Reply #24: Best advice is to leave...

[Whiskeytide]

We live on the gulf coast. I have a business here. But we still bug out about 200 miles to the homes of friends or family whenever a Hurricane is approaching. Unless you are a first responder or medical staff or someone else who is required to stay behind, don't. Why?

1. There is little you can do to protect property from a Hurricane even if you're there. Trying to tarp a couch in 100 mph winds and stinging rain, in the dark, when there is probably a water moccasin in your den, is simply not worth the risk to your life and limb. I suppose afterwards there are some things you can do to lessen the losses, but its still just not worth the risk. Look around your house and ask yourself if there is anything there you'd jump in front of a bullet for? Really? There is nothing in my home or in my office that I can't find a way to replace, or learn to do without. Both are insured (I know that doesn't always work out, but still), and its just stuff. Back up your hard drive, batten up the house as best you can, take anything really important to you, and GTF out.

2. Friends and family will worry themselves sick for you, might not hear from you for days and will imagine the worse. Don't put them through that.

3. You can get back into a hurricane hit area fairly soon - a day or two - unless it is catastrophic. If that's the case, there's no reason to get back quickly anyway.

4. Looters are not really the problem the media makes them out to be. They're just not. Does it happen? Yes. Is it complete anarchy? No. Not unless the situation becomes what happened in New Orleans following the levy breaches. If that kind of thing happens, you don't really want to be there to engage in a firefight with looters to protect your big screen TV and your weed eater, do you? The MS gulf coast was devastated by Katrina to an extent I could not have imagined. For miles inland, there was nothing to loot. For the next 30 miles, there was no one to do the looting - only people like the OP trying to dig out and survive. If a survivor wants to rummage through the ruins of my house to find things to help them and their family survive - fine. I would give them permission if I were there. If they go in to get my TV and weed eater, I'm not going to lose sleep over it?

5. If it really hits like Katrina hit the MS coast, you might survive and make out OK like the OP. But unless you're a young, fit person with good survivalist skills, or otherwise really lucky, you're more likely to be a burden on emergency response personnel. They're probably already busy. I don't want someone else to perish because I absorbed EMT resources. I voted for Reagan once as a young man - so I already have enough on my conscience.

6. Go to the house of a friend or family member, get a bottle of whiskey, have a good meal, and watch The Weather Channel intently for 27 hours. Spend time with people you like and care about, but don't get to see often because they're 200 miles away. That is a much better way to ride one of these thing out. JMHO.