One common element in all the stories I've heard is that those who stayed — wished they had not done so, once the storm was upon them.
And, at near the end of the personal story below — there is the point being made about climate change's impacts. Our national priorities and those of our states and local jurisdictions remain oblivious to what is going on with our planet's temperatures and the consequences of the choices we are making.
From an email:
A friend of mine with family in the Panama City area posted this report from her mother this morning. I asked for her permission to share, and then asked for her thoughts on why her family didn’t evacuate. Granted there are some nits to pick — but I hope you can feel the emotion.
—
You see, Hurricane Michael appeared out of nowhere. People in the Panhandle of Florida had very little time to prepare. Many stayed behind, including my granddaughter and her father because they didn't think it would be bad. It was bad. It was really, really bad. The entire Panhandle coast is devastated. The storm was quick moving, but winds in the eye wall were 150 miles per hour.
How did this happen? Why did Michael intensify so quickly and surprise everyone by growing from a Cat 1 to almost Cat 5 in just a short time? Water temperature. The Gulf of Mexico's water temperature is 89 degrees! Warm waters cause tropical storms to spin out of control, growing in size and intensity very quickly.
So, today the lives of three of my children are tossed upside down. They are homeless or can't return to their homes for a long time. They are jobless, because businesses need to repair or rebuild. And this is not an isolated case. This happens over and over again and again throughout the world, and is happening more and more frequently. We've actually become immune to it. Does anyone even remember Hurricane Florence? Irma and Maria happened only last year.
The thing is ... this didn't use to happen so often, or so extremely. I'm old enough to know that major hurricanes were not that common. But ocean water temperatures are rising, and the world's climate is changing. These are FACTS. Scientists have data. Every month I read "record-breaking" heat, cold, hurricane, typhoon, "unseasonal" ... so don't tell me that climate change is a hoax or is not real. This shouldn't even be an issue, contesting whether these things are even real! They are! The climate of the world is changing at an alarming rate and we have very little time left to stop it, or slow it. This is not the time to worry about making a profit. This is the time to seriously consider if this planet will be safe or unsafe for our children and grandchildren.
And, by the way, I still have one granddaughter unaccounted for in Panama City, who stayed back with her dad. This has affected my family in Michigan. We assume and hope and pray that she is safe with her dad, but there is no cellphone service right now out of the area, so dad can't call her mom to say they are OK. The last we knew he ran to the neighbor's for shelter after the windows were blown out in his home.
Wake up, America! CLIMATE CHANGE IS REAL, and every one of us will feel the effects before all is said and done.
EDIT: I asked her why she thinks her sisters and brothers-in-law stayed:
My brother-in-law and his daughter are still there because they didn't think it would be that bad, and by the time they realized that they should leave, there was a mandatory “stay put” order.
My sister and her two kids left more out of fear of power outage and flooding.
None of them believed it to be as bad as it was.
She also left with only one bag of stuff believing they’d probably be back home in a day or two. They went up to a hotel in Alabama and then after the hurricane came through, they proceeded to come up here to Michigan with family.
