ELI5- How did people survive hurricanes before you could predict them?
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Before there were modern weather-forecasting models, people had other ways of watching and predicting the weather. People then were not any less intelligent than people today; they knew when storms were coming because they were, by necessity, more in touch with the natural world. They knew what to look for, and when to head inland.
They often didn’t.
There was a town called Indianola in Texas which was wiped out by a hurricane. They rebuilt, and another Hurricane came and wiped them out again. So they gave up. There is a plaque in a nature preserve that you can visit but there is no more Indianola.
Also, they learned to build inland. Galveston was a busy port town but stayed small due to hurricane risk. People settled inland near Houston.
Mostly, they built their houses in ways that could stand up to a hurricane. A lot of traditional east asian houses are essentially built on stilts. This allows typhoon floodwaters to pass underneath the house rather than through it.
If that wasn’t an option the locals would move away for the season. You only see typhoons and hurricanes in specific months so nomadic tribes would just pack up and leave.
Native populations were good at predicting storms and preparing appropriately to minimize damage and loss of life.
Non-natives died and rebuilt. The history of Florida is incredibly interesting if you like the topic. It wasn’t until the early 1900s that anyone bothered trying to build anything significant. It was pretty much regarded as useless land until one dude bought a whole bunch and marketed it. Miami was completely destroyed once and rebuilt “better.” I could go on forever.
Lived in Hong Kong. You can see the clouds coming in and a sense of oppression. The true sign that a typhoon is imminent is the flurry of dragonflies that ride in the first winds. When you see those it is time to prep.
People have survived all kinds of natural disasters and devastating weather related phenomena. Human kind has an excellent ability to understand, adapt, and overcome. We can live in cold places, hot places, wet places. If you’re asking about how people would’ve survived 1000 years ago? They probably fled inland at the first sign, sight high ground and did their best to stay dry and warm, and even then there were probably a significant amount of fatalities due to injury, infection, starvation or exposure. Short answer – a healthy amount of fear to prompt people to put distance between them and the coast, and a healthy amount of luck.
If you look back through the records and adjust for inflation, increased population, storm strength, etc. we suffer a lot less from hurricanes now than in times past. Quite a lot less.
[https://www.researchgate.net/figure/US-hurricane-fatalities-by-decade-US-fatalities-in-landfalling-hurricanes-from-1900-to_fig1_227282076](https://www.researchgate.net/figure/US-hurricane-fatalities-by-decade-US-fatalities-in-landfalling-hurricanes-from-1900-to_fig1_227282076)
We were really getting on top of it until climate change kicked in.
For one, birds, especially seagulls, start acting a lot differently when a storm is approaching. So if they’re all suddenly flying low or grounded, it’s time to prepare.
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