first earthquake, now hurricane irene

As of this moment, the hurricane is beating up the Outer Banks and parts of Virginia. I'm wondering how points further north will fare, given that the New Jersey/New York Metro areas haven't experienced anything like this for a while. I hope nothing too drastic happens. Although it is informative when buildings and infrastructure are tested to their design limits, there are less destructive ways of determining how well stuff we build works.

Architecture is still so far from a science that terms like "building science" make me smile. Science is not about absolute predictability, but through the efforts to accumulate information from many events, greater clarity can be achieved about the probable outcome of events. Architects delight in making outrageous claims and there is very little follow-up in our profession. Insurance companies, however, take a harder look at building performance during events like the one we are about to experience. I hope I'm not a statistic.