Hurricane Wilma, the definitive edition.
Living an hour north of Orlando, I have survived Wilma!
Granted the storm actually went through several hundred miles south of us and all we received were the outerbands of the storm. I still feel completely qualified to give my firsthand account of the terror that was these outerbands:
Rain and Wind. Lots of it.
Okay. Thatisall.
(Whew!)
…Actually no. Although we were technically in the predicted cone of impact for most of the hurricane forecast; once the hurricane came closer, we were no longer part of the “CONE of destruction.” But don’t tell the local newscasters this. They did their best to report evacuation routes, school closings, best methods of plywooding your windows…and scaring the heck out of a lot of people. I know, I know. The weather was bad, but why not just report it instead of giving dire circumstance after circumstance of what could happen? The “what ifs” were as implausible as the newscasters NOT wearing yellow rain jackets as they tied themselves to a pole to keep from “blowing away.”
Do you wonder why people don’t evacuate from these storms? Because our local media makes it out that everyone is in danger. You’re in Naples? Yeah you’re going to die! Want to evacuate to Orlando? Well that’s fine but there will be possibly hundreds of tornadoes and the wind gusts could down trees and homes and small animals and young children could be blown away. Plus alllll the hotels are filled up.
People were asking themselves where they could go, because no place was safe! The ENTIRE Florida Pennisula was going to be in someway completely devastated…either by the stormwall, the tornadoes, the pythons, the sharks with the laser beams attached to their head… whatever.
Again, report the facts without the hype. And how about red rain jackets next time?
Janette says:
Amen, Sister! The tales of our Impending Doom! were much harder to endure than the event itself.
Glad to hear that your survived the crisis!
Common Sense Runs Wild says:
Wilma Update 12:30 PM Monday
Hopefully this is my last Wilma post because luckily there’s not much to report. The rain started to really come down at 3:30 this morning. At 5:22 Wilma really announced her arrival with a hail of pine cones. It made…
jonas976 says:
Great news! Is your house damaged?
Greta (Hooah Wife) says:
I was making evacuation plans from Oklahoma. I thought Wilma could turn, gain some media driven power and wipe out Tulsa!