Harvey crashes furry convention Mephit Fur Meet
Remnants of the hurricane that created historic flooding and devastation to Houston, Texas and the surrounding suburbs continue to move northeast. For one furry convention convening this weekend in Olive Branch, Mississippi, the timing of its arrival is causing travel headaches for those who hoped to arrive on Thursday evening.
The convention announced via Twitter that nearby Memphis Airport in Tennessee had closed due to the storm:
We have been notified that Memphis Airport is Closed. We will attempt to keep you up to date!
— Mephit Fur Meet (@mephitfurmeet) August 31, 2017
Major flooding is also occurring, which will cause headaches for those on the ground as well. Fortunately, the forecasts indicate that this storm will clear out by early Friday morning so it will hopefully not put a damper on the entire weekend's activities.
Convention goers are advised to follow the convention's Twitter feed for further updates.
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Sonious (Tantroo McNally) — read stories — contact (login required)a project coordinator and Kangaroo from CheektRoowaga, NY, interested in video games, current events, politics, writing and finance
Comments
Bad bad weather forecast, u no ruin furry cons. Go to your room, you're grounded.
Harvey's a real jerk.
Can we keep the jokes to a minimal? This storm is killing people. I get that this is furry news and con goers are being inconvenienced but let's not forget that for a lot of people it's deadly serious.
Absolutely, Huston took the brunt. Katrina was a swift devastating punch, this one was more like a slow and agonizing driving of one's face against concrete. The deadly flooding is just the start as recovery can be just as treacherous. My hope is that our federal leadership takes its role seriously here in helping get them back on their feet.
I'm guessing, or hoping, no furry is going to die in Memphis or on their way to Memphis. It's heavy rain at 30 mph. But you never know, so use caution. Car accidents, even in good conditions, have taken the lives of furries to and from conventions.
Yeesh. This might impact the con moreso than I realized it would. I wonder what happens for people whose flights get bumped and they can't make the con - would the convention refund their membership or roll it over to next years?
Not that it's anything but idle curiosity for me, anyhow.
Hopefully flights will be coming in after delays and people can arrive on Friday, if I hear any updates I'll post them.
Funnily enough, despite Mephit announcing the airport's closure on their twitter feed, when I tried to find information regarding the airport closure from the airport site itself, and other sources, couldn't find much.
Maybe the person who notified them jumped the gun. Huh.
Incoming reports say the wet dog smell is completely unbearable.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
We're used to it by now, Rakuen. After all, you're all wet.
:P
I attended MFM this past weekend. Most of the drive down was clear, I started encountering some rain about two hours out, and then for the last 30 miles or so had some of the heaviest rain I've ever driven through. Later that afternoon we heard the airport had closed; I thought they meant for the evening, but a couple hours later found out it had reopened. People who approached via I-40 Arkansas had to deal with some of the worst flooding and accidents. Several others who had planned to arrive Thursday were delayed until Friday by flooding and road closures. Finally, we can only guess how many prospective attendees from Texas, Houston in particular, were unable to attend due to Harvey.
Despite all of that, most of the delayed attendees were there by noon Friday, the weather cleared up, and we had a fun and highly enjoyable convention weekend. Attendance was even up slightly from last year.
Thanks for sharing your report on the weekend's impacts. Glad to hear that damage seemed to be more tempered than what had happened in Texas and that people got there safe.
Yes, thanks very much for this followup report.
Fred Patten
MFM isn't in Memphis anymore. They moved the Olive Branch, MS several years ago.
Olive Branch, MS is within the greater Memphis, TN metro area.
It's a good catch, but they need to update their Twitter profile!
Not sure what you're getting at. The Twitter profile currently includes, "Started in Memphis now just across the line in Olive Branch, MS". Some people were under the impression that moved awaaaaaaay from Memphis, when it's still in a Memphis suburb. It's like saying MFF isn't in Chicago, which is technically true but it's in the Chicago area.
The location set in the profile visible on the Twitter website says "Memphis, TN".
And technically correct is the best kind of correct. :-)
As you say, MFF isn't (and has never been) in Chicago - despite what some hotel/airport names implied. As noted on the convention's website, it has been held in Arlington Heights, Schaumburg, Wheeling and Rosemont - all suburbs of, but separate to, Chicago. It'd be appropriate to call it a Chicagoland convention, or in the Chicago area, and I'd expect that for a story aimed aimed towards a national or worldwide audience, but we have to be specific.
It's the "Localization bug" the person who originally commented is probably from the area and I'm not. This usually caused one to put the suburb as part of the larger metro area nearby. Usually only locals will be able to distinguish the specific suburb names from the greater metro area where as someone not from the area would not.
As someone who lives in upstate New York, I am exceedingly familiar with this 'broad strokes' approach to geography. Given I have to qualify "I'm from New York, not the city" all the time.
Funnily enough you did beat me to the MFF isn't in Chicago thing. Was also going to use "Fur the'More was never in Baltimore" as well. The closest it got was a suburb to the North.
I think what throws people off in this case is that they fail to take into account that part of the Memphis metro area is not in the state of Tennessee. Some of the south suburbs (including Olive Branch where MFM takes place) are across the state line in Mississippi, and some of the west suburbs are across the river in Arkansas.
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