Poverty. The answer is always poverty. Evacuation is not free and never has been.
Currently sitting in the Tampa Bay area while a category 5+ hurricane comes barreling at me. I’m in flood zone D next to E so I shouldn’t have any issues there. In a building that is solid brick/cinderblock construction, built like a bunker. Don’t worry about me. I got water, food, and enough fat to get me through the winter as they say.
The one thing I don’t have is the hundreds or thousands of dollars it would take to drive 2+ states away and get a hotel for a week. I simply don’t have it. Then you have all these people in places like Missouri or Montana posting this question about why people would not evacuate. We don’t have the goddamn money. It’s not hubris. We SHOULD evacuate. I don’t see any of the people saying this offering up a spot on their couch. We should always evacuate… somewhere other than the house of the person who thinks we should, apparently.
We’ve been through a few hurricanes here. I’ve endured 1+ week without power and internet before in this very apartment I’m in right now. It does suck to be stuck without modern comforts in a tropical area but at least it isn’t August. We’ll survive.
I’m making some garlic bread on an everything bagel for me and my wife to snack on right now. Going to do laundry at the laundrymat in a few I think that’s what people don’t get is everything is so domestic and normal right up until the winds start really hitting.
Word. People expect crises and disasters to be dramatic, even cinematic, but it’s mostly boredom and then terror and then, if you’re lucky, boredom.