![]() ![]() When asked why nothing has been done to improve Orlo Vista’s infrastructure, Demings said there is an engineering plan in place, but the hurricane struck before the county was ready. The National Weather Service said Ian deposited 9 to 10 inches of rain in the area. ![]() Orlo Vista gained attention as its residents suffered through yet another flooding, with one 21-year resident telling the Orlando Sentinel he’s seen Orlo Vista flood out from six hurricanes. Some of Orange County’s most deluged neighborhoods included the unincorporated community of Orlo Vista and apartment complexes such as Arden Villas and Cypress Landing, the latter of which was home to more than 200 families. Orange has been working since the last major storm, 2017′s Hurricane Irma, to improve county infrastructure. Some will take a matter of months.”ĭemings also said infrastructure improvements to insulate against future storms could take a couple of years. ![]() For some of those families, their homes are going to have to have substantial renovation work done within them. “That’s going to be a process,” Demings said. The last remaining shelter, the South Econ Recreational Center, had 116 people and 26 pets in need of help. Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings also stated that the county had on Wednesday alone deposited 6,000 tons of debris, which is 71% higher than normal.Īs of Thursday, all but one of Orange County’s shelters had closed. On Thursday Amy Mercado, Orange County’s property appraiser, said during a press conference the county was still assessing the impact but had estimated about $172 million in damages - a combination of public and private sector properties. Ian’s power downgraded to a tropical storm upon passing south of Orlando, but dumped historical amounts of rainfall over the area, and toppled trees and poles with its tropical-storm-force winds and hurricane-force gusts. So I think one thing to learn is what that cone means.”Īdditionally, Stevens believes better efforts can be made to communicate the threats of storm surges and tropical storm-force winds that might extend outside of the center of the cone. “It’s very uncomfortable not to know things with certainty. “But we as human beings get very fixated on the line (in the cone), and we want certainty,” she said. However, one that she thinks can improve is communicating an understanding as to what the cone of uncertainty actually is - which is based on forecast errors by the NHC over the last five years and is a probability of where the storm “might” go. Overall, Stevens said she was impressed with the NHC’s forecast and tracking a difficult storm. “Until they had the center of circulation, which happened the weekend before, it’s really more difficult to forecast exactly where it was going to go,” she said. ![]() Adding to the difficulty was Ian’s slow development and lack of circulation, Stevens said. That front is what ultimately pushed the storm toward southwest Florida. He also stated that Lee officials were working with “imperfect information.” Ron DeSantis defended Lee County’s decision to hold off and blamed the media for focusing much of its attention on Tampa Bay. Since Ian’s passing, Lee County officials have been facing scrutiny for waiting until the day before Ian’s landfall to issue an evacuation order. The forecast was difficult to make but accurate The path changed and the storm passed farther south over Lakeland, where the Lakeland Linder International Airport is located - the home base of NOAA’s hurricane hunters. In particular, Fort Myers was met with a record-high 7.26-foot surge.Īt one point, Ian was forecast to pass directly over Orlando. Ian swept the coast with a storm surge pushing water levels 12 to 18 feet along the southwestern Florida coast. It was also the first Category 4 hurricane to impact Southwest Florida since Charley in 2004. Ian was the sixth major hurricane to make landfall over Florida in the last 30 years, according to the NOAA. Category 5 has sustained winds of 157 mph. Ian recorded maximum sustained winds of 155 mph, just shy of a Category 5 storm, as it neared landfall. ![]()
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