The Power of Water

The pictures above show the weather today on Pensacola Beach. 80°, beautiful blue skies, fluffy white clouds, and hundreds of people out at the beach enjoying the weather.  Several days ago things were quite different though. We went through the worst rain, thunder, and lightning storm I have ever seen.  We received approximately 27 inches of rain in 24 hours. Oh my gosh,  it was unbelievable.  For us it wasn't the rain that was so bizarre but the amount of lightning and thunder that went on for about 8 to 10 hours 2 nights in a row nonstop. The rooms were lit up as if the lights were on  because there was so much lightning.

The picture below reminds me more of those days and nights. Even though we were very lucky and had no damage and no water standing in our yard, many people were not as lucky.  Highway 98 is the only main road through Gulf Breeze.    About 5 to 8 miles down 98 to the west several subdivisions got hit so bad with the rain that the water collected in the street and then rose up into the yards to the house and many of the houses had one to 3 feet of water standing throughout the house.  With the heat here flooding of the house is serious.  Mold grows almost instantly and the carpeting and often the walls have to be removed. This is what's happened to many of these people. Matter fact many of them still have the water standing in their yard and street.  Now what makes this worse for these people,  they did not live in a flood plane area and did not have flood insurance. Of course, the regular house insurance does not cover flood.  They have lost almost everything and have no help. Some people have totally lost their house because the damage was so extreme.

The city, county, and state have a lot of work to do to repair damaged roads.  Some of the roads caved in because of sinkholes.  A few lives have been lost because of this happening in Pensacola.

 Never underestimate the damage mother nature can do when she unleashes her power!



Kathy and Terry Cox are coming in on Thursday and we have lots to do. We plan on going to Fort Pickens, Pensacola Beach, historic Pensacola, and Joe Patties.   And Friday we have a very special ceremony to attend honoring a friend of ours. I will write more about that later. It looks like we are going to have good weather this week and no matter where you are I hope you have good weather also. Take care all!