Hurricanes are no fun no matter how that you look at them. They are unpredictable and can cause extreme misery. I certainly feel for those who are living in the worst areas. I recently asked a friend why he decided to live on an island in the ocean just after a hurricane missed his area. Some people just feel that it is worthwhile. Unfortunately Mathew just hit the Bahamas where he lives extremely hard. Due to the closing of the airport before their flight out, he and his wife are still there. We pray for their safety.
As I have mentioned my career was that of a city/county manager. Until I moved to Florida my experience was more in the bad snow storm line. Then in 1990 we moved to Florida to manage an east coast city. Andrew which was a very bad hurricane was projected to come ashore directly at our city. However, as hurricanes have their own decision making process, it turned south and did extensive damage in the Miami and further south area. One thing I do recall is coming out of the emergency management center and looking south. As I did, you could see the lights going out in the areas south of us. The blackout kept moving northward and enveloped our community as well.
Later we moved to a community on the Florida panhandle. I had been there only a short period when a hurricane was projected to come ashore on our beach area. It happened to be over Memorial Day which is normally a prosperous day for merchants, restaurants and hotels. Because of the potential danger, I ordered the beach evacuated. Naturally the hurricane veered west into Alabama and we had little damage to our beach area. Boy, I tell you there were extremely angry business people who felt I should be tarred and feathered – or at the minimum fired and sent back to whence I came – for ruining their weekend.
Fortunately, for me, the news media said that I did the correct thing, and citizens wrote to the newspaper supporting me. In fact, the business people retracted their comments and my severest critic gave me one of his special cups with my name on it. The cups were kept at his restaurant and were used when the person named came to eat there. We did eat there occasionally, and I now have the cup in our cupboard. We were lucky that time, but down the road we were hit with two separate hurricanes. Both of them really bashed the beach area.
I recall driving along the beach and seeing cars, including a Porsche, flipped over in the sand and others under buildings that had sunk down into the garage areas. When you build on sand, there is not a really great support system no matter how good the foundations. One of the storms involved a storm surge which wiped out a large number of small homes that had been built in the 50’s.
Those who had the properties actually made out as people bought the lots at “nice” prices, razed the old buildings and built nice new elevated homes. One of the few benefits from a hurricane, I guess.
The bottom line is that hurricanes are a particularly nasty form of nature’s way of operating. I believe we can all do without them.
Barry Evans writes about Life in The Villages for Villages-News.com