Experiencing a Hurricane: A Personal Story

by Millie Braund

Last week, Hurricane Irma, a category 4 storm, raged across the Caribbean and the east coast state of Florida, U.S.A. The event was covered by news stations all over the world, and led me to think back to a similar storm named Hurricane Charley in 2004. Although only four years old, I vaguely remember experiencing the hurricane, but ultimately remember being told an abundance of stories when growing up, by my parents and older siblings, due to the fact that we were caught in the very middle of it. During August of 2004, my family visited our holiday home in Florida for what was thought to be a relaxing break. This is a story they shared with me.

When news of the storm heading our way first came, we were staying in a hotel for a few days on the beautiful, sun-kissed coast of Longboat Key, which lies on the west-side, commonly known as the ‘Gulf-side’ of Florida as it sits on warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Hurricane Charley was predicted to hit landfall near Tampa, which is just north of where we were staying. As the storm came closer, the state authorities used television, radio and SMS broadcasts to order the evacuation of all people along the west coast affected by this prediction; This included us and about 1.9 million other citizens. At this point, we set off on a relatively long journey back to our holiday home near Orlando, dealing with the inevitable queues of traffic created by the evacuation; what would normally be a two and a half hour journey took us about eight hours.

When we finally settled back at our home, we tracked the storm on television. When it eventually made landfall in the early hours of the morning, it actually hit much further south than predicted. Shocking Floridians with its sudden change of course, the hurricane hit shore at a coastal town called Punta Gorda. The damage was devastating, due to the strong winds and the storm surge, which is where the sea level gets ‘kicked’ up due to the offshore wind. With the area being quite low lying and flat, the local impact was catastrophic. Sadly, several people lost their lives in Punta Gorda, amongst them some elderly people from a retirement community near the coast. The irony of our story is that, having been evacuated from Longboat Key, which did not feel the full force of the storm, the hurricane changed path, tracking diagonally across Florida, and right over where we had evacuated to in Orlando. So, we had to prepare the house for the oncoming storm - a direct hit; we brought all the pool furniture in and put sofas and beds up against the windows.

Being the only room in the centre of our house with no windows, we spent the worst part of the storm sat in the laundry room, which was about 6 hours. The storm itself had reduced to a category 3 storm by the time it hit Orlando, losing some of its ferocity as it crossed over land. However, a category 3 storm is still extreme, with wind speeds of around 129 mph, doing damage to a number of properties including Disney World, which closed for the first time in a number of years.

Alongside the hurricane itself came the risk of isolated tornados on either side of the storm, with a number of reports of tornados starting up along the track of the hurricane. Of course, tornados, albeit brief and modest in size, do far more damage than hurricanes, in an isolated area, due to their immense wind speed and power. The fear of a tornado made the experience all the more frightening.

Despite all the concern, with both high winds and deafening sounds of the storm for a long period, we did experience the phenomena of being in the ‘eye of the storm’. This occurrence was eerily calm, with no wind and blue skies above. It was so calm, in fact, that we went outside as some of us thought the storm had passed, but my parents knew better as the back, or ‘tail’, of the storm can be worse than the front. The period of calmness lasted for 20 minutes or so and was ominously beautiful. However, this beauty was short lived as we experienced the backlash of the storm as it moved over us and further north.

Damage to our house was limited to some panels of netting that covered the swimming pool; we were extremely lucky. Other homes in the near area, including our neighbours, saw more substantial damage to pool enclosures, walls and roofs. And although the poor weather continued for a few days, Disney was open the next day and we still had fun.

Hurricane Charley was responsible for 35 direct and indirect deaths, caused an estimated $16.3 billion in damage in the U.S. and the Caribbean and left over 1.1 million people without power for days and in some cases weeks. It was the strongest hurricane to hit the U.S. since Hurricane Andrew in 1992, sustaining winds of up to 150 mph at the time of landfall. Charley was just the start of a devastating 2004 hurricane season, being followed by Hurricane Frances three weeks later, causing $9.8 billion in total damage, and Hurricane Jeanne which came later in September. We were extremely lucky to have experienced such an amazing phenomena, whilst remaining safe and receiving minimal damage to our home. It is definitely an experience which my family will remember for long to come.