TechCrunch notes that Google has cancelled its NYC Android event on Monday, although Microsoft’s Windows Phone 8 launch is still on for today, since it’s taking place in San Francisco.
Hurricane Sandy is the biggest storm to hit the North Eastern seaboard in recent memory. Some 10 million people could be without power at some point over the next week. Here are some Flickr photos.
AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, and T-Mobile have made preparations and have safety tips. Some 6,500 cell towers and sites were damaged in August, 2011 by Hurricane Irene, which left severe flooding in upstate New York and Vermont in its wake.
TechCrunch and the Huffington Post list resources, including:
- A map of the evacuated areas in NYC
- A page for the NYC area,
- BreakingWeather on Twitter
- The Weather Channel’s “Hurricane Central Twitter feed.
- Red Cross has set up a page to help keep families connected as the storms roll in.
Hurricane Sandy could affect as many as 60 million people. Here’s a CNN rundown of top hurricane tracking apps:
- Hurricane — American Red Cross (Android
iOS). Free tracker that lets you “monitor conditions in your area or throughout the storm track, prepare your family and home, find help and let others know you are safe even if the power is out.” It’s a little light on meteorological data, but think of it as the “safety first” tracker, and check out the video below for a few examples of it in action. - Hurricane Software (Android). Both free, with ads and $2.99 ad-free. Hurricane data from the National Hurricane Center, high resolution maps, satellite images, warning information and storm tracks.
- iHurricane HD (iOS). Free with ads. You can track hurricanes using satellite and radar data, stage email alerts and gauge your distance from “each coordinate of the storm.”
- Hurricane Tracker (iOS). $2.99 Hurricane Tracker offers detailed storm maps, National Hurricane Center info, threat level maps, audio/video forecast updates, real-time feeds and push alerts.
- Hurricane Hound (Android). Uses Google Maps and tracks both forecasts and the locations of Atlantic and East Pacific hurricanes and offers standard NWS “tropical outlooks and discussions, public advisories, forecasts, and satellite imagery.” The free version hasn’t been updated in over a year, and it looks like the $1.99 add-free version is where developer STKI Concepts has “current radar and weather satellite overlays.”
- Hurricane / Hurricane HD (iOS). $2.99 hurricane-watching app (updated in June) offers a repository of global meteorological information, including tracking maps, satellite views, five-day forecasts, radar and bulletins from the National Hurricane Center. Use iOS’s locational services to determine how far away you are.
More than 617,000 electric customers have lost power in New York City, New Jersey, Connecticut and Westchester County, reports the NY Times, with millions expected to be without electricity in the coming hours. In Manhattan, the top section of a crane on West 57th Street near Central Park was dangling precariously about 80 stories above the ground. Several nearby buildings had been evacuated.
Twitter is offering free promoted crisis tweets to the Red Cross, FEMA, the New York City’s Mayor’s Office and the Maryland Emergency Management Agency to help keep users updated on the storm.
A 180-foot, 3-mast replica of the 18th century tall ship HMS Bounty sank on Monday, Oct. 29 during Hurricane Sandy, 90 miles southeast of Hatteras, North Carolina. Sixteen people were aboard when the ship went down midway through its journey from Connecticut to Florida.
Fourteen people on the ship made it to life rafts and on to safety, thanks to a dramatic rescue by the US Coast Guard documented in the video above.
