Hurricane Ian Direct Hit

[FAC257]

Just a heads -up. My area got the full impact of hurricane Ian. The eye wall sat on top of us for most of the day. We had 100mph to 150mph estimated gusts for most of the entire day. The angle the storm track took put us in the eye wall longer than normal. I was much luckier than my neighbors with minimal damage to my home. Thankfully i had just put on a new roof built to code about a year ago. My new next door neighbor from California didn't realize the types of home insurance you need in this area of Florida. His house is seriously damaged and not insured. Most of the power lines throughout town are laying on the ground and many power poles are down or snapped. Right now we have no power or water. Most of the roads in and out of town are under water for stretches. Quite a few abandon cars that didnt make it thru. The area looks like it was used as bombing practice by every AC in the Air Force, armed with cluster bombs. Even folks with generators are a bit anxious because gas is not easy to find right now. With the amount of damage to the power grid in this area, I'm guessing at least four months until I have power again. Water hopefully in a few days.

I've been thru a lot of hurricanes since the 60s on both sides of Florida and the aftermath of this one is way beyond anything I've seen before in an area I lived. The really unfortunate part, is that the areas hit hardest this time, are pretty much same areas that had to rebuild after Charlie. It took many years before all the blue tarps covering damaged roofs finally went away.

[bullfox]

Glad you made it through. I am still waiting to hear from my brother in Orlando.

[FAC257]

Cell phone service has been very sporadic when making calls or trying to connect to the internet for news. Texts seem to get thru, but with long delays sometimes.

[JJB17463rdBombGroup]

Wow that was quite shocking to see on the news. Glad that you personally made it through with minimum damage.

[Raceguy]

Forest, we are really glad you are OK and sorry to hear what you and your area are going through.
We are in New Port Richey, Fl and watched the storm from it's beginning with great concern for all of Florida.
We hope the power and water issues get resolved quicker than expected.

Take care
Ed