One Over X News

Being Real

I wanted to post some camera shots of the family. It is hard because there are really few recent pictures. A picture of me is rare enough let alone one of Amanda or all of us together. I'll post more as time goes on. I think it is good to know what someone looks like. Also it makes everything seem more real.

Back in September 2004 Hurricane Frances struck close to where we live. Although the storm weakened a good deal once it struck land, it lingered over eastern Florida for some time. It was a strong storm that did a lot of damage. It was a scary time as our house is about a mile from the beach and the news media did a very good job of compelling people to evacuate.

We had heeded the advice and evacuated to the west coast to stay with my sister, Joyce and brother-in-law Jerry. We were there for a number of days, or in other words just about long enough to have not quite overstayed a welcome. My daughter Sarah's birthday (September 4th) was celebrated during the evacuation.

When we returned home it was very difficult to navigate through some areas due to flooding, wind damage and very few working traffic signals even where there was working electricity. We were without power for about a day even after we returned home, meaning that the power had been off in our house for four or five days. Our food in the refrigerator and freezer was spoiled. Otherwise there was some uprooted trees in the yard, some damage to a fence outside and one shingle on the roof but otherwise the house withstood the fury of the storm.

We thought we had survived the rare storm that comes everyone generation or so. Certainly there had been more tropical storms than normal that tracked in the vicinity of Florida. Frances came after Charley hit the southwest coast of Florida and transversed the state. We had some wind gusts as Charley passed through Orlando (about an hour's drive from Satellite Beach) but that storm was a non-event for Brevard County.

It was with a good deal of confidence that we returned home and started cleaning up. I helped a neighbor trim her palm trees. My son and I removed a damaged section of fence and we cut down a couple of severly damaged trees. We were in the process of cleaning up. The debris from Frances' passing was still piled in from of everyone's house waiting for the special removal trucks to come. It was a monumental undertaking still Brevard was well on the way to getting back to normal.

There were a couple of hurricanes that seemed possible threats, Henry failed to appraoch Florida, Ivan went into the Gulf and plowed into the panhandle and lower Alabama. Then Jeanne looked like a threat then turned away. My neighbors were taking down the plywood from their windows the Sunday before the storm hit. All the media were announcing that Jeanne would miss Florida and like Henry go harmlessly out to sea.

Then around Monday Afternoon it became clear that Jeanne was making a loop and would not only hit the Bahamas but was turning onto a track to hit Florida almost in the same place that Frances had come ashore.

Because of the short window for preparation and because of my work schedule, we did not evacuate for Jeanne. It had only been a month since Frances and we had confidence in our house. We rode it out.

It was one of the scariest experiences in my life and something I don't think I will be doing if and when another storm like that rolls in. The house shook, the roof cracked and popped, the fiberglass garage door bowed in a good six inches. My confidence in the integrity of our house faltered. I don't think it could withstand a more powerful storm than Jeanne. I know my nerves could not.

At peak the storm had sustained 115 MPH winds with gusts up to 145 MPH or more. For about two hours, the storm was at its worst. It was the middle of the night, it was dark, there was no power and although my kids somehow slept through it I was constantly questioning the judgement that put all of us at risk.

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posted by Unknown @ 10:04 AM