Floridians with local ties prepare for Irma
As Hurricane Irma makes its way to Florida as a Category 5 storm, Floridians with ties to the local area are watching and preparing for the storm in their own ways.
Born in Connellsville, Justin Cope moved to Florida in 2006 and currently lives in Boca Raton, a city on Florida’s southeastern coast, with his wife, Jessica, and 10-month-old daughter.
“We’ve had a couple of threats here and there and a couple of warnings since I moved here,” Cope said about his time living through hurricanes in the past decade. “I’m keeping my fingers crossed that this one will miss us as well.”
Cope said on Wednesday that he and his wife and his daughter will depart from their home on Thursday morning and head north to Orlando and stay with family during the storm and can go as far up as North Carolina if need be.
He said that most businesses have closed down and his office closed down Wednesday through Friday as mandatory evacuations were announced in neighboring counties in anticipation of what’s being called the most powerful hurricane ever recorded.
By Thursday, mayors in Miami-Dade and Broward counties issued mandatory evacuation orders for barrier islands and low-lying mainland areas in the metro area of 6 million, where forecasters predict the hurricane with winds of 180 mph could strike by early Sunday.
Along with moving his family to safer grounds, Cope said he secured everything outside of his home as well as having impact windows installed.
Cope also noticed a lot of storm shutters being put up around the neighborhood, people waiting 45 minutes to fuel up at gas stations and empty store shelves as early as Sunday.
“There’s a little craziness, but it seems that people are sticking together and helping each other out,” Cope said. “We’re well ahead of this with the planning. They gave us enough of a warning.”
Beth John and her husband, Dave John, lived in the Uniontown area before moving to Orlando in 1990.
Located an hour inland from Daytona Beach, Beth John said there is always a risk during hurricanes, but their location saw little damage from hurricanes over the years.
“Orlando is a little less affected because we’re inland, “she said. “We’ve been pretty fortunate with that in our neighborhood.”
Beth John said Hurricane Charlie, a category four hurricane that hit Florida in 2004, caused little damage to their neighborhood with some trees down and a one to two-day power outage.
The Johns took steps for Hurricane Irma by having enough food and water and supplies on hand to last a few days, bringing in their outdoor furniture or anything that can fly away and there are always some people in the neighborhood who board up windows and take down their fences.
As of Wednesday, Beth John said the biggest thing she’s noticed in her area was the store shelves being completely out of water as everyone is trying to get supplies to make it through the storm.
Cathy Johnson noticed the same in her location in The Villages senior citizen retirement community in what’s called the heart of central Florida.
“People are going to the gas stations and draining the gas,” Johnson said, adding the local gas station was completely dry at 7 a.m. on Wednesday and the grocery store only had four shopping carts available by 7:30 a.m. that same day. “I think people buy more than what they need for a few days.”
Johnson grew up in East Huntingdon Township, Westmoreland County and then retired with her husband, Don Johnson, to Florida in 2002.
In that time, she said the worst hurricane experience was in 2004 as Florida was hit with four hurricanes in one season being Hurricane Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne.
As for preparation of the upcoming storm, Cathy Johnson said they’re watching the news to get a better idea of the course of the storm as she believes it will start hitting them around Sunday.
In the meantime, Cathy Johnson said she’s placing important papers in her car in case they decide to head north, taking photographs around the house for insurance purposes and backing up computer files on an external hard drive.
“We’ll move all the potted plants in the driveway and the chairs — anything that can be a projectile,” she said.
As for any type of evacuation, Cathy Johnson said she would imagine many people in retirement community of over 100,000 residents will stay in their homes during the storm.
“Then again, this is a whole new ballgame,” she said, adding that she doesn’t have a plan if there’s a mandatory evacuation other than heading north. “The story brewing out there right now is this will really be a killer storm.”