Tampa and Florida peeps... how's everyone doing? (Page 3/5)
maryjane OCT 01, 11:13 AM
Randy..
An old rancher friend of mine from Virginia, recently retired from 25+ years of federal wildfire/disaster response teams. Has a degree in forestry and multiple licenses for just about anything with wheel or tracks. He has worked fires all thru Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and places I can't remember. When he retired he took a job of transporting trailers to their destinations across the US but kept on the roles of disaster relief volunteers.
He left Va last week and was initially staged in Melborne Fla, moved to Cutler Bay, and yesterday crossed the everglades on IH 75 headed for Ft Myers.
Pumped 5400 gallons of fuel for utility company trucks last night. That is all his team is doing, fueling bucket trucks.
So, if anyone runs across on old bearded guy on a fuel truck, give him a shout. He's doing this 'pro bono'.

I've seen the utlity companies in action more than once after Hurricanes Rita, Ike, Harvey and others. Yes, they get paid for it, but it can every bit be equated to a combat operation's long logistic train and they don't mess around either..

1 week after Hurricane Ike came thru. These guys were from Joplin Mo.
The photo doesn't do justice to the number of trucks on this stretch of road, that runs thru a marsh between Winnie Tx and High Island Tx.


82-T/A [At Work] OCT 01, 12:21 PM
Got power back late last night... so checking my e-mails.

Dodged a bullet up here. We had a lot of downed trees and the Alafia river flooded, but it largely passed us by. We basically got CAT-1 or 2 winds up here, which wasn't enough to cause any significant damage. Sewers were overflowing, and you could see water (which stank) gushing up from some of the manhole covers in the fanciest neighborhoods. They had to bring in a generator to power the pump station. A lot of people don't know what to do when a traffic signal has no power, or when they revert to all flashing red... sigh... but other than that, we lucked out up here.

Just starting to see what happened in Naples and Fort Meyers. The bridge that connects Sanibel Island is basically destroyed...



Lots of destruction too... but most people evacuated those areas, which is good.
TheDigitalAlchemist OCT 01, 01:12 PM

quote
Originally posted by 82-T/A [At Work]:

Got power back late last night... so checking my e-mails.


Lots of destruction too... but most people evacuated those areas, which is good.



Very glad to hear you guys are alright.
randye OCT 02, 03:51 AM

quote
Originally posted by maryjane:


I've seen the utility companies in action more than once after Hurricanes Rita, Ike, Harvey and others. Yes, they get paid for it, but it can every bit be equated to a combat operation's long logistic train and they don't mess around either..






Don,
You are 100% spot on.
The C3 of all the response groups from power restoration to debris removal is also nothing short of military precision and operation.

The logistics supply train is still flowing in down I-75 and I-95.... LONG lines of tractor trailers and box trucks.

The Coast Guard Air Station at Clearwater usually has approx. 3-4 HH-60 helos and a C-130 or two sitting there but I went by today and it's packed out with military helos of almost every description. Apparently Clearwater and MacDill AFB have become rescue air operations centers.

We also had to go to my local Lowes hardware center today and was astonished to see 2-3 big stacks of NIB portable generators there.
I was told that they are all customer returns from those that bought them before the storm.
HOWEVER there people buying up every gas can they could find.

Good friend of mine owned a nice beach front motel and cottages "mini resort" on Sanibel Island.

Here's the before and after:





Along with all of the smalll cottages and 2 larger 2 story homes, a 2 story, 20 unit, motel building is completely GONE.
The entire property is basically scrubbed clean and only has a debris filled swimming pool left.

David had just closed on the sale of the property to a new owner 2 weeks ago.

[This message has been edited by randye (edited 10-02-2022).]

A_Lonely_Potato OCT 02, 06:30 PM

quote
Originally posted by randye:

The Coast Guard Air Station at Clearwater usually has approx. 3-4 HH-60 helos and a C-130 or two sitting there...



60? i thought they were all replaced with the 65 by now?
CoolBlue87GT OCT 03, 12:31 AM
CoolBlue87GT checking in. Yeah, Jim Cantore brought us bad luck.

Wow, we went through hell for more than 9 hours.

Power is still out, been running on the Honda Generator that got us through Charley in 2004.
CoolBlue87GT OCT 03, 01:25 AM






I'll add more later, the cell service is so bad, it's taking about 20 min to load each photo.

The mower helpped in moving hugh tree limbs that I could not move by hand and also towing small trailer to move all the muck that was blown into the yard.

I'll post one nore, show my neighbours yard, it looks how my yard did before I started cleaning.
Cheeper2keeper OCT 03, 01:31 AM

quote
Originally posted by CoolBlue87GT:

CoolBlue87GT checking in. Yeah, Jim Cantore brought us bad luck.

Wow, we went through hell for more than 9 hours.

Power is still out, been running on the Honda Generator that got us through Charley in 2004.





Happy to hear that you're ok.
maryjane OCT 03, 09:45 AM
Good to see you check in Coolblue.
Many Floridians are learning that trees are NOT your friend.
Raydar OCT 03, 10:39 AM

quote
Originally posted by CoolBlue87GT:

CoolBlue87GT checking in. Yeah, Jim Cantore brought us bad luck.




I'm happy that you are okay.