The one iOS app that you definitely want in a Hurricane

Superstorm Sandy hit the northeastern U.S. a week ago and, living in New Jersey, I found myself in the eye of the storm. In fact, my house in Northfield, NJ -- about 4 miles from the ocean -- received a direct hit from Sandy and we lost power for about four days. 

But by all accounts we got incredibly lucky. When you see the destruction Sandy caused in Atlantic City, Ocean City and Long Beach Island, we got off relatively unscathed. These aerial before and after photos of Sandy's damage in New Jersey are chilling, but seeing houses littered about like legos undescores the power of storm of Sandy's magnitude. 

Although relatively close to the ocean, we don't live on the barrier islands which were evacuated ahead of the storm's landfall. Living on the mainland, and far enough back from the marshes, we weren't required to evacuate. My backup plan was to retreat to my parent's house about 20 miles further inland if things got dicey. I gassed up our vehicles, gas cans, pulled out our generator and prepared for the worst. We slept in the downstairs den in case any of the dozen or so 80-100 foot tall oak trees on our property gave way.

In the preparation process I probably purchased a dozen of the highest rated iOS "hurricane" apps, and several are good, but there's one that stands above the rest and is the main app I recommend in a hurricane: Hurricane Tracker ($2.99 iPhone, $3.99 iPad) by EZ Apps Inc. With it I was able to follow all of the various Sandy information on one concise page. 

Other Hurricane apps showed its path or a radar or two, but each required more and more screen touches to get information. Once I loaded the main Hurricane Sandy page in Hurricane Tracker, I could easily scroll through all of the latest animations and projections. It also features instant alerts, 65+ maps and comprehensive audio and video updates. Kudos to Steve and Cindy on an amazing app. It's the only Hurricane app that you need.