Panic Buying Grips the East Coast: Mad Rush for Supplies Ahead of Mega-Storm

While many people are still trying to make up their minds about the potential severity of the storm threatening the U.S. northeast, it’s not stopping millions of concerned residents from racing to to grocery stores, gas stations and hardware depots in droves.

If you’ve ever wanted to know what it looks like when the 99% of Americans who have failed to prepare for a disaster wake up and realize they are facing a major crisis take a look at what’s happening on the east coast ahead of Hurricane Sandy.

Good luck buying lanterns, generators, propane, or – if you are really unprepared – rain boots and batteries in areas in the path of Hurricane Sandy as it bears down on the U.S. East Coast.

The approach of the gigantic storm, which is expected to come ashore on Monday night set off a weekend scramble for supplies from Virginia to New England, causing long lines at gas stations, bare shelves at hardware and home-supply shops, and a run on bread, bottled water and canned foods.

“It’s been crazy. We’re the only one open who still has gas,” said Karen Tripodi, a customer service representative at Cumberland Farms, a gas station and market in Newington, Connecticut.

“They’re coming in for propane, ice, water, milk and cigarettes.”

read more http://www.infowars.com/panic-buying-grips-the-east-coast-mad-rush-...

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Permalink Reply by Central Scrutinizer on October 29, 2012 at 8:51am

really???.....around here its biz as usual. No stores have been cleaned out, & there's generators available thru 3 different chains here. (Central Va)

AND we're in the alleged path!!!!!...or we WERE. I believe this crap has been "hyped-out" way too much myself, I see the route of this thing has changed 13 times since Saturday & its not making it near here now supposedly. Think the msm just likes to put the fear factor in the sheep and get the economy stimulated via BS hyped up storms ;)

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Permalink Reply by truth on October 29, 2012 at 8:56am

The Bread Aisle In Manhattan’s Upper West Side Is Now Empty

Monday, October 29, 2012 8:03 AM

Zero Hedge | It seems like it was just yesterday that we were posting pictures of empty shelves at New York supermarkets ahead of the epic dud that was Hurricane Irene.

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Permalink Reply by Central Scrutinizer on October 29, 2012 at 9:05am

well ya gotta remember the majority of mass in Va are Goobers & Gomers here, so probably chalk it up to idiocracy @ its best. We're no longer in the path anyway, and I doubt if NY is anymore, this thing will probably peter out and fade away out to sea somewhere.....lol

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Permalink Reply by Central Scrutinizer on October 29, 2012 at 9:22am

Panicked Evacuations Mix With Nonchalance in Hurricane Sandy’s Path

Residents left the Waterside Plaza apartment complex in Manhattan, which is under an evacuation order, on Sunday.

They streamed out of low-lying New York apartments and grand Connecticut shore homes, a steady, often reluctant parade of evacuees with rolling suitcases and duffel bags; birds and cats in cages; Fruit Roll-Ups and stacks of magazines.

Hundreds of thousands of residents from East Haven, Conn., to Cape May, N.J., were ordered to leave their homes on Sunday as Hurricane Sandybore down on the Eastern Seaboard. Many complied, departing by car or ferry, school bus or subway train, though not without stress or anger, as people in Lower Manhattan jostled tensely for taxis and yelled at others for jumping ahead of them. The exodus out of Connecticut was so large that some gas stations ran out of fuel.

“Everyone is panicky — oh my God, they bring in any kind of container they can think of and fill it up with gas!” said Ann Persaud, owner of the South 7 Citgo station in New Milford.

Some evacuations were more complicated: Some 60 patients and 180 nursing home residents were moved by ambulance and bus from Long Beach Medical Center to higher ground in Nassau County and elsewhere.

“We’re all being taken out; I don’t want to go,” said Carol Mule, 74, a patient. “But it’s better than staying here being flooded to death.”

Still, with memories of last year’s less-than-ferocious Hurricane Irene still fresh, some residents simply would not move, expressing skepticism and a New York-style nonchalance, despite Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s warning that they were risking their safety by staying.

“Last time they made such a big hype out of it and nothing happened,” said John Miller, 27, who chose to stay in his Battery Park City apartment, having evacuated last year to New Haven and been stuck there for a week because it was hit harder than New York.

This time, Mr. Miller was hunkering down, stockpiling water, soup, crackers and pasta and filling his bathtub with water. His friend Paola Boettner was remaining, too. “It’s more painful to evacuate than stay,” she said.

Mayor Bloomberg ordered people living in so-called Zone A — which includes parts of all five boroughs, among them Battery Park City in Manhattan; Red Hook, Coney Island and parts of Dumbo and Brooklyn Heights in Brooklyn; City Island in the Bronx; and the Rockaways in Queens — to evacuate.

People who stayed behind would not face arrest, though Mr. Bloomberg said they would not only put themselves at risk, but also possibly endanger the lives of emergency responders: “We hope you don’t face those kinds of dire situations, but you could.”

Mr. Bloomberg said the decision to evacuate came after forecasters said that flooding from the storm would be graver than originally thought: a storm surge of 6 to 11 feet was forecast for New York. Areas of New Jersey and Connecticut were put under evacuation orders, too.

The reluctance to pack up and go seemed especially emphatic in luxury apartments in Dumbo and Brooklyn Heights, with residents dismissing the dangers and expressing excitement at the adventure of riding out the storm.

At One Brooklyn Bridge Park, a huge waterfront condominium in Brooklyn Heights — its residents include Linda I. Gibbs, a deputy mayor, and Steven M. Cohen, a former aide to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo — most people were staying, said the building manager, Vinnie Adovasio.

He said he had told the police, who had promised to check up on the building during the storm.

Deirdre Michalopoulos, 48, who lives in a luxury condominium on a cobblestone street in Dumbo, a stone’s throw from the East River, said she and her family stayed put during Irene, to no ill effect, and would stay for Sandy too. “We live on the ninth floor, and I don’t think the water’s going to get up that high,” said Ms. Michalopoulos, who was heading out to buy supplies, and planned to pass the time cooped up inside, watching movies with her two children. “It’ll be great.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/29/nyregion/panicked-evacuations-mix...

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Permalink Reply by truth on October 29, 2012 at 10:21am

Officials in Connecticut warn of giant 16-foot storm surge, with 15...

In a message sent to residents Sunday afternoon, [Norwalk, Connecticut] Mayor Richard A. Moccia warned of a 16-foot storm surge brought to land by Hurricane Sandy. [...] “I have declared a state of emergency in the City,” he said. “Coastal flooding from this event will peak at midnight on Monday night and will be worse than any flooding Norwalk has experienced in recent history. If you have ever experienced flooding before it is likely you will be flooded in this storm.” Moccia said that the storm will be equal to a Category 4 hurricane and will produce 16 foot storm surges.