Another storm in the books, and it went a lot like the other two that we've had to deal with here in the Orlando area. There was some variability in the predictions as far as wind speed goes, but it was in the slot that is typical for a so-called "direct hit." Measured wind speed at the airport peaked at 46 mph, gusting to 74. If you look back through the various storms that have swept through here in the last several decades, it's about what is expected relative to our position in the middle of the state. Hurricanes don't do well over land. Comparing to the previous storms, many of the same areas saw flooding, and older structures were damaged. Things could in theory be worse, but the most probable outcome is what we got each time. Ian was about the same, while Irma had slightly higher sustained winds.
Don't get me wrong, that constant sound is terrifying, and it feels like it keeps getting louder. But we didn't have any damage, just a tree in our back yard leaning a bit. We had zero water intrusion, not that we were doing anything specific to help it. The door seals, including those on the garage, are pretty effective. We did lose power for about a half-day, which is a first in our 11 years living down here. The Internet died an hour or two later when the cable company's battery backup died. We were able to keep lights on and food cold with our battery, which feeds all of the non-high-voltage stuff. That means no AC, water heater or stove, but we have propane backups to cook with. In our immediate area, it was the usual debris and standing water all over the place, and some larger, older trees down. New neighborhoods with new construction show just how important the revised 2002 building code is, and frankly the water management is much better as well. Our "dry" retention pond was not dry this time, for example.
Obviously other parts of the state didn't do as well. Tornadoes were spawned, almost two dozen, on the front-right side of the storm, which happened to be South Florida this time. Storm surge was expected to be much bigger than it was, especially in Tampa, but that came down to a "wobble" in the storm's eye replacement cycle 12 hours out of landfall, and weakening from a front coming from the north. The surge was still pretty bad further south, including down in Punta Gorda, where my in-laws live. They narrowly avoided surge, and lost some shingles, but otherwise things look OK. They evacuated to our house for a few days.
Even though logically I know and understand what the outcomes are likely to be, it's still a lot for your brain to deal with. What doesn't help is the way that the entire TV weather apparatus handles it. I'm not sure if it's that they don't understand the prediction science, or don't care, as long as people are watching them. The Internet, like everything stupid, amplifies the noise. Much was made about the fact that it was a category 5 storm at one point over the gulf, but that's virtually meaningless in terms of outcomes for where we live. It would have to be the worst 1 in 1,000 scenario for wind to get much higher than it was here. The legitimate concerns are about flooding, tornadoes in that front-right quadrant and stuff flying around or down power lines. That's never the focus inland, when it should be. It annoys me.
So that's three storms for us in our Orange County tenure. The center of each passed around what I would guess was 20 to 30 miles from us, though that matters less since it has less of the concentrated energy over land compared to water. Hopefully we're done for the season, but that's even harder to predict.
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