风暴灾害横扫美国.docVIP

Extreme weather cut a path of destruction across the United States in 2011. For Bill Wing, it began 12 months ago, on New Year’s Day, as he surveyed the damage from a tornado that touched down in Cincinnati, Arkansas. “It sounded like a freight train coming, he says. We werent in the direct path of it. You could feel the wind moving and the shaking, more like an earthquake for us.”? That tornado was among 1,600 that crisscrossed the nation in 2011. Twelve weather-related disasters accounted for $1 billion or more each in economic losses, a new record, according to Chris Vaccaro, spokesman for the National Weather Service. “We’ve seen historic events of nearly every weather category, says Vaccaro. So in terms of snow storms, and hurricanes and floods and droughts, all of these events this year ranked in the top three or even the highest ever recorded.” The extreme weather affected millions of people, claimed 1,000 lives, resulted in 8,000 injuries and totaled more than $52 billion in economic losses. The most costly, according to David Brown, of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, was the year-long drought that continues to grip southern plains states. VOA - S. Baragona In 2011, Texas farmers contended with a year-long drought which continues to grip southern plains states. “We’re looking at $6 to $8 billion in damage from agricultural losses, from fire losses, in places like Texas, New Mexico and Oklahoma and if the drought persists for the next several months, as we expect it will, those damages will only increase.”Vaccaro says a growing population and expanding infrastructure account in part for the damages, but also large-scale cyclical weather patterns came into play in 2011. “First and foremost was La Nina in the eastern Pacific which altered our standard storm patterns. And we also had a pattern in the Arctic called the Arctic Oscillation. That was a big factor in the winter and spring months, allowing cold air to flow into the United St