Over 84,000 commenters noticed the especially suggestive nature of this graphic published by a hurricane monitoring Facebook page. Photo: National Hurricane Updates/Facebook
First and foremost, the devastation wrought by Hurricane Florence (now a tropical depression) over the weekend has been serious. Parts of North Carolina are completely inundated. And the death toll from the storm has risen to 20. Our thoughts are with those affected as recovery efforts are currently underway.
Last week, though, as North and South Carolinian’s anxiously braced for impact, National Hurricane Updates, the official Facebook page for the app Hurricane Tracker, may have inadvertently added some much-needed levity to the situation when they published a suggestive graphic.
“Ignore the specific numbers as they will change & likely increase, but based on the latest NHC forecast here’s where the most extensive wind damage may occur,” explained a Tuesday post in an earnest attempt to keep the page’s over 270,000 followers informed. The accompanying graphic, however, looked especially phallic leading to a deluge of over 84,000 comments rife with puns.
“North Carolina should just tell Florence it has a headache,” wrote commenter Cat Mason.
“‘Hurricane Florence is expected to penetrate the East Coast on Thursday evening, relentlessly pounding the Carolinas and Virginia well into early Friday,'” wrote Erin Buell in an epic lampooning of a weather forecast. “‘Swelling into a category 4 storm, Florence will ravage the land, blowing unprotected windows out and thrusting the region into total darkness. One million residents have been ordered to pull out of the area and for those who stayed behind, well, let’s just hope they have a Plan B! Back to you, Chuck!'”
National Hurricane Updates later commented on its own post: “But yeah, was a totally unintentional graphic.”
The post has been shared 161,000 times.
