FeaturedHow Hurricanes Affect Waste Collection
A hurricane is a powerful storm with intense winds. Visualizing that it destroys, and blows away anything in it's way. The whole place would be covered in junk.
What happens with the huge mess?
For starters the people are asked to sort the waste into piles for collection such as; vegetation, building materials, appliances, and household garbage. The heavy duty job is taken care of by the waste handlers. The waste handlers work with emergency officials to plan a safe pick up pattern to clean up the waste. Attempting to tackle obstacles in their way such as waste clustered, and damaged road conditions. Also some workers could be trapped inside their houses due to flooded waters. Pushing through they are committed to working safely, and efficiently on the urgent clean up to remove materials that may seep toxins into the flood waters, and possibly spread illness.
How long does clean up take?
Depending on the size of the storm it could take multiple years to clean up all the debris. For example, hurricane Harvey started August 2017, ended September 2017 yet they believe it will take years before they will be able to clean up all the debris that was scattered, and left by the storm.
Hurricanes are known for filling landfills. Back in 2005 Hurricane Katrina caused an enormous amount of damage leading into over one hundred million cubic yards of waste to be dumped in landfills in the time to follow, reaching a clean-up bill of 2 billion dollars. 
The cost of hurricane damage can result into hundreds of billion dollars as studies have proven in our past encounters with the storms. The amount of waste clean-up from Hurricane Harvey, and Hurricane Irma has not yet been known but the estimate for the cost will most likely be a similar cost to the price of Hurricane Katrina. Source (Read More Here)
The problem people often forget is that landfills are not limitless; properly sorting the waste could make a huge environmental difference in the stock up of unnecessary garbage. Sorting the debris into recyclable material, and non-recyclable material would change the future of what the landfills will turn into. Spending years to clean up the mess, won't be as bad if the waste is properly sorted compared to it piling up, and possibly creating larger problems with toxins of the mixed garbage that sits over time.
