It’s been a horrific year for storms coming out of the Atlantic / Caribbean. Below is the summary of tropical storms so far this year as reported on CNN’s 2017 Atlantic Hurricane Season Fast Facts.
Tropical Storm Arlene
April 20, 2017 – Tropical Storm Arlene forms in the central Atlantic Ocean. According to the National Hurricane Center, April tropical storms are rare, and this is only the second one (the first was 2003’s Tropical Storm Ana) since the use of satellite.
April 21, 2017 – Arlene moves southwest and south until it dissipates.
Tropical Storm Bret
June 19, 2017 – Tropical Storm Bret forms about 125 miles southeast of Trinidad.
June 20, 2017 – Weakens into a tropical wave.
Tropical Storm Cindy
June 20, 2017 – Tropical Storm Cindy forms in the Gulf of Mexico, about 265 miles south of Morgan City, Louisiana.
June 22, 2017 – Makes landfall just south of Lake Charles, Louisiana. Later weakens to a tropical depression.
Tropical Storm Don
July 17, 2017 – Tropical Storm Don forms about 485 miles east-southeast of Barbados. Weakens to an open wave the next day.
Tropical Storm Emily
July 31, 2017 – Tropical Storm Emily forms near the west coast of Florida and makes landfall on Anna Maria Island. Weakens to a tropical depression after making landfall.
August 6, 2017 – Tropical Storm Franklin forms over the northwestern Caribbean.
August 7, 2017 – Makes landfall on the eastern coast of the Yucatan Peninsula.
August 9, 2017 – Franklin becomes a Category 1 hurricane about 105 miles northeast of Veracruz, Mexico.
August 10, 2017 – Makes landfall in Veracruz, Mexico. Later, Franklin weakens to a tropical storm and then dissipates.
August 13, 2017 – Tropical Storm Gert forms in the Atlantic Ocean.
August 14, 2017 – Gert becomes a hurricane, the second of the season.
August 17, 2017 – Weakens to a post-tropical cyclone.
August 17, 2017 – Tropical Storm Harvey forms about 250 miles east of Barbados.
August 24, 2017 – Harvey strengthens into a hurricane.
August 25, 2017 – Harvey makes landfall between Port Aransas and Port O’Connor, Texas, as a Category 4 storm with winds of 130 mph. Harvey is the first Category 4 hurricane to make landfall in the United States since Hurricane Charley in 2004.
August 26-29, 2017 – Harvey is downgraded to a tropical storm, but stalls over land causing extreme flooding in Texas.
August 30, 2017 – After retreating from the Houston area back to the Gulf of Mexico, Harvey slowly moves northeast and makes a second landfall near Cameron, Louisiana.
— The death toll from Harvey is at least 57 deaths. Harvey dumped an estimated 27 trillion gallons of rain over Texas and Louisiana during a six-day period, according to WeatherBell, and also set a record for the most rainfall ever from a tropical cyclone in the continental US, at 51 inches of rain. Estimates put eventual total losses at as much as $75 billion.
August 30, 2017 – Tropical Storm Irma forms 420 miles west of the Cabo Verde Islands.
August 31, 2017 – Irma becomes a hurricane and intensifies into a Category 3 hurricane.
September 4, 2017 – Irma strengthens to a Category 4 hurricane about 490 miles east of the Leeward Islands.
September 5, 2017 – Intensifies into a “potentially catastrophic” Category 5 hurricane as it roars toward the northeastern Caribbean islands.
September 6, 2017 – Hits Antigua, Barbuda St. Martin, Anguilla, St. Kitts and Nevis, US Virgin Islands, British Virgin Islands, causing major damage and devastation to many of the islands.
September 7-8, 2017 – Causes major damage to the Dominican Republic as it passes along the northern coast of Hispaniola. Blasts through Turks and Caicos overnight.
September 8-9, 2017 – Makes landfall in Cuba overnight as a Category 5 storm, with winds of 125 mph. The Bahamas are hit by hurricane-force winds. At least 24 people have died in the Caribbean.
September 10, 2017 – The Florida Keys take a direct hit from Irma as a Category 4 storm. Initial estimates are that 25% of houses on the island chain are destroyed, and 65% have major damage. Irma moves on to hit Marco Island as a Category 3 storm, then travels up the Gulf of Mexico to pummel Naples, Florida.
September 11, 2017 – Irma is downgraded to a tropical storm in north Florida, and to a tropical depression soon after its wind gusts hit Atlanta, causing power outages and downed trees.
September 5, 2017 – Tropical Storm Jose forms about 1500 miles east of the Lesser Antilles.
September 6, 2017 – Jose strengthens into a hurricane.
September 8, 2017 – Becomes a Category 4 hurricane, east and southeast of the northern Leeward Islands.
September 14, 2017 – Weakens to a tropical storm.
September 15, 2017 – Becomes a hurricane again as it makes its way up the Atlantic, east of the US coast.
September 6, 2017 – Tropical Storm Katia forms in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico and strengthens into a hurricane the same day.
September 8, 2017 – Makes landfall in eastern Mexico, in the state of Veracruz, as a Category 1 hurricane.
September 9, 2017 – Weakens to a tropical storm as it moves inland in Mexico.
Tropical Storm Lee
September 16, 2017 – Tropical Storm Lee forms in the eastern Atlantic Ocean, west and southwest of Cabo Verde islands.
September 17, 2017 – Weakens to a tropical depression.
September 16, 2017 – Tropical Storm Maria forms about 620 miles east-southeast of lesser Antilles.
September 17-18, 2017 – Maria rapidly intensifies from a tropical storm into a Category 5 hurricane.
September 18, 2017 – The storm hits the Caribbean island of Dominica as a Category 5 hurricane and devastates the area.
September 20, 2017 – Makes landfall near Yabucoa in Puerto Rico as a Category 4 hurricane. It is the strongest storm to hit Puerto Rico in 85 years. The energy grid is heavily damaged, with an island-wide power outage. Restoring electricity may take months, the governor of Puerto Rico says. The storm also hits the US Virgin Islands, where at least one person dies, likely from drowning.
September 22, 2017 – The National Weather Service orders the evacuation of about 70,000 people living near the Guajataca River in northwest Puerto Rico because a dam is in danger of failing. The storm continues to churn northward, making landfall in the Caribbean islands of Turks and Caicos as a Category 3 hurricane.
September 25, 2017 – Only a few medical centers on the island have working generators and at least three hospitals lack running water. Shortages of medical supplies are reported.
September 26, 2017 – Maria weakens to a tropical storm as it heads northeast out to sea.
— The death toll from Maria is at least 45 people in Puerto Rico and at least 15 in Dominica.
October 5, 2017 – Tropical Storm Nate forms near the coast of Nicaragua. At least 28 people are killed after Nate passes over Costa Rica, Nicaragua and Honduras. Hundreds are rescued from floodwaters and mudslides. Many lose power and running water.
October 6, 2017 – Nate strengthens into a hurricane about 95 miles west-northwest from the western tip of Cuba.
October 7, 2017 – Hurricane Nate makes US landfall as a Category 1 storm near the mouth of the Mississippi River in southeast Louisiana.
October 8, 2017 – Nate makes its second and final US landfall early in the morning as a Category 1 hurricane near Biloxi, Mississippi, and is later downgraded to a tropical depression.
Tropical Storm Ophelia
October 9, 2017 – Tropical Storm Ophelia forms in the Atlantic Ocean.
October 11, 2017 – Strengthens to a hurricane.
The Mummy: “You only have to watch the trailer to know that Producer-Director Alex Kurtzman’s reboot of Brendan Fraser’s once-charming mummy movies is full of embalming fluid.” — David Sims, The Atlantic
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales: “The subtitle of the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie is ‘Dead Men Tell No Tales.’ The moral of the movie, alas, is that the same cannot be said of dead franchises.” — Christopher Orr, The Atlantic
Baywatch: “Thank heaven for Dwayne Johnson, whose foot-wide smile will not be switched off, and who saves the life of the movie. Whether it deserves to be saved is another matter.” — Anthony Lane, The New Yorker
Snatched: “Snatched is a trip very much like the one it portrays: one that, in the end, does a pretty poor job of putting the ‘fun’ in ‘unrefundable’.” — Megan Garber, The Atlantic
I highly recommend The Waking Up podcast, and particularly episode #71, in which the host, Sam Harris, holds a conversation with Tristan Harris an ethicist for design. If you’ve ever gone to Facebook to look up something quickly and then wondered how you found yourself caught in a vortex of wasted time, this conversation will surely enlighten you. Recommended listening for everyone that uses technology and especially those that build it.
From Tristan’s bio page:
Called the “closest thing Silicon Valley has to a conscience,” by The Atlantic magazine, Tristan Harris was previously a Design Ethicist at Google and left the company to lead Time Well Spent, a non-profit movement to align technology with our humanity. Time Well Spent aims to transform the race for attention by revealing how technology hijacks our minds, and to demonstrate how better incentives and design practices will create a world that helps us spend our time well.
Tristan is an avid researcher of what persuades our minds, drawing on insights from sleight of hand magic, linguistics, persuasive technology, cult psychology and behavioral economics. Currently he is developing a framework for ethical persuasion, especially as it relates to the moral responsibility of technology companies.
His work has been featured on 60 Minutes, PBS NewsHour, The Atlantic Magazine, ReCode, TED, 1843 Economist Magazine, Wired, NYTimes, Der Spiegel, NY Review of Books, Rue89 and more.
Previously, Tristan was CEO of Apture, which Google acquired in 2011. Apture enabled millions of users to get instant, on-the-fly explanations across a vast publisher network.
Listen to the conversation as Sam and Tristan talk about the arms race for human attention, the ethics of persuasion, the consequences of having an ad-based economy, the dynamics of regret, and other topics.
(or use Overcast to listen at a faster speed — that’s what I do)
Here’s a taste of what Tristan’s all about:
The battle over “Stairway to Heaven” will rage on for at least one more chapter as the copyright infringement case heads to a federal appeals court. Rolling Stone Magazine has the details.
At the crux of the “Stairway” lawsuit is the accusation that the IV classic copies a riff found on Spirit’s instrumental “Taurus,” which predates the 1971 single. In his appeal, Malifoy wrote that the jury did not find the two songs “substantially similar” because they were not permitted to hear the version of “Taurus” that Jimmy Page allegedly ripped off.
Rings: “First you watch Rings, then you die…of boredom. And it might feel like seven days before the end credits too.” — Don Kaye, Den of Geek
50 Shades Darker: “Very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, boring.” — Liz Braun, Toronto Sun
A Dog’s Purpose: “It might be one of the most cloying and aggressively irritating films that I have ever been subjected to.” — Josh Kupecki, Austin Chronicle
Monster Trucks: “What if ‘monster trucks’ actually meant – wait for it – that there were monsters in the trucks? From an idea by a four-year-old (really), and it shows.” — MaryAnn Johanson, Flick Filosopher
Gold: “Gold is more of a bronze.” — Peter Howell, Toronto Star
2017 is the University of Lethbridge’s 50th anniversary. In celebration, the Faculty of Education has produced a series of videos that tell the story of the program through personal memories. This collection reveals what makes the U of L’s teacher education program one of the finest in Canada — community, relationships, pedagogy, research, and heart.
I feel lucky to have been asked to participate:
A lot of people on social media couldn’t wait for 2016 to be over because, they believed, 2016 encompassed more than the usual number of unfortunate events for one year.
I haven’t checked but I’m pretty sure 2016 wasn’t worse than any other year. Of course, last year there were a couple of pretty impactful events. The UK’s decision to leave the European Union (Brexit) and the election of Donald Trump as President of the United States of America (Endpire1) are, no doubt, going to have lasting consequences.
However, for me, 2016 was one of the best years of my life and it flew by so fast, I can hardly believe it. The biggest highlight of course being that in 2016, Andrea and I got married.
Here’s a quick recap with links to a few of the blog posts I made last year:
- Teaching in Brocket for Alberta Works — I loved that job and feel a real connection with my students
- Presented at SWATCA — my first time presenting at a conference, was very happy with the glowing reviews.
- Sascha — after a long and happy life, sadly, Saschi had to be euthanized.
- Hutterite Colony — rounding out my Southern Alberta teaching experience, my time on the colony won’t soon be forgotten. I felt a great connection with the kids and the rest of families there. They treated me both as family and as an important part of their community. I felt bad leaving them for…
- Teaching New Media in Taber at W.R. Myers — Even though I was hired to continue next year (temporary) at the colony, my dream-job (probationary turning to permanent) came up and I had to take it.
- Drone Fair — attending the first Drone Fair in Calgary with my brother was a chance for us feel more like we did when we were kids. I loved hanging out and chatting while learning about remote controlled aircraft. It was a super fun weekend and he even came home with a new drone.
- As a summer job, I was thinking about door-to-door sales for the home security/home automation company, Vivint. I did a bit of training with them and though excited about the product and the opportunity, in the end some cultural differences gave me second thoughts.
- Summer in Waskesiu (Prince Albert National Park) — great time on the lake but I only caught one fish all summer.
- Our riverside wedding — Nestled in next to the gorgeous South Saskatchewan River, we said our vows and got married in front of friends and family.
- Started my new job at Myers — teaching New Media, Finance, Animation, Computer Science, and CALM. I feel so lucky my teaching career is finally taking off.
- New Teacher Conference — travelled to Calgary for some professional development. First time travelling for work.
- Adobe Education Exchange Classes – honoured to be recognized for my artwork
- Visiting family in Medicine Hat and Saskatoon for the holidays
Here’s hoping 2017 will bring many more great memories (and more blog posts).
1. As far as I know, I just coined the term “endpire” — meaning the end of an empire. Hopefully it catches on.