2012 marked the third year of living in Florida and I distinctly remember thinking at the beginning of this year: "Man! I've never experienced a hurricane in the whole time I've been here! What is going on?"
Well, I'm not saying that thinking these things really made any difference in the meteorological outcome of 2012 in the Southeast, but I will say that if Mother Nature was listening to me of all people, I must have pissed her off or something. Four big storms this year, and each one of them found me.
1: BERYL
TROPICAL STORM
(Late May, Jacksonville/Fernandina Beach FL)
The first one of the year honed in on Northern Florida in late May. I had just returned from two weeks in the field, went in for surgery a few days later, and then spent my recovery hunkered down for the storm.
This storm (pronounced "Burl") churned up the Atlantic quite a bit, knocked over powerlines and trees, and also KO'd the beach house on the power front. We had friends visiting so we had a big ol' low country boil on the table, and bathtubs full of water in anticipation of the storm. Once the power went out, we were in for a long, hot evening as it was 80+ degrees with humidity, and if we tried to open the doors to let a "breeze" (read: gale-force wind) in, it would most definitely rip the wallpaper off the walls. So I speak for myself and everyone else staying the house that night when I say that I slept in a pool of my own sweat. Ah. Life in the south.
2: DEBBIE
TROPICAL STORM
(late June, Central Florida)
Debbie was fun because we were doing course prep work down in Key Largo and got a bit of weather during that week. Then when we went to run the course up in Central Florida. At this point it was raining and it was windy but the storm was on track to swing west and head toward Texas.
Well, it didn't. Instead it moved over Central Florida and just parked it for a few days, directly over the FOUR teams that we had in the field at the time. Most of them just stayed out there and hunkered down, however the Marion County Sheriff's department insisted that my team get off the river. The end result was 36 hours of hanging out at base for the team, while I made multiple trips out to the river, first to get the team, then to go back the next day and get their gear in a driving rainstorm, and then again to take them back out. I was getting more than slightly irritated with Mother Nature at this point, and also extremely impressed with our instructors and students who were battling the weather out there.
3: ISAAC
HURRICANE
(late August, Alabama & Louisiana Gulf Coast)
Here's the thing. I get so comfortable during my off-time that I have a minor meltdown any time I have to leave and go out on course. These feelings quickly subside as soon as I get in the car and start driving because they are just classic signs of "transition stress" which you feel right before you start a transition. When you actually get in the car and drive, or start whatever the next phase is, it goes away. For me, I love my job and find a lot of fulfillment in it, but it is still hard to break away from vacation.
For Isaac, I was coming off of four precious days off, post course, to go into training in Alabama. And so I was slightly cranky again when it was time to leave. About 12 minutes after I arrived in Alabama I was informed that #1 training had been pushed back two days because #2 we were under a mandatory evacuation by the governor of Alabama.
My reaction was typical. "Nooooooo......" breath "....ooooooo!" as I slowly fell to the floor. I had spent the past six hours thinking about how nice it would be to just have two or three more days of lounging at home. I was quickly assured that "it would be okay" and indeed it was, as all of us at the base snapped into disaster mode the next day by securing the base and all its gear before the storm rolled in. This involved a brand new adventure to all of us: driving canoes out to the local airport to store them in a hangar. Which, in turn, provided us with the brand new experience of driving on runways to get there.
The next few days were spent hanging out indoors, reading, eating, drinking and watching "Human Planet." My poor mother was notably distressed, having not one, but TWO daughters in a hurricane zone. We assured her that everything was fine. Micaela was safe and sound running a shelter north of New Orleans, an operation that boiled down to playing a lot of cards and hanging out as I understand it. And I was drinking cocktails at 10:30 in the morning, hanging out with great people, and getting the best sleep I had in months.
In Fairhope, we barely got touched by it, just some heavy rain bands and wind that didn't do too much damage. Training went on as scheduled, resulting in us trying to outrace the flood waters that were coming down from the north and occasionally flooding our camp.
4: SANDY
HURRICANE
(Late October, Everglades)
By the time Sandy rolled around, I was so ready for the end of the Hurricane alphabet, and knock on wood for this to be the last one of the year. I went out for a field visit on the course I was supervising, when Sandy was kicking up in the Caribbean as a tropical storm. After 24 hours out there, it had been upgraded to a hurricane and we began to make plans to get the team out if need be. Fortunately, they were on the outer edge of the storm and it wouldn't get to the point where they needed to be evacuated. Unfortunately, it meant a couple of WET nights out there and some crazy wind as the team struggled to get to solo. It definitely resulted in the wettest night I'd ever experienced in the field, on the outer edge of a tarp with rain coming in sideways every 30 minutes or so. Also, one of my favorite lines from students I'd ever heard, uttered sporadically throughout the night: "Miss! Miss! Miss! ... awww. Nevermind, I'm flooded." Such a dejected statement after the tarp unloaded its puddle on him. Fortunately, the kids and instructors had a good sense of humor about it and they were tough to boot. And that night was the night that I finally decided to spring for rain pants. It took two tropical storms and two hurricanes for me to pull the trigger on that one, but there you have it.
The water level rose considerably in Southern Florida. In the Everglades it was WAY up, as evidenced by the channel marker picture below, and the Bird Lane photos show what was going on down in the Keys at the time. A nice result of that was that the Everglades turned back into bird haven for a few days there and we had 8 roseate spoonbills feeding in the shallows off Highland Beach one morning during solo.
Now, it is not lost on me that a lot of people out there were ACTUALLY affected by these storms in a pretty bad way. I feel fortunate that myself and everyone I know was not harmed, and I also have an enormous amount of respect for the people who were REALLY in the field for these storms.
But man, it was a wild summer here in the Southeast.
