What Hurricane?

[Captned]

Yawn....

Captned
Miami Beach
78 46' SF

 

[Angela]

Any excuse for a party, eh?

But seriously, this was a very good drill for me, being my first time (though it is raining rather hard at the moment and the wind has the boat tilted to one side). I wanted to be broken in gently and while that's not how it appeared a few days ago, seems now, that's exactly what I'm going to get.

Ang
Key Biscayne

 

[MarioG]

Hi Ang. Your in the best spot that marina has. last year Jay put a really large fishing boat in the same spot your in. no problems. Your right, this is a very good drill for you. looks like in a few hours it would have blown through. Hopfully you'll have seen the worst of it.

 

[Angela]

Yep....all this hype has completely worn me out, so I'm going to bed now and just sleep right through it, just like Jay said would happen.

 

[Jaxfishgyd]

Just consider this as a trail run for all of us here in Fla.

The season is really "just beginning" but hopefully everyone has everything they will need should a real one comes thru.

I am a native Florida boy (born/raised in Ft Lauderdale, lived in W. Palm Beach before moving to Jacksonville in 1985) who has been thru 3 hurricanes, Been a telephone repairman since 1969 and have been sent in to do phone repairs after Camille, Andrew, Floyd, Charlie, and a bunch of others (not Katrina) So have seen what damage they can do.

Hopefully this will be the only storm we get and we do need the rain. But what is really scary, at least up here is how many boaters still don't take these storm seriously.

The common reply is "Hey, we haven't had a hurricane here since 1964" which to me means..."we are due". Their idea of getting ready is putting out an extra fender or small diameter line.

I use 3/4th lines (think I had close to 20 out when we had the storms 2 yrs ago) onto every cleat and piling I could reach and had every fender I have out (13 of them).

But heck, he who laughs last......

 

[CARL GUZMAN]

Well I'm back I left the boat after 20 lines later ,wow I'm beat and I'm double tied everywhere , It was nice to see everyone at the marina, I met owners from boats I never seen before , we had a good time and all helped each other out , I was going to stay the night but the Admeral called and said it's all clear and to get my but home I didn't want to tell her I was already home she would have gotten jelous of my other baby

 

[solanderi]

Hey Capted,

Is that you up on the Fly Bridge over on B dock yelling at the sky "Is that all you got, Ernesto?" Ha Ha.

I'll definitely take a boring storm any day.

What is amazing to me is that Max Mayfield is apologetic for not hitting the intensity part right on. Sure, some businesses board up and the Keys are evacuated. Yeah, no doubt that stinks for those businesses but the alternative is unacceptable. What if the Director of the National Hurricane Center was a cowboy....sounds like a comedy in the making.

These things are loose cannons and Ernesto's tale will have a happy ending in S. Florida.

Greg
1985 45C
Hat Time

 

[Boss Lady]

The news media is only looking for ratings. If you want the real weather picture, you have to find it yourself. Us tax payers have paid for the best weather monitoring system in the world, yet we still have some boob with the bad hair piece trying to sensationalize every rain drop or wind gust that comes along, so they can get a bigger market share. It would be nice if they just tapped into all the government sites and reported the facts. My grand paw and his June Bug in a match box did a better job at predicting the weather than these self proclaimed "super star meterologists" that every TV station has. I would rather see the satellite photos from the GOES weather sats, than some idiot in a cheap rain suit standing next to a palm tree telling me its really windy out here. Well, Goooollllly, I was wonder what all that noise was and why the trees limbs were moving back and forth! I guess if we all had the IQ of an ameoba we just might need the local weather "TEAM" to tell us the apparent.

 

[jim rosenthal]

So you're saying you don't like bad hair pieces and cheap rain suits?....I'm crushed, just crushed.

 

[Boss Lady]

LOL, Hi Jim,

I was just being my natural sarcastic self. The media gets the sheep so worked up here in NC when "bad" weather is approaching every one freaks out and you cannot get a loaf of bread for several days. I wish Donald Trump "had" a hair piece it would look better than what he has. With his money it is a shame. He would be the best Bosely hair client and spokesman. "I used to be a jackass with a bad hairdo, but thanks to Bosely, now I am just a jackass"!

 

[CARL GUZMAN]

Wow you guys are really belly ackhin , but I see where your comin from but me and angela are the only ones who really broke a sweat and where put out. Even after 37 years here in Naples I thought it was going to put up more of a fight. My wife put up more fight tonight but I usualy win

 

[Pascal]

it's blowing pretty good this morning, Fowey Rocks just outside Key Biscayne is reporting 35g41 and tehre is a double rain band jsut off shore from key west to just south of miami.

the local TV stations are pathetic... trying to make a big stink out of nothing... i really think they are hosing down their clowns before putting them on air, and probably rigging big blowers or maybe lines to shake those palm trees....

most of the time i spent preparing was needed anyway (bimini, securing cushions, dinghy, etc...).. the extra lines were uneeded but didnt' take long...

 

[MikeP]

The news media is pathetic. A while back we had some rain here pretty steadily for over a week. There was a lot of water but it wasn't really a problem. There was a news crew next to where I worked filming in the rain. The "reporter" was standing in water nearly up to her knees in long rubber boots. The part you couldn't see on TV was that she was standing in a small field with a low spot where water always gathers. There was no standing water anywhere else. We were looking out of the office window while they were filming, trying to figure out what they were doing. That evening we saw the news with or dedicated and concerned reporter standing in "knee-deep" water frantically describing the terrible situation that was about to engulf Long Island! "Those with home generators should be ok..." Home Depot must have loved it.

There sure ain't no Walter Cronkites out there anymore!

 

[Wild Bill]

How 'bout the Canaveral Port Authority and the Captain of the Port ordering a mandatory evacuation of Port Canaveral for a rain storm!
For those being hauled out, it will cost $20/ft.
The rest of us burned fuel to go elsewhere for a couple days.

But, I've never known the military to pass up an opportunity for a drill. The cost to the public is irrelavent.

 

[DeeRow]

I live in the Stuart, FL area. Ernesto is approaching us from the same direction that Wilma did. The prediction for Wilma was the same as the prediction for Ernesto. Fortunately, Ernesto fizzled where Wilma strengthened. There were many folks here who did not prepare for Wilma who were caught "flatfooted" (to quote Genisis). For me, I spent about 8 hours preping the house and the boat. The "cost" of this prep was very small considering the "benefit". The risk of doing nothing was not acceptable. I was pleased to see my neighbors all doing the same. Three direct hits in 2 years has made us very serious about storm prep. We have been blessed so far in that these storms have only been cat 1 or 2. It is very clear to me that weather predictions have a large margin of error. They are getting better with the path prediction but the strength is unpredictable. There are tornados within tropical storms, therefore, I will always prep for a hurricane/tropical storm.

Mark

 

[Angela]

Well, I've seen the first fiberglass casualty of Ernesto.

My bow was tied to the bow of a large tow boat. Earlier this morning, I saw a small salvage boat and SeaTow down at the fuel dock with passengers who had been in an inflatable dinghy somewhere out in the bay. They put them off at the fuel dock and tied up their dinghy to the dock. Then, another boat brought a couple of men back to that big tow boat to which I was tied. They threw off my bow line to a marina person who tied it off to another piling, threw off their lines, and hauled ass out of here. I heard him yell, "I'll pick up those lines later; there's a boat that needs me now." The wind was screaming at the time he left. A little bit later, I saw on the news that a sailboat had lost its anchor and crashed into the bridge at Rickenbacker Causeway. They crashed into the low bridge (now a fishing pier) that the big one replaced. The news truck was in our parking lot. I also saw the tow boat, to which I had been tied, on TV doing the rescue. After a while, I wanted to see what the conditions were like at my normal slip since where I was was so serene (by the way, I am just stunned at how calm it is where I am and just how windy it is where my slip is just a short walk away). As I walked through the parking lot I saw the sailboat. It was a 58' sailboat owned by a man from Germany. He was sailing around the world, but that trip of a lifetime has now come to an end. Here's what is left of his boat:

 

[Genesis]

Oops!

There was some TV footage of a couple of sizeable boats completely underwater at their docks. Given this storm's lack of intensity, you have to wonder if those were instances of "forced sale to insurance company".

Let's hope that if so, the people who did it are caught and prosecuted...... but for the REAL losses, that's REALLY sad!

 

[Pascal]

this wasn't a real storm , dont' see how any boat could be lost at the dock unless they were left at a very exposed marina...

i dont' understand how anyone could have ended up on the old bridge... the bay is no place to anchor in a storm... many better places starting with marine stadium.

 

[Angela]

Update on that sailboat:

The more I looked at that boat, there was something familiar about it that I just couldn't grasp....and then I finally recognized it. That boat's been here longer than I have. That boat was in the marine stadium bay for months, and then about a month ago, it moved around to the other side of the key where he's been anchored, just a short distance away from the bridge, and on the wrong side of the bridge for a storm that is approaching from the south. Some other dockmates of mine here at Rickenbacker approached that guy a few days ago to offer help moving the boat and suggested to him that he return to the marine stadium bay. He was advised that he was in the wrong place to ride out this storm at anchor. He declined all advice and assistance. So, he pretty much made his bed.

On TV, he is portrayed as a tourist passing through. Not so. Some other residents here who have been here a long time say that if he is making his way around the world in that boat, he is "drinking his way around the world." I'm told he was an arrogant SOB to those who offered help. The sailor claims, on TV, that he was planning to head for Key West, the next leg of his trip, tomorrow. I seriously doubt that was his plan. Pascal, you've probably seen this boat off to your right as you come off the bridge -the blue-hulled sailboat. Just when I was feeling sympathetic for him......the truth be known.

 

[Liquid Asset]

My cusin lived in Miami for a long time and he would always tell me that in Miami, there is always a real side to every story. He was right, I have seen it proved multiple times over. Makes me laugh every time I hear of another.