I live in Winter Park, FL, which is pretty much a suburb of Orlando. We tried to treat Irma initially with the kind of healthy skepticism/optimism people do with these things, hoping it wouldn't be as bad as forecasted. It never is, right? I went through Charley in 2004. It was loud and windy, of course, but it never really got that bad where I was, though I did lose power for 5 days. Irma was EVERYTHING they said it was going to be.
The winds were picking up all day Sunday. I was hoping to get as much football in as possible as I'm a Packer fan (KEEP READING!) Around the time the game ended was when the our power went out. It was one of those progressive deals where the wind picked up and the rain started falling heavier and it was only a matter of time. Ours went out around 9 PM. I talked to my Dad on the phone around 11 PM. At that time, it was windier than a regular bad storm and the rain was spitting, the kind that heavily sprays your face from big wind gusts. I sat on an old couch I have on my porch and just kind of took it all in. Of course, I was thinking: "This is going to be as bad as it gets, right? Pretty windy and rainy but...what are the wind gusts right now? 40? 50? Shouldn't get much worse than that, right?" So I listened to my IPOD in bed and figured I'd sleep through most of it. I turned the IPOD off around 1 AM and my ears were greeted with just incredible noise from outside, dwarfing anything I'd heard from Charley. I went to my glass door, opened it and looked outside and it was a maelstrom. The winds had picked up probably 40 to 50 mph from where they were when I first started listening to my IPOD. I had a good view of several large trees and they were being whipped around like feathers in a wind tunnel. It was like wind bombs were planted inside and were going off. Even the biggest trees looked like they were going to break into pieces at any moment. It was like the wind was a human tearing apart a piece of broccoli. There was a leaning tree across the way that I was particularly cheering for. It got battered and slightly uprooted but survived. I couldn't turn away, partly from curiosity and partly from fear. It was like I'd miss the falling tree with my name on it if I turned away and I wanted to see it coming. And, hey, Pliny the Elder's curiosity got him killed when Vesuvius blew and buried Pompeii in 79 AD so I definitely wanted to be cognizant of what was happening. If he could be intellectually courageous, so could I! Every now and again, a blast of lightning would shine in the clouds and, coupled with the wind and rain, was particularly eerie and terrifying. It was one of those humbling experiences where we realize just how easily weather can rip us to pieces or turn us to slush whenever it really wants to, which is the scariest when we're actually in the grip of that weather. I got a bit of sleep around 2 AM but the winds didn't die down. It was so constant and lasted so long that there was no exhale period. It even stayed windy the next day, though the rain had gone and it was sunny out.
I got up early the next day and went to a friends to see if she was okay. Branches and leaves littered the complex. Large fences were blown down and gutters were torn asunder. Interestingly, we didn't have much of a rain problem the morning after. The water level of our local creek wasn't out on control and there were only occasional collections in the parking lots. I think we have good drainage where we are. I lost power for almost 48 hours, which is more than acceptable when you get hit like we did. I won't go into any of that. Bottom line, if any hurricane of this intensity comes again, GET THE FUCK OUT! I rode this one out but I'm not sticking around for the next one. It was as bad as the weather people said it would be. Still, it was also a bit of an honor watching it happen. Hopefully, it will be the biggest one I ever see but now I can now proudly wear the "I Survived Irma" T-shirt.
