The storm

Mike, please be safe. I have been thinking of all our friends in Florida for the past couple weeks. Our prayers are very much with you and yours my friend.
 
We have been fortunate so far here in Naples, but now the storm surge is beginning to rise.
As the hurricane is now making landfall I know that all of us hope for the best outcome for everyone in the path.
The stress of dealing with this over and over is not what any of us want to face.
 
Hopefully Mike and all of the people south of Tampa where landfall was, are as OK as they can be today.

I'm just north of Tampa and we still had heavy rain and 65 MPH winds when I went to bed at 3AM this morning.
Generator running but no AC. Fortunately it is going to be in the 60's at night for the next 5 or 6 days.
 
At least 3' of water in our lower level when the power/cameras went out at 9pm on Sanibel. Fortunately, we evacuated to a hotel in Estero. We also had 18" in the lower level with Helene 2 weeks ago, and just finished cleaning up and repairing that mess. Of course, Ian was another story here ... I hope and pray our friends to the North came out ok.
 
The damage is just terrible. We did get lucky in that the storm was affected by wind sheer and was weakened before coming onshore. Also, because the eye came over Sarasota, the storm surge was a lot less than the predicted 10’-15’.

When we evacuated on Tuesday, my wife and I had an emotional moment. We prepped our home as best as possible. I took my music system apart and raised the components and vinyl to counter height but, honestly, the projected surge would have completely flooded our home. We had reconciled in our minds the high probability that we would have severe damage and, potentially, lose the home and music system.

Today I sit in our family room enjoying a cup of coffee feeling lucky and blessed. Our house survived the high winds, we had minimal water surge (none in our home) and there’s practically no damage to the property. Yes, lots of cleaning to do. It will take a bit of time for our town of Sarasota to get back to normal but we are safe and healthy; that’s what matters.

Thank you everyone for all the well wishes.
 
TomS said:
At least 3' of water in our lower level when the power/cameras went out at 9pm on Sanibel. Fortunately, we evacuated to a hotel in Estero. We also had 18" in the lower level with Helene 2 weeks ago, and just finished cleaning up and repairing that mess. Of course, Ian was another story here ... I hope and pray our friends to the North came out ok.
Click to expand...

So sorry about the damage. We love visiting Sanibel and Captiva. Glad you evacuated and are safe. Very frustrating to go thru this mess twice in a season let alone within several weeks.
 
My hope is there won't be anymore this hurricane season, which ends Nov. 30. Already, there's been 3 fairly cataclysmic hurricanes this year in the Southeast. Remember that before Helene and Milton, Beryl did extensive damage in the Caribbean Islands.

These hurricanes were all due to the excessively warm sea surfaces temperatures in the mid-Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico this year. Here's the data from NOAA from just a couple weeks ago. Yikes!

SST-2024.jpg
 
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