New York City didn’t see as much destruction as they had expected, but many communities up and down the east coast were severely impacted by Hurricane Irene. Buzzfeed has a roundup of frightening photographs from various locations. This one shows Route 12 at Cape Hatteras National Seashore. The damaged road isolated 2,500 people on Hatteras Island. Link

(Image credit: Steve Helber/AP)

If you ever thought you might like to have an otter as a house pet, this video will change your mind. These are female African clawless otters, acting the way their species do. -via Arbroath

YouTube user jeremiahjw has some compelling slow motion videos of stuff blowing up.  Not buildings or robots, although he does compare himself to Michael Bay.  The focus of his spendid ‘splosions is small stuff like the toy cars above, a variety of outdated gadgets, and most eloquently, Mr. Potato Head.  All set to wonderful, happy music.

About the embedded video:

The cars I used were “off brand” cars and Matchbox. The yellow truck was a Hotwheels, the only one to survive un-damaged. Filmed on the Casio EX-F1 at 600fps. One shot is at 1,200fps near the end.

jeremiakjw YouTube channel

Self proclaimed mainstream-subversive art collective Superflex, decided they’d answer a question nobody had ever bothered to ask: "What does a McDonald’s restaurant look like as it slowly fills with water?"

Although we should thank them as they took the time to painstakingly recreate a McDonald’s and slowly flood it, filming it all for an exhibition at the South London Gallery.

It’s actually quite a satisfying thing to watch a generic boring fast food joint wash away, be sure to check out the video on the page.

Their latest work is a short film, “Flooded McDonald’s”, where they’ve (shockingly accurately) created a full-size replica of the inside of the ubiquitous fast food joint and then slowly filled it with water. Playing now in an exhibition at South London Gallery, the film is exactly what the title suggests and yet so much more.

Link – via reddit

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Jake.

Another tornado caught on camera. These weather phenomena never cease to amaze me but I’m glad I don’t live in an area where tornado formations are frequent.

Link: LiveLeak