Don’t let it be you who has to dash in a panic to the grocery store to fight over the last few gallons of water, granola bars or batteries left on the shelves as a hurricane looms off our coast.
Nor should that be you waiting in a snaking, three-hour line at the pump as the storm creeps closer so you can fill your gas cans. Or trying desperately to find a place to bring your kids, your pets or old Aunt Mabel as the highways clog.
As Floridians, we’re supposed to be more clever than that. We’re stocked up on water, food and other supplies well ahead of time. We know to keep our gas tanks filled - and have a few cans in the shed filled, too - as soon as the first forecaster utters “convection” and “Tampa Bay” in the same sentence. We have a plan for where to take the family, the pets and Mabel.
And yet …
Every year, it seems, it’s the same old story: We get complacent, we watch the forecasts, we say this one will pass, we wait until the last minute and then we’re stuck.
Suddenly, we are Florida man. We look as foolish as the guy who robbed a convenience store with an alligator.
If there is any year to correct that behavior, this is the one.
It may not feel like it after Hurricane Idalia flooded hundreds of homes last year, but that hurricane season was muted by an El Niño weather pattern that stunted hurricane growth. Record-hot ocean temperatures made it precarious, but 2023 was largely a mild season.
This year, an emerging La Niña pattern, which fuels hurricanes, is expected to emerge just as hurricane season starts to heat up in August. And those hot ocean temperatures have stuck around - they were at summer levels months earlier than usual.
One of the most important things you can do now is build a solid hurricane kit, one that has essentials that may keep you alive after a storm such as medications, food and water; but one that also has items that will just make your life a little easier or more comfortable after a hurricane hits, such as a headlamp or a battery-operated fan.
Start putting it together now: You don’t want to wait until a storm is headed this way - when everyone else will be scrambling for the same things you are.
Read more about building all kinds of storm kits: www.tampabay.c...
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Негізгі бет Hurricane season 2024: Checklist for building a storm kit
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