Читать книгу The Great Galveston Disaster - Paul Lester - Страница 14

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Unfortunately for Galveston, the slow movement of the hurricane was an additional menace, since this meant the longer pounding of the vertical winds of high velocities. As most readers know, the hurricane is a storm which has two entirely distinct motions. It is a great cyclonic whirl in which the winds blow into and about the centre at great velocities, while its motion along its track may be comparatively slow.

In the present case it took the hurricane four days to cross the Gulf from Key West to Galveston, which was at a rate of about twelve and one-half miles an hour. Its rotary winds, however, even a hundred miles from the centre on Friday, were raging at a rate of over fifty miles, and as the vortex passed directly and slowly over Galveston, the buffeting of the winds beginning on Friday evening and continuing far into Saturday, must have been terrific. Moreover, as the whole of Galveston is built up of frame houses without cellars on uncertain foundations, the evil possibilities must be obvious.