Evacuation Stations

Irma hits Lakeland

Tuesday, 12th September
Thank you dear friends and family for the calls and messages checking on our status during hurricane Irma. As far as we can discern from media, social media and friends' texts our area has survived pretty well. That said no one has reported on our condo building or beach yet.

Floridians have been tracking Irma since 31 August; it hit here 10/11 September. Over 6 million people evacuated and now over 1/2 FL without power. The east coast, although less directly hit, seems to have some of the worst flooding along with Marco Island on the west coast where Irma came ashore.

We have now been at a hotel for 5 nights and cooped up for four days - going stir crazy and very tired, but not complaining. I decide to write this blog waiting to go back home.

So here's how it unfolded. Remember the forecasts this time last week were for Irma to hit Miami on the East Coast of Florida - how wrong they were!

Thursday afternoon (7th September) word reached us that our county, Pinellas, was about to order mandatory evacuation of zone A, which is all of city of Madeira Beach, earlier than we anticipated. All a bit of a surprise as initially the hurricane was on the eastern side of the state and expected to turn northward before it got to the west coast.

Hubby and I then were scrambling to get an extra night in a hotel and get out fast to travel safely and avoid the chaos that may ensue with large number of evacuees Friday and Saturday. I thought we were pretty well prepared and monitoring the situation well for an overly cautious plan to leave Friday - ha ha. Gasoline and water running short as of last Tuesday. My learning is to prep and go even earlier than it appears necessary.

We had a smooth run to Lakeland (one hour east of the beach) our selected place to go out of the way of both the Gulf of Mexico and Bay storm surges, but not too far. All week the predictions were moving Irma's path to the East Coast of Florida so Lakeland seemed very sensible (confirmed by a life long local resident too). We have a good room at a reasonable price on the 2nd floor (not too high for winds, but above ground level possible flooding). We also were able to refill our gas tank and have some non-perishable food supplies with us. In our hotel room we have a microwave, small fridge, but no backup generator if we lose electricity and internet.  Irma brushes Cuba Friday as a category 5 storm.

source NY Times - Irma's actual path

wrapped petrol pumps & boarded up shop in background

Friday night (8th) businesses starting shutting up with nothing much predicted to be open for Saturday.  So we decided to hunker down and out came the hurricane box of food rations along with Friday's restaurant dogie bags. Although we brought things to do, it was pretty unsettling waiting for a major weather event to overtake one.

We kept wondering if we should make a dash further north as the storm path prediction moved Irma closer and closer to us and the west coast of Florida, but with full hotels/shelters, roads clogged and notoriously bad Florida drivers, that seemed another risk into the unknown. Since no one knew Irma's path . . . we stayed put and prayed for the best. Saturday Irma is downgraded to category 4 storm. At some point all roads/bridges into Pinellas county are closed.

bed as far from window as we can get it

Winds picked up Sunday afternoon (10th) in Lakeland, but nothing too bad.  We moved our bed away from the window, lost cable/TV Sunday evening and crawled into bed just as we lost power here in our hotel at 11:25 Sunday night (Apparently our condo lost power just around the same time).

Through the night winds strengthened and the windows rattled, so I was a bit on edge for sleeping, but really it just sound like a bad storm to me.  Irma now a category 2 (approaching a category 1) at 90 -110 mph with the eye passing right over us about 2 am. The windows in our hotel room leaked a little but we survived just fine, although apparently it got a bit wet on the first floor of our hotel.

Our car is unharmed, starts and is full of gas. Fortunately it is cloudy and not too hot here Monday as we are without air conditioning or any ventilation in our room. Someone falls in our hotel lobby on a slippery floor (humidity) and breaks a leg.

No electricity means no TV, no internet which is an experience in itself! Unfortunately local radio stations stopped broadcasting local hurricane updates so we were in an information void all day Monday. Friends and sister kindly texted some information and we managed to call the Pinellas county emergency center and Duke Energy. We heard  Pinellas 'borders' reopen at 9:30 am, but we still received mixed information from the media on bridge openings and hence our ability to get back into Pinellas county and home. Late Monday residents only allowed back on our barrier island - storm surge of maybe 3 feet. Estimates for electricity restoration could be weeks they say. Curfews imposed in a number of places. No restaurants or groceries open, no gas/petrol. Still people are driving home.

So surprise when our hotel electric came on at 6:30 Monday night!!!! Yippee, amazing how happy electric power can make one - hot coffee, cold drinks, warm shower, air conditioning and information from the outside world!  Wow!!  We also have water and no sewer issues we are aware of at the hotel. We are most fortunate and better off than most of Florida!

We then hear that the Pinellas barrier islands are reopening, but there is wide scale power outage, downed electric lines, sewer issues (so please no flushing and keep water usage to a minimum), no gas and dangerous driving as many intersections have no traffic lights. Locals seem to be zooming through at 50+ mph. Yikees!

Tuesday morning (12th) our Lakeland hotel is temporarily closed to new guests as the exhausted staff try to regroup. Neighbors text our condo now has electricity. Media report maybe a roof blown off a nearby MB apartment complex.  Rivers are flooding and not yet peaked across Florida. Caribbean destruction total. We are so blessed! Plan to return home Wednesday, hoping road conditions continue to improve.