The hurricane track and strength have become the worst case scenario. It keeps moving west to Florida. Currently, the eye should make landfall right on the coast around Palm Beach and head straight up to Jacksonville with significant damage along almost the entire east coast of Florida. Mandatory evacuations have been called for all barrier islands and low lying coastal areas in Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina. The newscasters are saying this is the biggest, worst hurricane Florida has EVER seen! That's saying something!!!! It's going to be a category 4 when it hits.
Hurricane strength winds should reach even our area of Poinciana over night tonight. 5 p.m. Thursday through 5 p.m. Friday, with landfall around 3 a.m., is the current prediction.
We made sure our supplies of food, water, batteries, and other hurricane kit items were all updated and handy yesterday. We also put our hurricane shutters up for the first time. It took us about two hours and was hot and sweaty work, but we are very happy we did it. We are wishing we had sandbags for the garage door and the screen door out on the lanai. We expect water could come under those doors because they are not sealed tightly by any stretch.
We will be bringing everything in from the lanai except for the furniture. Plants, microwave oven, and all small objects will be moved in to the dining room this afternoon.
We have cancelled all of our plans through Sunday and will just hunker down beginning this afternoon. Mark is currently out for his Art rehearsal and then has to go to Publix to correct a mistake with one of his prescriptions. Once he gets home from that, we will just spend the next three or four days inside.
It's currently only 9:15 a.m., but it is raining like crazy all of a sudden! I am not sure if this is just another random little storm that pop up regularly in central Florida or the earliest edges of the hurricane. Interesting. I'll be happier once Mark gets home, which won't be until at least 1:30.
We are not really worried about the integrity of our house or even the roof. We are concerned that the lanai screens will not hold up and that water could come into the lanai. If the lanai screens are damaged, then the kitchen window is at risk since there were no shutters provided for it. Also our front door and our kitchen door to the lanai as well as the French doors in the dining room that go to the lanai have no shutters or other protection. Garage doors are also at risk in high winds. They have been known to collapse or be ripped off in really heavy winds. If it goes, then all the contents of the garage could be damaged.
Those are worst case scenarios and probably not likely to happen. Anyway, there's nothing we can do to prevent it, so we will just see what happens.
Tornados can be spawned with a storm this big. We have our emergency weather radio and a hand crank radio to keep up with information. If tornados are coming, we will hunker down inside the walk in closet in our bedroom. Other than the powder room in the kitchen area, it is the only place with no windows. Again, this is an unlikely event, but the newscasters keep reminding us that it could happen.
The only thing they say is a DEFINITE is the loss of power. They expect the power to go out tonight and stay out for about three days. We will lose all the food in the fridge, which is sad but not fatal. We have plenty of food to eat that does not require cooking. We also have a grill and charcoal in case we do want to heat something or have to boil water. We have plenty of bottled water and will also fill up the bathtubs with water just in case the water supply becomes compromised.
We have full tanks of gas in both cars and will have our devices fully charged at all times. We have car phone chargers, so once the storm has passed and we can open the garage (which can be opened manually if the power is out), we can run the cars and recharge cell phones. We are hoping the cell phone towers still operate! Landlines always work when power is out, but we cancelled that about year ago. Oh, well.
In any case, if the power goes out, there will be no more blogs for awhile!
Having said all this, I will admit that even though this sounds scary, I am not afraid. I believe our house is well constructed and will not sustain any damage that would be threatening to our safety. I believe we will be uncomfortable in the heat and humidity for a few days once the storm has passed and the power is out. That is not threatening to our safety either, just our comfort! We can safely, albeit uncomfortably get through this historic storm.
When I have power and the ability to write a blog, I will certainly let you know how we did.
If you are reading this from anywhere that expects to see the hurricane, then I hope you are prepared to hunker down and stay safe, too.
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