five-day forecasts of the inexorable intensification, and projected storm track, of a major hurricane like Dean — especially in light of Hurricane Katrina and the possibility that Dean will shoot the Cuba-Yucatan gap into the Gulf of Mexico with only moderate landfall diminution — leads me to an analogy.

When you were a kid, especially if you were a boy, did you ever hit a baseball in a street, or an open field next to houses, and watch its inexorable arc toward somebody’s window? Or did you throw a football indoors, hit a living room lamp or vase, and watch it tumble toward the floor in what seemed like slow motion?

Or, as an adult, have you accidentally bumped a glass off the counter and seen it tumble toward the inevitable crash on the linoleum-over-concrete kitchen floor, in what seemed like a freeze-frame progression?

In all those cases, you and I knew what was going to happen, but were powerless to change the trajectory of the baseball, lamp, or glass.

Well, that’s what a big hurricane is like. You have a pretty good idea where it’s going to be two-three days from now, and a decent probabilistic estimate of where it’s going to be four-five days down the road, but there ain’t a damn thing you can do about it (other than evacuate, of course).