All language subtitles for Apocalypse Earth Series 1 Part 4 Hurricanes Storms Of Destruction 1080p HIDTV x264 AAC MVGroup org

- [Narrator] Hurricanes
are the largest

and most destructive
storms on earth.

- It's a feeling
of helplessness.

Do a lot of praying.

- [Narrator] Exploding in size,
and packing a deadly punch.

- The storm surge just kept
coming and coming and coming.

- [Narrator] With an
ever-increasing warming ocean,

they can strike at any
time during their season,

putting more and more of
our coastline at risk.

- In the future,

and I like to say
the near future,

we are going to have
a severe hurricane.

- [Narrator] Anyone can
run from mother nature,

- It's like, oh boy.

- [Narrator] But
no one can hide.

(screams)

Earth, air, fire, and water,

essential for human survival,

but in their extreme,
destructive to everything

and everyone in their path.

- [Man 1] Coming down
right now, major tornado.

- [Man 2] Man, that's
a monster.

- [Narrator] These are stories,

- [Man] Oh big-time
flashing clouds.

- [Narrator] Of
Apocalypse Earth.

Tropical cyclones form in
various parts of the world.

Typhoons form in the
Northwestern Pacific basin.

Whereas hurricanes
form in the Atlantic.

They all need warm,
oceanic sea waters

to begin their journey.

From a collection of clouds,

to a crushing and many
times deadly storm,

while hurricanes are
a natural occurrence

that instill fear,

they arise to adjust imbalances
of heat in the atmosphere

and provide the ecosystem
with needed rainfall.

But too often nature's benefit
has a significant impact

on humanity and our environment.

Tree toppling winds,
soaking rains,

and the most
damaging and deadly,

huge waves of water
called storm surge

that can overwhelm
anything in its path

with an unrelenting
blanket of seawater.

Now, armed with knowledge of
how these monster storms form,

scientists can better predict
when the next one may arrive.

Before a hurricane attacks,

one of America's
East Coast states,

it quietly begins life thousands
of miles away in Africa.

- A hurricane basically, as
it starts out, it's a wave,

it's a buckle in the
tropical easterlies.

And what happens is, as
that buckle starts to move

from East to West, it
develops some disturbances.

- [Narrator] A disturbance is
a small area of low pressure.

As these disturbances
move across the Atlantic,

they pick up more energy
as warm water evaporates

and is sucked up
into the clouds.

After 24 hours,

these disturbances
start to form into

clusters of thunderstorms.

- If a low pressure
system develops

along these thunderstorms,

you're going to start
to see a depression.

- [Narrator] A
depression is a region

of low barometric pressure.

- As that depression intensifies
and the winds intensify

to tropical storm strength,
39 miles an hour or greater,

it becomes a tropical storm.

- [Narrator] Winds in
this type of depression

start to pick up as the size
of the thunderstorms increase.

- Once those winds increase
that low pressure has sustained

winds around it of 74
miles an hour or greater,

it becomes a hurricane.

- The American Southeast,

a prime target for hurricanes.

With more than 40%
of all U.S. strikes

taking place in Florida,

the sunshine-state can quickly
turn into the storm-state

during hurricane season.

Hurricanes hit Florida
more than any other state,

as Florida suffers from
unfortunate geography,

with most of its landmass

directly in the
path of destruction.

Bounded by the
Atlantic on one side,

and the warm waters of the
Gulf of Mexico on the other,

Florida is a prime target
for weather catastrophe.

All hurricanes have
a unique marker.

Hurricane Michael of 2018,

the first category
five to hit the U.S.

since Andrew in 1992,

was a crop killer,

costing Florida farmers
nearly $160 million.

Hurricane Irma slammed into
the Florida keys in 2017

before making another
landfall in Marco Island.

A record, six and a half
million people evacuated

in the days leading
up to the storm,

in what turned out to be
Florida's largest evacuation.

Irma was a power killer,

wiping out electricity to
nearly a third of the state.

The worst ever to
strike Florida, Andrew.

Deceivingly small in size,
but incredibly powerful.

This category five killer
took the lives of 63 people.

And at the time, becoming
the costliest storm

in the history of hurricanes,

making landfall in
the United States.

It had been more than 25
years since Floridians

suffered a direct hit
from a major hurricane.

In that time, Florida's
population exploded,

with people migrating from
the Northeast and the Midwest.

In other words,

people with no
history or experience

with the state's violent
history of tropical storms.

Andrew, the first tropical storm

of the 1992 hurricane season,

would forever alter
the landscape.

Natural areas of
vegetation and swamps

serve to buffer some of
the effects of hurricanes.

Newly developed areas close
to the coast were wiped out.

And for those who survived,

a new sense of what it
meant to stare into the face

of an historical
wrecking machine

and live to tell about it.

(bold music)

- [Stan] Would you believe
this woman just went through

hours of labor and
delivered a baby.

- [Narrator] Miami, Florida.

New father, Stan Goldenberg
thinks this day will be

one of the happiest in his life.

- At 4:35 that afternoon,

we had our first
daughter, Pearl.

- [Narrator] But less
than 300 miles away,

mother nature gives birth
to a far more ferocious

and violent offspring.

His name is Andrew.

- As Hurricane Andrew
neared The Bahamas,

he intensified to
category five status

with wind speeds near
175 miles per hour,

and hit The Bahamas.

- [Narrator] After
savaging the Bahamas,

at Florida's East Coast.
Andrew takes dead aim

- [Narrator] As a meteorologist,

Stan knows how dangerous
hurricanes can be,

but he also knows it's too late

to move his hospitalized
wife, newborn daughter

and three sons
out of harm's way.

- I could not imagine having
to deal with the storm

deal with a birth.
in the middle of having

- I, like thousands
of other people,

really could not comprehend
how bad this thing would be.

- [Narrator] Believing his
wife and baby are better off

at the hospital,

Stan decides to weather
the approaching storm

at home with his sons.

Assuming the location is safe,

a group of friends and
relatives has joined them.

- [Woman] Say hi.

- Hi.

- Started to be gusty
outside and breezy,

and start to hear the roar.

Looks like maybe
30 miles an hour,

maybe 40 mile an hour gusts.

- [Narrator] Sweeping
in from the Atlantic,

Andrew slams into the
Southeast Florida coast

and starts to decimate
everything in his reach.

(thunder rumbling)

- This hurricane was
a category five storm

when it went onshore, with
sustained winds of up to

185 miles per hour.

- In some ways, Hurricane
Andrew, being so small,

only 90 miles in diameter,
was a lot like a tornado.

An EF5 tornado with wind
speeds of 200 miles per hour

is comparable in some
ways to this hurricane,

because you had a very
intense circulation

right in the center,
just like a tornado.

(thunder rumbling)

- [Narrator] Stan videotapes
the storms approach.

- [Stan] Yeah, the power is out,

so I don't know if you
can see anything except

maybe a few lightning flashes.

- [Narrator] Totally unaware
that what's about to happen

will change his life forever.

- It is blowing out there.

I certainly have never seen
anything like it before.

I don't know if we've
hit the worst yet.

We happened to be in a
concrete block house.

If I had had any idea
how much devastation

the storm would have caused,

we would have probably
been out of there,

but we didn't know.

It got worse and worse
and scarier and scarier.

We lost plywood on
the front window.

Then at a certain point,

the eye wall hit.

(thunder rumbling)

(wind wails)

It just moved it to
another dimension,

and things just
started to rip apart.

We're sitting there,

and my brother-in-law
says the roof is gone.

And, the next thing that
happened is the wall

between the kitchen and
the living room fell on us.

(siren wailing)

- [Narrator] By morning,
Andrew has moved on,

leaving Miami ravaged
beyond recognition.

- The most damage came from
the winds of the hurricane.

It looks just like a
series of EF5 tornadoes

went through that area.

You had trailers
that were destroyed.

You had buildings that were
taking off of their foundation.

90% of the roofs in Dade
County alone were blown off.

- [Narrator] In
his twisted fury,

the compact, but merciless
monster has smashed to bits

nearly everything the
Goldenbergs cherish.

- [Stan] Our car, I believe
is smashed somewhat.

We are glad to be alive.

This is the wall,
fell on top of us.

We were underneath here.

And this is where we crouched.

I was pinned very
heavily down there.

- [Narrator] Miraculously,
the Goldenbergs

and their friends all
endure Andrew's wrath

without serious injury.

- We were scared. We really
thought we could die.

(tense music begins)

- Hurricane Andrew
destroyed so many homes

that 180,000 people
were made homeless.

And total damages
in today's dollars

are approaching $50 billion.

- People who have not been
through a storm like this

cannot imagine what it's like.

- [Narrator] It's a
lesson to be remembered.

Anyone can run
from mother nature,

- It was like, oh boy.

- [Narrator] But
no one can hide.

atures

of the Gulf of Mexico
are the fuel

that drives some of the most

catastrophic storms
in the United States.

Florida's neighboring
States in the Gulf coast,

like Texas, also find
themselves in storm paths.

When hurricane Harvey hit
the Houston area in 2017,

no one expected, nor were they
prepared for the aftermath

that left the city under
four feet of water.

The crippling effects of
Harvey would be felt for days

upon days as the
unrelenting wind and rain

pounded the Texas shoreline.

In late August, 2020,
the same coastline

faced a rare occurrence.

Two storm systems, Marco and
Laura, struck just days apart.

Marco remained a tropical storm,

but Laura intensified to
a category four hurricane

just before it made landfall
over Western Louisiana,

as one of the most powerful
hurricanes to hit the coastline,

with a dangerous storm
surge that flooded

many parts of the region.

Warm water, specifically a
stream pouring into the Gulf

and the Caribbean,
called a loop current,

helped create one of the
biggest flood makers,

2005's Hurricane Katrina.

On Monday, August 29th,

the category three storm
made landfall over Louisiana,

bringing devastating storm
surges along the coast.

The city of New Orleans
was hit especially hard

as the storm breached
its massive levee system.

Katrina displaced tens
of thousands of people

who found temporary shelter

inside the New
Orleans Superdome.

Hurricane Katrina was
an event that altered

the face of America.

It also caused the
most destructive flood

in United States history.

In the months
following the disaster,

experts from both Northern
California and Louisiana

debated what had led to
the catastrophic failure

of the levees.

Some officials claimed that
the levees had been overtopped.

To investigate, a
team of scientists

from Louisiana State University

went searching for
new evidence as to why

the levees failed.

- The flooding of New Orleans
is a manmade disaster,

and the trigger was Katrina.

If the manmade
levees hadn't failed,

Katrina would have been a
case of mopping up some water,

and that's it.

- [Narrator] New
Orleans wouldn't exist

without its levee system.

The city was established in
1718 on the only high ground

adjacent to the
Mississippi River.

This area became
the French quarter.

- In the case of New Orleans,

we actually have a
city that's in a bowl,

it's below sea level.

That is because New Orleans
was built on a swamp.

And as they drained the
swamp to allow the houses

to be developed, the swamp
soils contracted, they subsided.

And over the years,

the whole city has
subsided below sea level.

- [Narrator] The city
didn't really grow

until the early 1900's,

when an engineer
named Baldwin Wood

designed a complex system
of pumps and drainage canals

to keep the city dry by pumping

the water out of the marshlands.

The system is based
on two key elements;

levees, which stopped
floodwaters from flowing

into the city,

and pumping stations
that pump unwanted water

out of the city.

New Orleans has some of the
largest pumping stations

in the world,

but they depend on the
canals to move the water

back into Lake Pontchartrain.

Each of these
canals has a levee,

an earthen embankment
top by a concrete wall.

About 350 miles of levees
protect greater New Orleans.

The biggest threats of flooding

come from Lake
Pontchartrain, to the North,

and the Gulf of Mexico,
to the East and South.

The Army Corps of
Engineers was responsible

for the design and
construction of the levees.

But according to a
post disaster report

prepared by the corps,
the system had a flaw.

It was only built to
withstand the storm surges

from a category three hurricane.

In August of 2005,

five hurricane,
as Katrina, a category

bore down on New Orleans,

fears begin to mount
that the levee system

wouldn't be able to
protect the city.

- We had closed all
of our floodgates,

we had inspected our levees.

And so with a storm of
this magnitude, you know,

all we could do at that point
in time was to wait and see

what was going to happen.

- [Narrator] State flood
manager, Mike Stack,

was ordered to evacuate
to Baton Rouge,

about 60 miles North
of New Orleans.

- Everybody's first
duty, so to speak,

is to stay out of harm's way

so you can react
to the situation.

It's a feeling of helplessness.

Do a lot of praying.

- [Narrator] At 6:10
am, Monday, August 29th,

Katrina made landfall, 60
miles Southeast of New Orleans.

She had weakened to
a category three,

with winds between 111
and 130 miles per hour.

- I thought the levees would
be able to withstand the storm.

I felt they were
well engineered.

- [Narrator] During the
height of the storm,

all emergency workers
had to take cover.

So they had no way of
knowing what damage

to the levee system
Katrina was causing.

- [Narrator] Hurricanes
spin counter-clockwise.

So the eastern part of
New Orleans was subjected

to the most devastating
elements of Katrina.

The 110 mile an hour
winds created a 20 foot

tsunami-like wave.

This massive storm surge

charged into New
Orleans from the Gulf.

It traveled down the
intercoastal waterway,

which funneled the surge

straight into the
heart of the city.

- The design of the navigation
channels around New Orleans

have inadvertently
created a funnel,

a system to inject the
surge right into the city.

So just imagine now
the surge is building

on the East side of the city,

the winds are blowing the
surge in to this funnel.

- [Narrator] Like a bullet
coming down the barrel

of a rifle, the
massive waves smashed

into the industrial canal.

The levees were first over
top by three feet of water,

and then scoured away.

The lower ninth
ward was wiped out

by an 18-foot wave of water.

- For five blocks,

every single house
was destroyed.

In essence, it looked
like a tsunami wave.

Many, many homes
shifted off their piles

or spewed out across the road,
motorcars totally overturned.

So that gives you an
idea of how effective

this injection of the surge was.

- We're gonna try to
set up that shelter.

- [Narrator] At emergency
operation centers

across the city,

officials struggled to get a
handle on what was going on.

- Sometime after nine o'clock,

we began to get calls from
areas East of Parish Road,

which we all knew that we were
in for a catastrophic event

because the water
was coming over

every single levee that we had.

- [Narrator] Then, the
building that Bob Turner was in

began to flood.

- The water came in and
created a whirlpool effect

in the lobby of the
government complex

and just took all of the file
cabinets, all the computers,

all the desks that were
in the various offices,

swirled them around
in the lobby.

- [Narrator] With communication
systems barely working,

officials were unable
to get a complete

picture of the
damage until 24 hours

after the storm had passed.

The first shock was
the 17th Street Canal

that empties into
Lake Pontchartrain.

There on the Eastern
side of the canal

was 151 yard breach
in the levee.

Water was rushing into
the nearby neighborhood.

Every single house was
inundated by 10 feet of water.

- We first became aware of
the levee breaches on Tuesday,

the day after
landfall around noon.

At that time,

authorities were saying
that the 17th Street Canal

had failed due to overtopping,

that this was an act of God.

We had such a big storm,

such big surge that we'd
overtopped the levees,

and overtopping had eroded
the back of the system

and it had failed.

- [Narrator] Officials
also discovered

two more levee failures on
the London Avenue Canal.

Water was streaming
into the city,

and nobody could stop it.

80% of the city was flooding,

and it would take two
weeks for emergency crews

to plug the levees,

and then another month
to pump out the water.

But while emergency
repairs were progressing,

a storm of controversy
was brewing.

There was no clear explanation
for the failure of both

the 17th Street and
London Avenue levees,

which had inundated
downtown New Orleans.

- I knew that there was a
potential for some of the walls

to be overtopped,

but I never thought we'd
have failures in a walls.

- [Narrator]
Because they were on

the western side of the eye,

these levees were only subjected
to 70 mile per hour winds,

coupled with an 11
foot storm surge,

which engineers believe
they could easily handle.

- Unfortunately, the authorities
kept putting the spin out

that it was overtopping
and, you know,

it's an act of God and
it it's not our fault.

And we started to feel,

hang on it is somebody's fault

because things
shouldn't have failed.

rina
underscored the fragility

of the levee systems
that protect many cities.

- Levees are the ultimate
in engineering hubris.

These piles of dirt are
gonna hold back these floods,

which are capable of
sculpting the earth,

we can't hold the water back.

All levees do is they manage it.

In Katrina's aftermath,

169 miles of the 350 miles
of levees around New Orleans

were either damaged
or destroyed.

While the levees were
being repaired.

The Louisiana State
University Hurricane Center

started its investigation.

The question. was
this an act of God,

or engineering failure?

- This became a forensic study.

In fact, if you will,

we were looking at each of
the breaches as a crime scene

because we wanted to know every
little thing that we could.

Was it a failure
because of design?

Was it a failure because
it was badly constructed?

- [Narrator] A team of
scientists and engineers

comb through the destruction
looking for clues.

Paul Kemp was one of
the investigators.

- Now what we did was,

we came in with the
same assumptions

that everyone else had.

That was, that the
storm was so big

that the water went over
top of all the levees

and caused failures
because the levees

were not built to withstand
that kind of storm.

And then when we came down,

we saw the evidence
on the ground

and in the high watermarks,

that told us no.

What happened here was
we had a big storm,

but it was not a storm

that should have caused
this much damage.

- [Narrator] The biggest
clue as to what happened

at the 17th Street Canal
was the resting place

of the flood wall itself.

- Well, not every levee breach
leaves its own tombstones.

And these monoliths that
you see here say a lot

about how this particular
failure occurred.

- [Narrator] The flood wall
fell backwards toward the canal,

which pointed investigators
to a flaw in its construction.

The 17th Street Canal was built

using an eye flood wall design.

A 17 feet into the levee.en

attached to the steel sheet.

Tadditional eight feetn

of flood protection.

Once the water got underneath
the earth and levee,

it lubricated the layers
of soil, so they separated,

then the pressure of the surge
removed the entire structure.

- The force of the
water pushed the levee,

pushed the wall as one piece.

And it actually caused
the ground

where we're standing here,

to start to wrinkle
up and to push up.

And they call that a heave,

and some of these
houses where heaved up

and moved laterally, and they
ended up on top of trees.

- [Narrator] At the
London Avenue Canal,

the levees failed for an
entirely different reason.

When investigators
arrived on the scene,

they were presented
with a mystery of sorts.

- Once we got here, we
were pretty shocked to find

beach sand everywhere.

And I'm a coastal scientist,
and I felt right at home.

This was a essentially the
kind of sand that we would find

on the beaches at Santa
Rosa Island in Florida.

Mounds and mounds
of it everywhere.

Where did it come from?

- [Narrator] The sand came from
the foundation of the levee.

It provided an
important clue as to why

the London Avenue levee failed.

- When the levee failed here,

it didn't fall over like
it did at the 17th Street,

here, the hole appeared
underneath the levee

and the levee fell
into the hole.

- [Narrator] Engineers
characterize this as a blowout.

The levee was built on
a foundation of sand,

which was quickly washed
away by the rushing water,

creating a 35 foot hole into
which the levee wall fell.

The LSU team concluded
that all the levee failures

on both London Avenue
and 17th Street

were caused by design errors
by the Army Corps of Engineers.

The Corps had not taken
the weak soil conditions

into account when
they built the levees.

They also learned that
the corps was using

antiquated flood projections
from 1959 for its designs.

- As a consequence, they
design for a very weak storm.

Combine that with not taking
into account the soils,

cost cutting on the
designs of the levees,

and we ended up with a system
that failed catastrophically.

- [Narrator] The LSU
team concluded that 87%

of all the water that
flooded New Orleans

came from levee failures,
not overtopping,

and these failures
unleashed a powerful force.

- When you look at
a natural disaster

in terms of what is
the most destructive,

it's invariably water.

Water's very heavy
compared to air.

And as it moves, it
has a lot of momentum,

has a lot of energy,

so it can knock down
buildings, motor vehicles,

scour huge holes.

In fact, it's far more
devastating than wind

or even fire.

- [Narrator] More
than 160,000 homes

were destroyed by Katrina,

a testament to the devastating
destruction that happens

when a house is
inundated by water.

15 years after Katrina,

many neighborhoods are
still only 90% occupied,

and many areas are
still trying to recover

from the aftermath
of the hurricane.

(wind rushing)

- Hurricane Katrina really
was in a lot of ways

kind of a worst case scenario

of a giant, powerful
hurricane bearing down

on a very low-lying
and unprepared city

with a high population.

- The National Weather
Service did a splendid job

of forecasting
Hurricane Katrina,

warning people to
leave well in advance.

There was plenty of
knowledge out there

to anybody who wanted it.

- [Narrator] But, no amount
of knowledge or warning

can curb Mother Nature's fury.

(chopper blades whirring)

- This really is a wake-up call

for people not just in
the path of hurricanes,

but in any area where nature
threatens a natural disaster.

(whooshing)

(wind wailing)

- [Narrator] When Hurricane
Katrina rears her head

just North of Miami Beach,

Theiss is on the scene.
storm chaser Mike

- Before it plowed
into the Gulf Coast,

Katrina crossed the
state of Florida first,

which a lot of
people don't realize.

They could see how
powerful it was

and I just knew that
this was gonna be

a once in a generation
type of storm.

(people yelling)

(wind roaring)

- [Narrator] Not everyone
shares Mike's concern.

Some Florida residents treat

the violent wind as a novelty.

- People generally
underestimate the intensity

of almost every
natural disaster.

They're having parties.

They're out in their front yard

and many of them are
taken by surprise.

- [Narrator] Katrina
spares these men,

but kills two others
while crossing Florida,

and she's only getting started.

- Katrina exits the
West coast of Florida

and then experiences very
warm Gulf of Mexico water

in the loop current.

You need at least
80 degrees to create

and maintain a hurricane.

Water temperatures
in the loop current

in the Gulf of Mexico
were 85 degrees plus.

That's an enormous
amount of heat.

(dramatic music)

Katrina greatly intensifies
from a Category 3

to a Category 5 in
under nine hours.

That's significant.

- [Mike] Well, here's
one of the outer bands.

Look at that, this is Katrina.

- [Narrator] Mike
Theiss chases Katrina

to the next spot where
she will make landfall,

Gulfport, Mississippi.

people are leaving.
He arrives as most

- Gulfport had the
bullseye on it.

That is where the
right front quadrant

was gonna come on shore,

where you're gonna find
catastrophic winds,

the extreme storm surge, and
basically, total destruction.

- [Narrator] A storm
surge is one of nature's

most devastating secret weapons.

- It is well known that the
high winds of a hurricane

can cause extreme damage
when it hits land.

What is perhaps not so
well known is the fact

that the storm surge can be

just as destructive
near the shore.

A storm surge is largely caused

by the water in the ocean
being piled up by strong winds

ahead of the hurricane as
it approaches the shore.

There's also the low
atmospheric pressure

that causes a sort
of a suction effect,

lifting up the
surface of the ocean

directly underneath
the hurricane.

That large amount of water
surges onto the shore

as a massive flood and can
cause significant damage.

- [Narrator] 80
miles to the West,

mandatory evacuations
are ordered

for New Orleans and
surrounding areas.

Many people comply.

Others do not.

- Hurricanes are a way of
life in the Gulf of Mexico.

2004, Hurricane Ivan caused
New Orleans to be evacuated.

One year later, 2005,
here it comes again,

the exact same scenario.

We had the warning systems,

but so many people
chose to ignore them.

- [Narrator] Back in Gulfport,

Mike and fellow storm chasers

commandeer a beachfront hotel

and brace for
Katrina's approach.

- Okay, right now, the
time is 7:36 Eastern time.

- [Narrator] Though the
hurricane loses strength

as it heads toward land,

Mother Nature has no plans
to loosen her death grip.

(wind howling)

(dramatic music)

The water started off
just a couple feet.

One wave comes in
and then the water

stays at that height.

Next wave comes in on
top of the previous wave

and it goes up a
little bit higher.

The storm surges came through

and just kept coming
and coming and coming.

Well, there's the Gulf
of Mexico right there

coming into our parking lot.

- [Narrator] The water
slams into the hotel,

forcing the storm chasers
to retreat inside.

(water rushing)

(waves crashing)

- The entire building was
vibrating with every crash.

(waves crashing)

(background chattering)

(intense music)

You can here glass breaking in.

You can hear tree
limbs breaking.

(waves crashing)

You could actually
hear the automobiles

crashing into trees.
as they were

(glass shattering)

- While we were in
the hotel lobby,

one of those automobiles crashed

through the front glass doors--

- [Man] We gotta get
outta here, guys.

(water rushing)

Oh gosh.

- [Man] Yeah.

- [Man] Oh my god.

(wall crunching)

hallway of the lobby.
--and came into the

- That was our cue that
it's time to go up.

Watch this door.

(door banging)

- In this area, FEMA
had done flood studies

and had set 12 feet
above sea level

as the maximum surge
that this area would see.

- [Mike] Second floor,

the water's comin' up
the stairwell here.

It's all the way
to the first floor.

(dramatic music)

- [John] In reality, the surge
was more than twice that,

28 feet in some locations.

- [Narrator] The water
rises at deadly speed,

putting Mike and his colleagues
at even greater risk.

(water whooshing)

- [Mike] It started to get into

the second floor
of the building.

The entire first floor was
just getting disintegrated.

(water roaring)

(dramatic music)

- Those waves have
power on their own,

but they're also
carrying debris.

Between the impact of the water
and the debris it carries,

that's a huge threat to life.

(water roaring)

- At the maximum
extent of the surge,

we would seE a coastline
that, in some cases,

goes inland more than 12 miles

from where it is at normal tide.

- [Narrator] Once
the storm surge

marches as far as it can inland,

it does an about face
and starts attacking

from the other direction.

- The area's hit first
by winds going on shore,

but as the hurricane moves,

the rotating winds
that are going there

are now ones going off shore.

- As it recedes, it takes
away cars, walls, partitions.

- What was amazing to me was
how fast the water receded.

It went from being 28 feet high

to being completely gone
within about 15 minutes times.

It was almost like somebody
pulled the drain in the bathtub

and all the water
just went away.

- Water gets piled up fast,
also gets blown out fast

as different parts
of the hurricane

go over the one site.

- [Narrator] Though the
bottom floor is decimated,

the structure is strong

because of local building codes,

preventing the hotel
from collapsing.

- Buildings built
in the surge zone

have breakaway walls
in the first story.

So, by having the
walls breakaway,

leaving just columns in place,

the overall force on the
structure is greatly reduced,

and the structures
can then survive

storm surge flooding
without collapse.

- [Narrator] Outside the
hotel, the majority of Gulfport

has been washed down
to its foundation.

- It was unbelievable.

All that was left
was concrete slabs,

just completely clean
like a clean slate.

- We had floating casino barges

as large as a city
block that came on shore

and completely crushed
reinforced concrete buildings.

So we're talking about
massive amounts of water,

huge forces affecting
hundreds of square miles,

just unimaginable
surge from a hurricane.

(water whooshing)

- [Narrator] Just
as in Gulfport,

thousands of victims
in New Orleans

face a grim new reality.

- Given the fact that
most of New Orleans

is below sea level, once
the water floods in,

it just stays there
until it's pumped out.

(chopper blades beating)

Several thousand
people had been trapped

on rooves and attics,
on freeway overpasses.

(dramatic music)

- [Narrator] For those caught
in Katrina's cross hairs,

life will never be the same.

- There are still large
areas of New Orleans

that are a ghost town.

Everybody that lived
there has gone elsewhere,

and they're probably
not coming back.

may be more prone to
hurricane landfall,

the Northeast has seen
its share of activity,

reaching up the East coast
as far as New Hampshire,

Northern states often
finding themselves

in the cross hairs, most
recently and notably,

impacted by two of
the last decade's

most devastating storms,
Hurricanes Irene and Sandy.

Experts believe a
Category 3 hurricane

could devastate New York City.

When this killer storm comes,

there will be massive power
outages and loss of life.

Debris-filled water will
flood lower Manhattan.

Fierce winds will
rip apart buildings.

Prior to Hurricanes
Irene and Sandy

striking the New York, New
Jersey and Connecticut area,

many in the tri-state may
have found it inconceivable

move that far North.
that a killer storm could

Bplagued the Northeaste

for hundreds of years.

- The great colonial
hurricane occurred in 1635

and was a complete surprise
to the English settlers

who had never seen
a hurricane before.

Damage was reported in
the Providence plantations

and the Plymouth colony and in
the Massachusetts Bay colony.

- [Narrator] Major
hurricanes also hit

New York and New
England in the 1900s,

but the storm that
struck Long Island

on September 21st,
1938, would define

the destructive potential of
a New York City hurricane.

(dramatic music)

A hurricane nicknamed
the Long Island Express

rammed into the South
shore of Long Island

at 2:30 in the afternoon.

Within hours, over
700 people were dead.

More than 50,000 people
were left homeless.

The storm of '38 is one of the
worst storms of the century,

an event almost forgotten today.

- It had sustained winds of
around 120 miles an hour,

with gusts to over
150 miles an hour.

- [Broadcaster] With 48
states, as the scene of...

- [Narrator] In
1938, meteorology

was a much more
primitive science.

There was no Doppler radar.

The only protection
against these storms

was individual storm trackers

watching the sky and sea.

headed towards Miami,

butin Jacksonville, Floridackers

had started to veer North.

The churning wall
of water and wind

reached Cape Hatteras,
North Carolina, a day later.

A high pressure
system off the coast

and one along the
Alleghenies created a chute

for the storm to fly
up the shoreline.

One of the factors surrounding
the surprise attack

of the storm was the lack

of eyewitness data
and information.

One of the largest hurricanes
in recorded history

was moving up the coast and
nobody knew it was coming.

In 1938, meteorologists
believed that the

colder water temperatures
of the North Atlantic

were incompatible
with the energy needed

to produce a hurricane.

- A common fallacy in
thinking about hurricanes

in the North is
that the cold water

North of the Gulf
stream protects us.

It all depends on how fast the
hurricane is moving forward.

If a hurricane is moving forward
35 miles an hour or more,

as it leaves the Gulf stream,

it's like a car out of control

and it's going to hit
New York and Long Island

with undiminished force.

- [Narrator] Richard
Hendrickson was

18 years old in '38.

A native Long Islander,
he was a weather observer

for the US Weather
Bureau as well as working

on his father's farm.

- I woke up that morning
and did the morning chores

chicks and so forth.

- [Narrator] At 2:30
in the afternoon,

the storm hit Long Island.

Forward speed was
60 miles an hour

with sustained wind
of 120 miles per hour

and gusts over 150.

- The worst conditions were over

the Eastern part of Long Island.

The Hamptons saw surges
between 15 and 20 feet of water

come in over the
dunes and just envelop

many of the towns
on the East end.

Few people actually
saw the wall of surge

coming toward them
and managed to live.

- [Narrator] Water
filled with deadly debris

pummeled dunes and buildings.

Onlookers tried to
flee to higher ground

ahead of the roaring storm.

- It covered a tremendous
area of Long Island,

which is another
devastating characteristic

of Northern hurricanes.

They expand and they move
faster as they come North.

- [Narrator] Each
square yard of sea water

carried the deadly
weight of 1,700 pounds

as the surge hammered to
pieces massive summer homes.

(eerie music)

(camera shutter clicking)

- They took the sand dunes
and the beach right out

and made an opening between

Shinnecock Bay and
the Atlantic Ocean,

and I went down to
check the buildings.

We had 25 buildings in six acres

and all the buildings
were smashed.

- [Narrator] The
howling storm charged

across Long Island
Sound and smacked

Connecticut and Rhode
Island in the face.

At rush hour, the storm crashed

into downtown
Providence, Rhode Island,

then a city of 250,000.

One witness described the surge

pushing water from
the bay into downtown

was as if someone had turned
on a giant water faucet.

People were clinging
to lamp posts.

They drowned in their cars.

Plate glass windows of
department stores popped out.

Sofas and washing
machines floated by

with people riding
them like lifeboats.

A sporting goods store
pushed its inventory

of small row boats out
the second story window.

Within hours, the same hurricane

also wreaked havoc in
Massachusetts and Vermont.

- Because it was so
fast-moving and so large

affected thousands
of square miles

and it downed over
2 billion trees

and affected lots of properties,

all the way up inland into
Wooster, Massachusetts.

Every single property
on Long Island

had some damage from this storm.

There was low level wind damage

all the way up into Canada.

Over 60,000 people
were left homeless

from the 1938 hurricane.

- [Narrator] The
widespread devastation

is vividly captured in this
extremely rare 1938 color film.

Almost 700 people were killed.

Thousands were injured.

Nearly forgotten
over 80 years later,

it is still one of
the largest hurricanes

to strike the United States,

but despite the devastation

this hurricane
caused the Northeast,

this storm did have
a positive impact

on the economy during
the Great Depression.

- At that time, you
could get anybody to work

for two dollars a day.

People had to have
their doors fixed,

their chimney rebuilt,
the trees out.

I like to say that that was
the end of the Depression.

- [Narrator] In the decades
since this natural disaster,

there has been
tremendous development

along the East coast.

In 1938, there were
less than 750,000 people

living on Long Island.

Today, there are close to eight
million people living there.

Fortunately, technology
has advanced since 1938,

and meteorologists use
devices to track storms

and their severity
and alert the public

if they need to evacuate.

When 2011's Hurricane Irene
and 2012's Hurricane Sandy

barreled up the East coast,

the public was given
advanced notice

that allowed for
preemptive measures

and evacuations
that saved lives.

never believed a
storm like Katrina

could ever hit their city.

Then came Sandy in 2012,

the biggest hurricane ever
to form in the Atlantic.

Measuring some 900 miles wide,

the unrelenting rain,
the ferocious wind

and the flooding storm surge

serves a reminder that no area

on the US-Atlantic seaboard
is immune to hurricanes.

The Northeast saw a
glimpse of that destruction

just one year
earlier in the form

of Tropical Storm Irene.

Irene's damage, the costliest
until Superstorm Sandy.

Before these storms, we'd
have to go back decades

to find one this strong
to batter the Northeast,

but wind, rain and flooding

are nothing new
to the Big Apple.

In fact, New York has a
long history of storms.

In 1985, New York experienced

its closest call to date
with Hurricane Gloria.

- [Police] We are requesting
area residents

to volentarily evacuate

- Gloria was a Category 3 storm

that started in the Carolinas

and moved North
through New Jersey,

causing massive flooding.

Meteorologists and
emergency management experts

warned New York to
prepare for the worst,

but the worst never came.

- We were watching the storm
very closely on the radar,

and we watched the whole back
part of Gloria fall apart.

- [Narrator] Hurricane
Gloria broke up

as it passed over the
cold Northern waters.

By the time it reached New York,

most of the winds had
decreased to Category 1.

There was a small
swath of 15 to 20 miles

over Suffolk County that did see

sustained Category 2 type winds.

- It was very easy to
survive Hurricane Gloria,

and yet, parts of Long Island

lost power for seven days.

- [Narrator] Despite
$900 million in damage

and destruction as far
South as North Carolina,

New York City had dodged
a bullet this time.

- Go back to 1999 and
we looked at Floyd

as it was coming up the coast.

As it came off of
the Virginia capes,

it was no longer a hurricane.

We breathed a sign of relief

'cause that was pretty
damn close to us.

Isabel, 2003, another one,
it hit down in the Carolinas,

but slowly made
that Northwest turn

and we had damage all the
way up into Southern Jersey.

A couple o' hundred
miles to the North,

that same type of storm,

that would've affected
significantly New York City.

- [Narrator] Statistics
and weather data

indicate the next big storm
could be less forgiving.

To begin with, both the
Gulf and the Atlantic basin

have seen fluctuations
in water temperature.

- We're in the
multi-decadal cycle

of warm surface temperatures
of the Atlantic.

We can go back to about 1870

and we see a cycle of,
every 25 to 30 years,

we go through temperatures
which are warmer than normal

for about 25 to 30 years,

and then colder than normal.

- [Narrator] These warmer/colder
and wetter/dryer cycles

may have been exacerbated
by global warming.

- Because of global warming,

because of our rising sea
level, our warmer ocean waters,

ito say the near future,e

a severe hurricane.e

- [Narrator] But, it is
not just the frequency

of these hurricanes during
the current warm period

that is causing concern.

There has also been
tremendous construction

along the coast during the
last cold water period.

- We went through a
period from the mid-60s

to the mid-90s, where
the Atlantic Basin

was a little bit below normal

as far as water
temperature goes.

- Now that's when the
coast was developed

and people didn't have
the hurricane experience.

- [Narrator] Tremendous
coastal buildup,

a complacent population,
increasing hurricane activity,

a deadly mix for the East coast,

but it is only in
the last 20 years

that a scientist's best guess

was that the Northeast
only experienced

these larger hurricanes
every 150 years or so.

That means the city
would not be due

for a major storm
until around 2075,

but even with recurring
hurricanes

battering the Northeast,

scientists believed
that the East coast

only experienced
devastating hurricanes

every 150 years or so.

However, evidence found
on a New York City beach

challenged that hypothesis.

- We're in the Arverne
section of Rockaway,

part of New York's
public beach system,

and not many New Yorkers know

that after the Civil
War, out there 1000 feet

was a resort island
called Hog Island,

and it had causeways
and playhouses

and saloons and restaurants.

- [Narrator] The
area just off shore

was dredged after a
series of winter storms

in the early 1990s.

The sand was dumped on this
beach in Rockaway, Brooklyn.

- Here's a brick, a
remnant of a brick.

- [Narrator] In 1995,
Professor Nick Coch

and his geology
students were collecting

sand and stone along
this shoreline.

What they found would
change both the history

and the future of hurricane
prediction in New York.

- My students and I, after
the ocean was dredged,

found this material,
artifacts on the beach,

and in the process of dating it,

we rediscovered the
great 1893 hurricane

that devastated the
shoreline of New York.

- [Narrator] Dr. Coch's
students were able

to cross reference the items

they found on the beach,

and determine a period
in the early 1890s,

when it was possible that
all these different artifacts

could have been in
the same location.

- The 1893 storm was forgotten,

but it's very clear
in the New York Times,

all six columns
of the front page

talk about the
extreme devastation

that occurred on the
New York shoreline.

- [Narrator] Hog Island
was completely destroyed

by the 1893 hurricane.

- That go anything, it's
a thick piece of glass...

- [Narrator] With
the rediscovery of

this Category 2 storm,
Professor Coch now understood

that New York area storms
were much more frequent

than previously believed.

- We began to narrow
the recurrence interval

of a major storm on
the New York shoreline

to something more
like 75 to 90 years,

from 125 to 150 years.

- [Narrator] The near
misses in New York

were getting closer and New York

had been lucky for many years.

- [Narrator] In 2011, New
York city would experience

the destructive nature
of powerful storms.

When hurricane Irene
hit the big apple,

it's brutal path was marked
with several landfalls,

starting with the Bahamas
and gaining strength

to become a category three,

traveling across the Caribbean
before making landfall

on the mainland
in North Carolina.

Irene would weaken every
time it touched land.

By the time it made its
ninth and final landfall,

it had dropped in strength
enough to be downgraded

to a tropical storm.

Still, the effects were
enormous and widespread.

On Long Island alone,

the storm knocked out power to
350,000 homes and businesses.

In New York city, the Hudson
river overflowed its banks.

In New York, 10 people died
mostly due to flooding.

Irene's devastation led the
World Meteorological Association

to retire the name forever.

Irene is one of 100
names never to be used

for an Atlantic hurricane.

No one could predict what would
happen just one year later.

Another monster storm would
find its way once again

to New York's doorstep,

and this time the big apple
would be brought to its knees.

Despite Sandy hitting Cuba

as a major category
three hurricane

and despite its mammoth size,

it had weakened to a
category one status

by the time it made landfall

near Atlantic city
on October 29th,

and made the short trip
up to New York city.

But Sandy's weakened state

had all the meteorological
ingredients in place

to become a crippling storm

for the millions that call
the Tristate area home.

First, unusually warm
sea surface temperatures

kept this storm
primed with fuel,

and preventing it from doing
what most of these storms do

when they hit cold
water, weaken.

Second, there was an unusual
dip in the jet stream,

those high altitude winds
that helped guide hurricanes,

that brought Sandy
right into the coast

instead of out to sea.

Third, Sandy hit at the
worst possible time,

at a lunar high tide.

That tidal tug from a full moon

may have added a foot of
water to the storm surge,

which hit right at high
tide on the Atlantic coast.

Buildings in New York's most
flood-prone neighborhoods

were evacuated.

Still the wall of water
that hit Manhattan

was like no other.

The storm surge
measured nearly 14 feet

at New York's Battery Park,
easily swamping Subways,

car tunnels, and the
city's electrical grid.

Transportation in America's
largest city had come to a halt.

All along the East Coast,

airports were forced to
cancel 19,000 flights.

Amtrak canceled its service

on the Northeast
corridor for days.

Gas stations were forced to
shut down because of shortages.

And even if you
could drive around,

all the down trees and power
lines made it hazardous.

Sandy would even
cancel Halloween

and the New York City Marathon.

It would be days before
the incredible destruction

from Sandy would
be fully evident.

Entire beach communities gone

along with their boardwalks
and amusement piers.

Millions would stay in the
dark for days, some even weeks.

The intense wind and
catastrophic flooding from Sandy

killed 149 people.

But from the survivors stories
come valuable information

that could keep
more people alive

in the face of future storms.

But hearing the stories

and heeding the
warnings from survivors

may save those in the path
of the next deadly storm.

(intense music)

Toms River, New Jersey.

Mike is alone at his
grandparents' house by the Bay,

he decides to ride
out the storm at home

but has a change of heart.

- The whole first
floor was flooded.

I still had the second floor,
I was still roaming around,

I knew that I had
to keep myself calm.

- [Narrator] Alone in the house,
Mike has a change of heart.

- I though maybe I
should get out of here.

I mean, I have a better
chance of swimming out there

than if this house
collapsed on me.

When I went out the front door,

I didn't realize that the water

was eight feet in the streets,
and it kind of sucked me out.

- [Narrator]
Battling the current,

Mike grabs hold of his car.

- I'm hanging onto my
windshield wiper on my car,

I can't hold on too much longer.

Before you knew it, the
windshield wiper broke

and I got sucked
out into the Bay.

The current was so strong.

The more I tried to
swim towards land,

the more I got knocked
out into the Bay.

The waves are crashing
over your head,

you're panicking, you're crying,
you're screaming for help,

and there's nobody
out there to help you.

The water was so cold,

all I remember was
swimming with the current,

trying to get anywhere.

And this one wave

just put me into this white
pillar of somebody's house.

and I just held onto
it as long as I can.

It's a life and death situation

I need to break into
this lady's house.

I'm driving this brick
into this lady's door,

and I had no strength,

it had to take me at
least 20 to 25 times

even to break the door.

Their basement was all flooded

and their first floor
wasn't flooded at all.

When I went in there,
I'm crawling around,

first thing I do is
take my clothes off

and I saw this white
blanket on this couch

and I wrapped myself around it.

My pulse was slow, my
vision was going in and out,

I was so clumsy, I was
bunging into everything.

I knew I had
hypothermia at the time.

I was freezing, I was
never this cold in my life.

I'm trying to feel around
for any clothes in the house,

I got a pair of
jeans, a black jacket,

and I put everything
on me at once,

and I just curled up in a ball.

A half hour later, my
body wasn't warming up,

I was so tired, I thought
if I took a nap on the couch

that I wouldn't wake up.

- [Narrator] Mike passes out,

but a loud alarm awakens
him 10 hours later.

- I went upstairs and saw
this carbon monoxide detector.

And, you know, I said to myself,

there's no way I'm
dying like this.

You can't smell carbon monoxide.

I went on the top balcony

and I keep on hearing this
wave runner motor, jet ski.

And I'm screaming, "Help,
could somebody help me,

could somebody help me."

I don't know how I
made it, but I made it.

I didn't give up.

(dramatic music)

,

but the West Coast experience
is another kind of storm

that is just as devastating.

- The pineapple express
is the weather system

that can create some of the
worst flooding in California.

- [Narrator] The pineapple
express is a super storm,

a series of rain storms that
only happens during the winter.

It's a weather system that
stretches thousands of miles

out into the Pacific ocean
lasting seven to 10 days.

- Once the flooding starts,

the last thing you
want is more rain.

Then in the pineapple express

that's exactly what
you're going to get

because you have this very
long fetch of moisture

that is still aimed
at California,

and so you're still going to
get more waves coming through.

- [Narrator] To
make matters worse,

the storm picks up warm moisture
from the Hawaiian islands,

which it dumps on the
Sierra Nevada mountain range

only 75 miles East
of Sacramento.

The warm rain can
melt the snowpack,

sending up to 16 million tons
of water into Sacramento.

- It's a double whammy.

You get a warm, intense storm

and catastrophic
melting of the snow.

- [Narrator] This
is a serious threat

to a city like
Sacramento, California.

The downtown area is
next to the confluence

of two major rivers, the
Sacramento and the American.

Both of these rivers are fed
by the Sierra Nevada snowpack.

To control the water coming
down the American river,

the State of California
built Folsom dam.

The nine mile long earthen
dam with a concrete spillway

holds about 10,000
surface acres of water

and protects a million
people who live downstream.

When the dam was
completed in 1955,

state water experts predicted
it would take a year of storms

to fill the reservoir.

Seven months later,

a storm came through and
filled it within two weeks.

The dam was designed so
that during a monster storm

its large capacity could
hold back floodwaters

and protect the
Sacramento levee system.

In recent years,

experts have found some
flaws in the design.

- The dam, when it was designed,

really wasn't designed as
a flood control structure.

That is you can't do emergency
releases from this dam

until it's practically full.

If you know a storm is coming,

you can't rapidly empty this dam

because they never
designed it that way.

- [Narrator] Experts
are also worried

that the dam isn't big enough
to control the mega storms

that could roll in
on the Pacific ocean.

(water gushing)

Jeffrey Mount and his colleagues

at the University of
California at Davis

are attempting to come up with
a more realistic flood model.

(fast-paced music)

- Sacramento's history
of a flood management

is a classic case of using
the past to predict the future

and getting it wrong.

(rumbling)

(jack hammer poping)

When they built Folsom
dam in the 1950s,

their understanding of the
hydrology of that system

was relatively short.

They really hadn't
been paying attention

but for about 50 years,

and in that 50 years
it had been kind of a,

what I'd call a
kinder, gentler climate

with not big floods,
not big droughts.

We had a series of floods
in modest size before 1950

and everybody who assumed the
hydrology would be the same,

but right afterwards,
starting in 1955,

in the '70s there
were several floods,

of course there was
a big flood in 1986

and then a whopper in 1997.

So the climate in the second
half of the 20th century

has almost nothing to do with
the climate in the first half.

Regrettably, we designed
our flood control system

based on that first half
of the 20th century.

- [Narrator] Adding
to this thread,

global warming maybe
increasing ocean temperatures

causing bigger and more
powerful storms in the future.

Based on this flood data,

scientists fear the
reservoir behind Folsom dam

isn't big enough to handle
such a high volume of water.

Engineers are
addressing this concern.

The State of California is
raising the dam by several feet

to increase its capacity,
breaking ground in early 2020.

(thunder rumbling)
(water rushing)

(dramatic music)

- [Narrator] Amazingly, the
design and construction

of levees in and around
the Sacramento area

hasn't changed much

since the original construction
over 160 years ago.

- We've improved the
technology of levees,

but it's still an
antique design.

I mean, you basically are
putting a big pile of dirt.

There's a large mass out there
that holds the water back.

- [Narrator] Like New Orleans,

Sacramento has a history
of devastating floods.

The city was founded during
the California gold rush.

It began to grow next to the
confluence of the Sacramento

and the American rivers.

These rivers were key
to economic success,

but they also brought
devastating floods

during the springtime
snow melts in 1850,

'51,

'52,

and '53.

In the aftermath,

the local government took its
first steps of flood control.

- The city took the unusual step

of filling in the streets
in the center of Sacramento

so that what was
previously the basement

became the first floor.

- [Narrator] Even with the
city buildings raised 10 feet,

they kept flooding.

- Sacramento has got a
long history of flooding.

The legislature in the 1800s

would commonly after
row boats to work.

- [Narrator] To
control the flooding,

the city began to build levees,

but it wasn't a
coordinated effort.

(helicopter blades chopping)

- These levees, many of
them began over 100 years ago.

They were originally
built by farmers

and then later enlarged

and incorporated in the state
federal flood control system.

At the time they were built,

they basically dredged the
materials from the river,

muck, sands, whatever
that what was there,

plopped them on the
bank, shaped them up,

and that became the
levee that we have now.

It used materials and techniques

that we would reject
today as being inadequate.

- [Narrator] Then in 1917,
the Army Corps of engineers,

the same group that built
the New Orleans levees,

began rebuilding and expanding
the Sacramento levee system.

It covered approximately
1100 miles.

At the time they started, 90%
of the levees that exist today

were already in place.

So most of their
work involved repair

and reduction of flood risk.

City officials know

that they are facing
a dangerous situation.

The levees are subject
to constant erosion

in everyday wear and tear.

As fast as they can repair
one section of levee,

another erosion appears.

- If you have an area
which is surrounded

by 20 or 30 miles of levees,

it just takes one,
one weak link,

one beaver hole or one squirrel,
one tree that falls in,

the whole thing fails
when one part fails.

- [Narrator] Officials have
discovered hundreds of locations

where there is severe erosion
and degradation of the levees.

(fast-paced music)

The most disconcerting
thing about this levee

is the type of material
used in its construction.

The portion of the London
Avenue levee in New Orleans

that failed, also was
built on top of sand,

which was washed
away by floodwaters

and led to its collapse.

- This sandy material
here that's eroding away

is actually eroding
the base of the levee.

The water is
literally washing away

the foundation of the levee.

And if this continues to
happen the levee will collapse.

- [Narrator] The
Sacramento doesn't get

the deadly high velocity winds

that occur during a hurricane,

so emergency crews
can be on the job 24/7

fighting to keep
the levees intact.

- The job of these
flood fighters

is to identify a
problem with the levee

and then to attack that problem.

- [Narrator] The city
also has helicopters

equipped with infra-red cameras

that can inspect each and
every levee from the air.

Any underground leakage
invisible to the naked eye

will show up on the
heat seeking camera.

- We're not going to
take the attitude,

well the levees' gonna fail,
so, we'll just let it fail.

We're going to
attack that problem.

(dramatic music)

- [Narrator] With the
lessons of hurricane Katrina

still resonating
in the public mind,

the city and state
government in Sacramento

are actively taking measures

to avoid a similar
fate to New Orleans.

r

that feeds the so-called
pineapple express

gets its origins from
the warm waters adjacent

to the Hawaiian Islands.

Those waters while
feeding the flooding rains

of the West coast are
also fertile ground

for some of the worst
hurricanes of the Pacific.

Hurricane Iniki is by
far the worst storm ever

to hit Hawaii.

It struck the Island of
Kauai in September, 1992,

just 18 days after Andrew
ripped through Southern Florida.

Strong waves of up to 35 feet

crashed the shoreline for hours.

Because it moved so quickly,

flooding rains
were not a problem,

but its fierce winds
caused billions in damage

making it Hawaii
is costliest storm.

(wooshing)

- [Narrator] Hurricane Iniki,

a devastating category
four hurricane,

packing wind gusts up
to 200 miles an hour

is bearing down on the
Hawaiian Island of Kauai,

and destroying
everything in its path.

(people screaming)

Roofs blow through
neighborhoods like tumbleweeds.

- [Woman 1] Oh my God!

- [Woman 2] The neighbor's roof
is now blowing off their house.

- [Narrator] Palm trees are
snapped like toothpicks.

Even a two story concrete
steeple crumbles to the ground.

50,000 terrified residents
on the Island hunker down,

hoping to ride out
the massive storm,

including Tony Wichman, his
wife, and three young children.

They're hold up in the family's
120 year old beloved home,

terrified they won't
make it out alive.

- [Man] Whoa, our roof is going.

- [Narrator] By day's end,

hurricane Iniki will
become the most devastating

and deadly hurricane
in Hawaiian history.

(dramatic music)

- Hawaii just doesn't
see a lot of hurricanes.

- [Narrator] Chief
Meteorologist, Mark Jackson,

says Hawaii sees only about
three hurricanes every 15 years.

So when forecasters
first spot Iniki,

it's a tropical storm
off the coast of Africa,

11,000 miles away from Kauai.

They don't see it as a threat
to the tropical paradise,

but as the system
travels over the Atlantic

through central America,

and across the unseasonably
warm waters of the Pacific,

the winds converge
and form the walls

of the enormous cyclonic storm.

- It's very rare for a
hurricane of that magnitude

to make it that far North
in the central Pacific.

- [Woman] Oh no!

- [Narrator] By early morning
on September 11th, 1992,

Iniki, Hawaiian for
sharp and piercing wind

makes a beeline
straight for Kauai

and grows to a
terrifying category four.

- [Woman] Oh my God!

- It'll tear roofs
off at that speed,

it will totally
destroy mobile homes,

waves of upward, you know, 50
to 100 feet in the open ocean.

- [Narrator] But getting
50,000 people off an Island

within a few hours,
proves impossible.

Most residents have no choice,
but to stay put and pray.

- I'd never seen anything
like it before in my life.

(woman screams)

- Oh my gosh (laughs).

- [Narrator] News
cameraman Sisto Domingo

had no idea he was recording
one of Hawaii's darkest days.

- There were cars that
looked like Tonka toys

that were just piled
on top of each other.

It was just amazing to
me, the power of Iniki.

There were trees flying
in the middle of the road,

people were taping
up their windows.

- [Narrator] And then at
3:15 in the afternoon,

hurricane Iniki makes
landfall with a vengeance.

- [Man] There it goes.

- [Woman] Oh my God!

- [Narrator] Tony
Wichman, his wife,

and three young children are
trapped inside their home

that's been in the family
for three generations.

(intense music)

- [Man] Honey, this whole
house is going to go down.

Look at the roof already.

- [Man 2] Just grab
things and walk right now.

I'm gonna grab
the TV over there.

- [Narrator] 145 mile
an hour sustained winds

batter the Wichman's one-story
wood plantation home,

four by six tin panels
peel off the roof

like layers of an onion.

- [Narrator] Tony's laughing

to keep his kids from panicking,

(Tony laughs)

but he knows his family
is in real danger.

All that's protecting them
is what's left of the roof,

and six inches of drywall
covering the false ceiling.

- [Tony] The whole
sheets are gone already.

- [Narrator] Fearing his
family will be crushed

by their own home, Tony
sends his wife and kids

to huddle in the bathroom
of a newly built bedroom

located on the side of the house

that's shielded from
the piercing wind.

Suddenly a 200 mile an
hour gust hits the house.

The walls begin to tremble,
as seams began to shake.

And then the inevitable happens.

(wall crumbling)

- I turned around and that beam

just came right in front of
me and slammed the door on me,

and I barely got out of there.

- [Narrator] Tony's life
is speared by just inches.

- I cried in that moment.

Yeah, I didn't believe it.

- [Narrator] A beam
identical to this one

is actually what saves Tony.

When the ceiling
begins to buckle,

the second beam directly
above his head holds

supporting just
enough the ceiling

to allow Tony to
escape without injury.

Now, all thoughts go to
Lorraine and the children

still huddled in the bathroom.

- I was very fearful for
my family at that point.

I knew that this whole
house was not gonna make it.

- [Narrator] To his
relief, they're shaken,

but very much alive.

- We would hunker down for
about an hour and a half

before the wind died.

(laughs)

I felt a great sense
of relief at that point

that none of us were hurt.

After we felt brave
enough to go outside,

we looked at what was
left of the house,

I mean, the walls
had all caved in,

the roof was definitely gone.

- Everything was
leveled to ground zero,

and it blew those walls
that had come down,

it blew those into three
or four neighborhoods.

There was debris from miles,
miles away that we picked up.

- [Narrator] But what
had stayed intact

was that little bathroom.

- I know we had
that one safe haven,

which was the smaller
bathroom that we had.

That was the safest
part of the house.

It's very miraculous
that we survived

this category four hurricane,

because we had everything
going against us.

We didn't have enough plywood,

we weren't prepared with
enough tape on the windows,

we're living in an older home.

Yeah, I mean, we're lucky
to be here, very lucky.

- [Narrator] When the
winds finally died down,

Iniki's path of destruction
proved devastating.

14,000 homes were destroyed,
30,000 people were homeless,

and six lives were lost.

It takes the Wichman family
seven years to recover,

but at least they
have their lives.

- I'm definitely a lucky guy.

I have a guardian angel,
no doubt about it.

- I definitely don't
wish this upon anybody,

and I don't want another
one to hit Kauai, not ever.

- [Narrator] But as
climate change increases,

storm threats are expected
to intensify, not diminish

on both coasts of
the United States.

And the Pacific ocean can be
just as active as the Atlantic,

unstable and angry
as the Atlantic

when it comes to the production

of high powered
tropical cyclones.

In fact, what's known as
the Northwest Pacific Basin

is the most active
place on the planet

when it comes to these storms

called typhoons in
this part of the world.

Asian nations like the
Philippines, Japan, and China,

receive the brunt of
these killer cyclones.

Many of them bigger and
stronger than hurricanes

due to the warmer
waters of the Pacific.

Hurricanes are the most
fearsome weather on earth.

Monster storms batter coastlines

with wicked winds and storm
surges that bury entire towns.

Countless fortunes are
lost when hurricane strike

and more importantly,
lives are stolen

when warnings aren't heeded.

The great irony of
these disasters,

without tropical
cyclones and hurricanes,

the world, as we
know it would end.

They act as nature's thermostat,

transferring heat and
regulating the climate.

Hurricanes bust droughts
and enhance ecological life

and the creation of new
coral reefs and sandbars

to aid in bird migration.

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