Florida hurricane summit recalls monster Andrew
Florida hurricane summit recalls monster Andrew
The sobering lessons learned from Andrew — which transformed the business of forecasting tropical systems, preparing for them and picking up the pieces afterward — are a major theme at the 26th annual Governor’s Hurricane Conference being held this week in Fort Lauderdale.
yeah... and we don't have Craig Fugate any more....
I was one of the first commercial airline flights into Miami afterwards. The hotel they put us in on Miami Beach was white stucco, and covered with the green imprints of blown leaves. None of the windows were broken, but everything was soaked - carpets, curtains, etc. There was no water. I went looking for a store with bottled water and got to watch a lot of looting first-hand. It was like a party atmosphere, whole families laughing and having a great time while they smashed windows, My daughter tells me I'm a racist for even noticing, but every single one of them was black. They were carrying away pretty much everything they could lift. Saw one guy pushing a shopping cart down the road with three traffic lights in it. There were lots of cops, but all they did was watch. I talked to a couple of them and they were pretty frustrated, but those were their orders. Ended up drinking and washing with the water in the toilet tank.
I was stationed in Key West when this happened and had to evac. I can still remember the carnage driving back to the base from Ocala, not something I will ever forget.
We lived just north of the damage path.
My wife volunteered to go spend the day handing out emergency supplies with our church, 2 days after it hit. In Homedale, ground zero.
She came back pretty spooked. She said it looked like a nuke blast zone. The church was the only building she could see, that was standing.
As word spread that they were handing out supplies, the crowd got bigger. She was getting nervous until the National Guard showed up.
Crazy day....
