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Day 2 no power, the streets are dark, disaster tourism is at its peak.
What is disaster tourism?
Sorry to read it’s still dark out there, I hope you’re safe and sound.
Still around 500k (just in Hillsborough county) without power. Some stuff near me is coming back on, but entire neighborhoods are flooded, filled with downed trees and debris everywhere. Probably the worst hurricane to hit Tampa in a very long time.
A “major” hasn’t hit Tampa in over 100 years. (Major being 3 or higher.) Since landfall was Sarasota, I don’t know if this counts to break the streak, but it’s definitely the worst wind and rain in decades for Tampa and St. Pete. I’m very glad the storm surge didn’t also set records
What is disaster tourism?
“Disaster tourism is the practice of visiting locations at which an environmental disaster, either natural or human-made, has occurred. Although a variety of disasters are the subject of subsequent disaster tourism, the most common disaster tourist sites are areas surrounding volcanic eruptions.”
Other visitors have no connection to the site or the event, but happen to be there as tourists and visit those places as part of their sightseeing. A common example of this is tourists who come to Italy to sightsee in Rome and end up visiting Pompeii and its neighboring cities without initially intending to do so.
I feel like there’s a huge difference between visiting Pompeii and what I think of as disaster tourism. Even for more recent things like visiting Chernobyl, the site of the WTC (now), or Auschwitz aren’t the exploitative kinds of disaster tourism.
I kept reading and yeah:
the public perception of tourism depends on a wide variety of factors, such as whether the disaster was human-made or natural and how long it has been since the incident
70% of my area is without power but somehow I still have it. Likely people will be without power for multiple days. Add to that, many people I know are “trapped” in their neighborhoods (unless you have a giant lifted truck) due to high levels of standing water in the roads that has not yet receded. I don’t live in an area with storm surge flooding, so the flooding in this area is due to the torrential rains. Thankfully my neighborhood does not flood. Weird that for me everything is as normal basically but other people are having a bit of an ordeal.
At least in my area, we didn’t get large trees downed, only small ones, so I don’t know anyone with trees falling through their roofs or anything thank goodness. At least everyone I know is safe even if they are without power and can’t physically get out.
Tornadoes touched down very close to some people I know across the state as well, but thankfully no one was hurt either. One even had a tornado in their same neighborhood.
I live a bit north of where the eye made landfall, so our winds and storm surge were not quite as high as in Sarasota/Bradenton, but we had some of the heaviest rainfall in a very long while for the area.
Thanks for updating us. Glad you’re ok!
Thank you! I don’t know how those in storm surge areas are fairing. Those are always the most devastating areas in a hurricane.
I’m glad you’re safe.
I’m about 30 minutes south of Tampa Bay. We got hit hard by wind but the flooding was less than it was during Helene, but we also had a dam or something burst during that which caused a majority of the flooding. Our power was out for the night but we woke up to it being back on. We’re lucky because I have family not even a mile away that still doesnt have power tonight. Lots of trees knocked down and blocking roads, but I saw about a dozen different landscaping businesses going through the neighborhoods and clearing up roads and getting rid of the downed trees. I have family that live in a community with a golf course and the houses on the course got wrecked by the wind. A majority of houses in Florida, especially with pools, have these screened cages called lanai’s and a lot of those have either been ripped open or completely collapsed. It seems like most stores are gonna open back up tomorrow so people will be able to get essentials again. I think everyone is just thankful that it wasn’t as bad as it could be.
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Glad you guys are ok over there! Those winds looked terrifying!
In Orlando. It’s was extremely windy and rainy all last night and into this morning, but then it cleared up pretty quick. I didn’t lose services, but lots of others did. There’s debris everywhere from trees and whatnot.
I sheltered at my mom’s condo to keep her company. I’m just glad it wasn’t worse for us.
I’m curious ( I’m not in FL )
So it rapidly decreased in intensity a hour or so before landfall? I know someone near Tampa that they lost their car and home, but overall damage is significantly less than what happened in the Carolina mountains from Helene, is that correct?
Any ideas why it deintensified so? Is it worse than I understand? Pretty much everywhere reads like this ended up being far less destructive than anticipated, but that the anticipated storm and destruction would have been record setting.
The houses in Florida are built considering hurricanes, so they are more sturdy. Also, Florida is super flat and it has been raining everyday for months, so the ground was permeable but a little full already. Because it’s also near the ocean, the water can spread out into sea quickly.
The houses in NC are much less sturdy, so they would be more susceptible to wind damage. Also, because of the mountains, the valleys become pools of flood water. The ground there is much harder than in Florida, so it doesn’t absorb the rain as much. Since the pools are in the mountains, there’s only two ways for the water to leave. For the lucky valleys that aren’t entirely surrounded, the water can escape through the gaps making temporary rivers. The other route is through evaporation, which takes a long time. This delays the ability of recovery efforts because people literally can’t even get to the disaster zone.
The storm was mainly weakened by wind shear.
Here are some key points:
Wind shear is defined as the change in wind speed, wind direction, or both, over some distance.
Hurricanes thrive in environments where their vertical structure is as symmetrical as possible. The more symmetrical the hurricane is, the faster the storm can rotate, like a skater pulling in her arms to spin.
Too much vertical wind shear, however, can offset the top of the storm. This weakens the wind circulation, as well as the transport of heat and moisture needed to fuel the storm. The result can tear a hurricane apart.
Source: What is Wind Shear, and How Does it Shape Hurricanes
As to the destruction being less than the worst-case scenario predicted, that’s because the storm ended up making landfall south of Tampa Bay:
Tampa Bay remained in the hurricane’s northern eyewall, which meant that winds blew from the east—offshore—during the worst of the storm. Not only did these offshore winds spare the region the worst of the surge, but Tampa actually experienced an “anti-surge” as the storm made landfall. Strong winds pushed more than a metre of water out of Tampa Bay and into the Gulf of Mexico.
Source: How Hurricane Milton’s Destructive Surge Mostly Spared Tampa Bay
