"Major hurricanes, devastating wildfires, a drought and a series of extreme storms ran up the count of billion-dollar U.S. climate and weather disasters."
"As Hurricane Michael quickly gained strength over the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico in October, Tyndall Air Force Base began sending its stealth fighters to safer bases—all but the more than a dozen planes undergoing maintenance. Two days later, the base was being ripped apart by 155 mile-per-hour winds that left it littered with the twisted metal of torn-away rooftops and hangars.
The hurricane—one of at least a dozen climate and weather disasters in United States this year to top $1 billion in damage—left a wide trail of destruction through homes, businesses and farms from Florida to the Carolinas.
The military alone suffered several billion dollars in damage. During a U.S. Senate Armed Service Committee hearing on Dec. 12, Sen. Tim Kaine said the price tag for damage at Tyndall Air Force Base was about $5 billion, as he understood it. That added to earlier damage from Hurricane Florence: U.S. Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Robert Neller estimated that rebuilding properly after Florence's damage to Camp Lejeune would cost about $3.6 billion."
Phil McKenna reports for InsideClimate News December 18, 2018.
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