Under the Wrath of Frances

As Hurricane Frances swirled just off the coast of Florida and simply abused The Bahamas, my hometown area of St. Lucie County was in a state of emergency. Although it had been downgraded from a category 4 to a category 2, Frances was moving slow, excruciatingly slow with sustained winds of 120 MPH, and this almost non-existent forward momentum made this not only a wind event but also a significant rain event. Frances was forecast to drop some 13-20 inches of water as it spun and churned like a beautiful buzzsaw of natural power.

We all knew Frances was heading our way for at least a week, but we in South Florida are all conditioned to think that if we wait long enough, most tropical systems will turn. It happened with Floyd in much the same way years before in that it marched west for days with us as ground zero but turned north just 100 miles off the coast.

I was sure this would happen again, so I made the choice to hunker down with my family instead of sticking myself in the tin can nightmare happening on the interstate as millions fled to relative safety. And maybe...just maybe this baby would swing north and give us some epic surf.

I was horrifyingly wrong. We got very little waves as The Bahamas blocked most of the real swell activity. While there was some wind swell locally, north and south of us was absolutely bombing. In fact, check out this video from Miamiand article from North Carolina. Even my buddy from Cape Cod is claiming some great sessions too way up the coast.

So there I sat in a walk-in closet with my kids in bicycle helmets and the wind whizzing with wall-shaking force for more than 24 hours. We were hit point blank by both eye walls of a 200+ mile wide storm system moving at 5 MPH, and a tornado touched down just a block away. I'm sure this didn't help our situation.

As we emerged from the chaos, we were greeted with widespread damage and complete loss of power, phone, and water. However, no one I am aware of was hurt, and that's all that truly counts.

As we struggle with the loss of our modern conveniences, we are thankful its over. Strangely, President Bush was in town to pretend he cared by handing out ice and water for as few hours and get a hundred photo opportunities while we watch residents show their best and worst in long lines at the gas pump and the grocery store. Some moments are reminiscent of Mad Max in a apocalyptic cityscape.

Fed up with the heat, I grabbed my family, got all magical, and fired up the credit card up at Disney World. Pixie Dust was in large supply. As communications get better down this way, I will get busy packing this website with fresh info and articles. For thew moment, drop me a line if you want more info on the situation down here in South Florida or want to share your experiences.