Major Shift Makes Major Move - Hurricane Ian

 

So we went to bed last night seeing that the Hurricane had shifted down south of Sarasota...the further south for us, the better for the Condo...to far south, and worse for being in the DeLand area.  Last night around 2 am I watched the newscast and was about ready to hit the road right then and there...but I can't drive at night like I use to be able to do.  So this morning around 8 am I talked to Marcia about the situation, and we decided to leave the area.  Not only was Ian, as a Tropical Storm, going to pass by within a few miles of where we were, there were going to be many possible Tornadoes in the area too.  Enough is enough...we left and were on the road shortly after 9 am.  Saw the live cams of the Interstates, and they all looked good...not much traffic.  Just so happened to have a break in the rain, so I hardly got wet at all hooking up the car and unhooking the utilities.  Went east to I-95 in Daytona, and north on I-95 to the Jacksonville area to catch I-10 so that we could go west.  Other than about 10 minutes of huge downpour along I-95, the drive was problem free.  Traffic was not heavy, but not light.  It worked out well.

So we made it to Perry Florida, which is along US-19, as is our Condo...but the Condo is about 170 miles to our south.  Bottom line is, we are SAFE, little wind, no rain, and one of about 20 RVs in the Walmart Parking Lot in Perry.  We hope to make it back home tomorrow.  With the Hurricane going so far south, all is well in Holiday/Tarpon Springs area.  In fact, Tampa has done well with this southern path, but Sarasota, Fort Meyers and especially Port Charlotte have been hit hard...and since the path predictors missed on this one, they did not have much time to prepare.  (EVERYONE was saying it was hitting Tampa for the last 2 days prior to last night.)

We had a LONG travel day...lots of stress for the first 4 hours or so.

Now we just fulfilled our day with some gorgeous sunset pictures.  Tomorrow is another day, and we hope to be enjoying it at home in our condo...

Update on Hurricane Ian Plans

 

Within hours of my last post saying we were going to Chiefland, I canceled that plan as the Hurricane path moved right for Chiefland.  Late last night the path moved over to Tallahassee, and that model has pretty much held for thee past 12+ hours.  

All of the 'blue' area in the picture above is the 'Cone of Uncertainty' -- where it 'could' head.  The black line is the projected path, or a combination of the many paths, sometimes called spaghetti paths, that they squeeze together to form one path to represent a probable track.  

 

 

The thing is, there are MANY MANY spaghetti paths out there.  Keeping track of them in current time can be hard to do.  I am not sure which 'paths' or 'models' are used in the NOAA and the National Weather Service combined site (www.nhc.noaa.gov), but they put out a forecast every couple of hours, and that is what I follow the most.  I let them put the models together, and they come up with a probable path.  As the Hurricane gets closer to landfall, the more accurate the model becomes.  In 2018 when Michael went by us and hit Mexico Beach, their path was within a few miles from where they said it would hit land Monday night, to where it did hit land at 1 pm on Wednesday.  We saw no need to leave with Hurricane Michael, with this one...well, it is closer (not as far off shore).  So Monday we are headed east to DeLand, where Marcia's brother Dean and sister-in-law Caryl live.  That will put us 100 miles further east of the path, however we will still be within the 'Cone of Uncertainty'.  But as the Hurricane gets closer to hitting land, that cone will shrink...and we hope DeLand will no longer be in that cone.  If things change, well, that is why a motorhome has wheels.