Hurrican Matthew

digitalbeachbum's picture

So around 10am the outer bands started to roll in. It is always interesting to see the clouds shift to the south, which they never do here in Florida, it is always East to West or NE or NW in some fashion.  Yes, when a cold front comes through the clouds move south, but they are pushed in a line and you can see the cold front in the distance pushing the clouds as if they were egg whites on a pan being shoved to the side by a spatual.

However today when the outer bands hit the wall off water and wind was fierce and it lasted only for about 15 minutes, then it went perectly clear and the sun came out.

By 2pm the sky was dismal and the clouds started to get more of a circular pattern to them and were headed out in a SE direction. The rain and wind was hitting with more frequent and lasting longer. By 5pm the wind and rain was very intense, no idea on the speed but based on some of the previous experiences I put it at about 25mph.

We have batteries, a generator, a storm room under the stairs, and water just in case. The lines for gas were insane and I'm glad I filled up a day before. Most stations were out of gas and you couldn't find a battery on any shelf. Even the local super markets were empty.

By 8am the intensity increased. We had shut down work early and turned off all the servers. I had pulled in all the lawn stuff and tucked in in the corner of the house behind the south wall. The rain was really heavy and cold. I always find that very interesting about a hurricane. The rain is frigid.

Here at 11pm the rain outside is really bad. Some areas have lost power but I've been lucky. Still playing games online and hopping around the forums.

They have radar showing the direction of the storm over the next 12 hours and the eye will just miss us. However that puts us right west of the wall of the eye and we will be SW of it when it passes over Orlando.

In 2004 Charlie did a number and I remember not being able to make it to work and for months afterward there was downed trees and two giant mountains of wood chips 4 stories tall out at the local airport with a sign saying "free mulch".

I saw a few guys on the local channel telling the reporter that they were going to ride it out in their 40ft sailboat. LOL. Darwin award?

Sea surges were supposed to be 30-50 ft higher than normal which means most of the coast will suffer fantastic floods. Merrit Island and Kennedy Space Center is supposed to be underwater. They shut down all the bridges at 5pm. No emergency vehicles will be available until morning.

What stupid people not to take the ride inland to a hurricane shelter. Ridiculous.

Well, I'm only worried about tornados that spin off on the west side of the wall. It is always the worst location to be, the west, sw side (unless you are in the Pacific where you can get the reverse in a typhoon).

Enough rambling. Gotta get some sleep before morning and assess the damages.

 

Vastet's picture

I'm glad hurricanes don't

I'm glad hurricanes don't tend to survive the trip to Canada.

Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.

Brian37's picture

 It's now hitting my area

 It's now hitting my area so far just heavy rain and high winds. But  2 miles inland and as long as I have lived here no major flooding in my neighborhood ever. 

"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
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digitalbeachbum's picture

Well I got internet back

Well I got internet back today. The power never went out in our area, but various friends and family lost power for two days.

Most of the crap around the house did well and we have a lot of small clean up to do. Some minor flooding since I live near a swamp.

We are lucky not to have had the damn thing go further inland. It would have been another Charilie. However I know it took a very similar path to David in 1979 which had taken out power where I lived for seven days. Lucky for us, back then, our house didn't have AC. Our house was designed with Spanish clay tiles, raised wood floors and two giant motors (we joked they were off a B52 bomber) which when turned on sucked all the hot air out of the house, pulling the cool air from under the raised wood floors and pushing out the hot air through the attic.

I see today Charleston got slammed as well most of coast of Ga.

I believe that homes built today are fucked up. Boxed, flat walls, flat roofs. I'm all for partial underground homes and domed adobe style using modern materials. I had a former fiance whos parents had a domed house made similarly. They needed no AC. No heater. The only really strange thing was the slight curve in the walls, but that was easily adjustable by curving shelves.