It has been an active hurricane season with 3 storms affecting us since early August. Hurricane Debby kicked things off with incredible rain. Despite making landfall in the big bend region as only a category 1 storm, our area received over 15 inches which caused a lot of flooding. In fact, several streets in our subdivision were impassible for a couple of days. That had never happened before. Next up in late September was hurricane Helene which again made landfall in the big bend region but as a category 4 storm. The storm surges from Helene devastated our coastal areas. There were piles of sand on Anna Maria Island that reminded me of the snow piles from Midwest winter storms. Helene went on to destroy many areas in Georgia, the Carolinas, and Tennessee. We experienced moderately strong winds, but since we are about 15 miles from the beaches, we didn’t encounter any of the surge, and our rainfall was only about half of that with hurricane Debby. Just 2 weeks later hurricane Milton came ashore in Sarasota as a strong category 3 storm. It was a direct hit for our area and was definitely the most powerful storm we have faced since moving to Florida almost 10 years ago. There was significant damage and loss of power in the area. Despite the intensity of the storm, we came through in pretty good shape. There were lots of branches and leaves to clean up and a couple of smaller trees that needed to be straightened and staked. Several tiles from our roof were blown off. There was a lot of dirt and mulch that needed to be cleaned from the lanai, but no screen damage. We were more fortunate than many others.
Last week after getting things cleaned up from the storm, my good friend Art and I visited the Sebring area again. I’ve written about the area several times in the past. It was amazing to see debris piles as far as 50 miles inland. Unfortunately, our citrus crop may take yet another hit this year. We saw several groves with oranges all over the ground after being blown off by the strong winds.
I have added a few more shots from the day in the following galleries:
