Death toll to rise in Charley aftermath. Good luck to South Carolina:-/

[redrumloa]

'It's Andrew all over again;'

God forbid, but rumor is the official death toll will balloon once the surveying is done. News I saw reported rumors of 60 deaths in one trailer park alone. I hope this is wrong..

My thoughts are with PUNTA GORDA, FL and good luck to South Carolina:-(

[Glaucus]

Ouch! I hope all the Florida members here made it through the storm. Btw Red, where abouts in the sunshine state are you in? Was it hit hard?

  - Mike

[KennyR]

Lets just hope that the hurricane has spent most of its energy on uninhabited areas before it gets to the towns and cities of SC - and NC for that matter.

[redrumloa]

Btw Red, where abouts in the sunshine state are you in?

I am on the east coast towards the southern tip, very close to the coast. The storm started to make landfall in Fort Myers which is near the southern tip but on the west coast. That places the storm eye at about ~110 miles away at it's closest point to us. We had it very easy, only some gusty winds. The damage the news is showing is eerily similar to Andrew. More spread out, less poluplated area and probably won't touch the monitary damage of Andrew but indications are the death toll may easily dwarf Andrew :-( These people were not prepared. They havn't had a hurricane in ~80 years and the projected path was very wrong so many did not evacuate. Furthermore alot of trailer parks and elderly communities were in the path..

Not good :-(

@KennyR
Luckily for SC it was only a category one hurricane when it hit them. That's bad enough for sure, but won't compare to the category 4 carnage in FL.

[Tigger]

Punta Gorda was ground zero apparently Red, my dad is ok,  mom is in Vegas, but house took a severe hit, may be a total loss by the end of it.  My sisters inlaws live on Useppa Island, and though they were inland when it struck and are ok, they have been told the entire island may be a loss every home, every store, every shop.  My dad was head of Emergency Management for Charlotte County for 10 years and has been to other counties with his teams for Andrew and other Hurricanes, but his feeling is since it hit 4 counties badly, that the death toll and damage total is liable to much higher for this one then from Andrew.      
    -Tig

[blobrana]

Yeah,
 i was following it`s path via satellite...

it looked bad.




And there`s another two that may hit the islands this weekend.!!!