Pop up hurricane

It really struck me how fast hurricane Michael went from a tropical storm to a Cat 4 hurricane. According the Weather Underground, rapidly intensifying storms are becoming more common.

That has a huge bearing on hurricane preparation For example, it occurred to me that if I had a sailboat near Panama City, there would not have been time to move it. In fact there wouldn't have even been time to prepare a sailboat for rough conditions. Before a storm, the accepted practice is to remove the sails and as much stuff from the deck as possible. That includes things like biminis, solar panels, paddle boards, dinghys and anything else. Extra bumpers and lines are also deployed. Of course, none of that would have mattered when the whole marina gets rubbed out.

It's a major consideration for my future plans. I don't want to put money, time and effort into a boat only to lose it in a storm.

Currently we have only a partial picture of the situation in the Florida panhandle. Significant areas are communication dead zones. We won't really know how bad things are there for some time yet. I'm also betting that there will a significant number of hurricane related deaths that will go uncounted. We know that happens. Just look at Puerto Rico. I've sources that tell me it happened in southern Florida when hurricane Andrew hit. There were large migrant communities that just disappeared. These were mostly undocumented people living out in the boonies. Let's hope people got out of Michael's way in time.

If hurricanes are going to grow quicker than before, we'd better be prepared quicker than before.

-Sixbears