Journal archives for October 2022

October 04, 2022

Hurricane Ian


(REUTERS/Marco Bello)

Recently, the SW coast of Florida was struck by the disastrous Hurricane Ian. As the death toll continues to rise (103 as I write this), more photos of the storm's aftermath are being released.

This post isn't very iNat related, but it's very personal. Thankfully my area in SE Florida was barely affected, with just tropical storm winds and about a foot of rainfall... besides 2 tornadoes that occurred within my county and an additional 4 in my neighboring county. Though just an hour west of where I live, roads I used to drive on are now gone (the Sanibel area in specific), and houses and restaurants I've visited (in Fort Myers specifically) have been claimed by the Gulf of Mexico. :(

My family business, which is in the industry of designing and manufacturing water pumps, has locations all over Florida from Jacksonville to Fort Myers. Here's an example of our pumps in use to drain New Orleans after Katrina in 2006: (NBC News)
Ian resulted in our Fort Myers location now missing garage doors and a roof. But...things couldn't have been better... not one pump was damaged, not one computer cracked, nothing. The facility already has power and a company from Georgia is already restoring the roof. Praise the Lord!

My friends, the Morgan family, have experienced dramatic destruction in the Punta Gorda/Fort Myers area. Thankfully they were evacuated beforehand because flooding reached all the way to the ceiling, so they've lost a lot. So please pray for them.

Now to make this iNat related, vagrants. Yes, vagrants. Totally different topic, I know. Whenever hurricanes or tropical storms tend to blow through the Sunshine State, many interesting tropical species come with them. Kinda like a package deal. Anyway, Hurricane Irma for example (the absolute worst hurricane I've ever been in) in 2017 brought many Caribbean birds into the southern part of the state. This Yellow-faced Grassquit a few days after the storm observed by joemdo is one of them:
Even though we never really know if these birds are exotic escapees, there's no doubt that we observe a large increase of them after storms.

Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to read my post!

Posted on October 04, 2022 05:32 PM by gatorhawk gatorhawk | 3 comments | Leave a comment

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