myredracer wrote:
Talked to someone from Florida a few days who said that because Florida isn't that wide, flood waters drain away fairly quickly compared to Texas and surrounding areas. Not much consolation if buildings and everything else gets flattened tho.
From not far south of Orlando, basically from where the St John's River starts and flows North, call it an east/west line from Melbourne, most of the land to the south was at one time the Everglades. Thats the reason for all those canals, the swamps were drained in favor of agriculture. Yes it does drain fairly quickly.
I lived in O.C. MD in 1985 and stayed on the island for Hurricane Gloria. It was not a direct hit as the eye traveled North some miles off the coast. I did however watch sections of boardwalk turn up, bash into buildings, then turn to toothpicks. I also watched waves of surge, about 4' to 6', go in the front of first floor motel rooms and out the rear taking everything that was not concrete block along for the ride and deposit it in the back bay. 4' of sand was moved into the highway in a few hours.
I was driving coastal highway a few hours before Gloria arrived in a 76 Chevy Van doing 45mph, when I was passed by one of those square steel dumpsters doing about 60 lol. That's when I realized sticking around for the show may not have been the best move. Young, drunk, and stupid at the time. The hurricane parties at the bars were a good time however.
Moral of story, if I was within 5 miles of the coast I'd get the hell out. Wind is one thing. Even a couple of feet of moving water mixed with debris is something altogether different.
