Former Resident

Report #1
Well, this storm sure turned out to be worse than was predicted. It's the worst hurricane we've ever been through. We just got our electricity back today at home, after 8 days of being in the dark, and the office STILL has no power! We also got our phone back today, so that's great.

There is a lot of damage around. Our yard is a disaster. Our roof lost about 60 ridge tiles and a number of field tiles. Our screening over the pool and patio is half gone, some blown away, some at the bottom of the pool, some just hanging by shreds. Most roofs around here are damaged. There is roofing asphalt paper lying around everywhere, and hanging from buildings. Fascias of shopping centers have blown away. Some buildings have collapsed. Concrete power line poles have snapped. Boca Raton's beautiful landscaping is largely destroyed.

This hurricane was supposed to get sheared by a cold front before making landfall around Naples, and it didn't happen. We had prepared for a strong tropical storm or weak Category 1 hurricane, and it came over us as a Cat 2. In fact, the radio says that the back eye wall was a Cat 3. We got our first hint of this at the Sunday 11 pm newscast (just hours before the storm -- "Let's check it one more time before it comes"). We had made pretty good preparations, except Tom had put only half the steel panels on, so here we were - putting more panels on at 11:30 at night! (I say "we", but it's Tom who does all the heavy work around here, and steel is heavy!)

Then we went to bed trying to get some sleep. That worked until the first strong feeder bands were starting to hit us around 4 o'clock. Listening to that, by 5 I knew I wasn't going to get any more sleep, so I got up and watched the storm, and on TV. the doppler radar until about 8 or 8:30 or so, when the winds were hitting about 70 mph in Boca, and the cable TV. and power went out. From then on it got worse. We figured that, in this storm, our patio doors would be fairly sheltered, so we had not covered them with steel, and, although they held just fine, we were able to watch the yard get blown apart, a palm trunk falling on our roof, screens flying out. But the worst was the roof tiles (concrete, Spanish style): they made such a LOUD noise as they tumbled and bounced across the roof and landed in the yard, crashed on the patio or into the pool or wherever. It was scary.

When the winds eased up and the eye went over, Tom tried to move the palm off the roof, but it was too tall and, standing on the ground, the leverage worked against him, and he wasn't able to budge it. But the back eye wall knocked it off. I am in awe of the power of nature. The western eye wall was supposed to be easier, but it was worse. It blew even harder, now coming from the opposite side. But fortunately, it didn't last as long. When the winds had calmed down somewhat in the afternoon, we went outside and stood there with our neighbors, looking around at the devastation. Our very tall pine trees STOOD (minus a lot of branches) and we are grateful for that. Another neighbor was not as lucky.

But we lost half or more of the mango tree (the trunk is still there, but instead of large branches it now has stumps) and the avocado trees. We lost a couple of palm trees, flowering Tibouchina tree, a number of Areca palm trunks, banana palms, Schefflera, etc. The pool was full of everything: screens, branches, leaves (many trees lost all their leaves); you couldn't see the bottom. It was tough to see all the damage. What's that? I asked Tom, pointing at a big something in our yard. It was part of a chimney belonging to the Wootton family on the street behind us.

Report #2
The office came through OK. All the glass was protected with steel panels. The pressure of the wind on one of the outer walls did force the ceiling grid out of alignment, with ceiling panels popping up and out, but Tom fixed that already. The wind pressure also caused a printer against that same wall to fall and shatter, but we didn't see any further damage. However the power is still out, so we went out and searched for a generator on Sunday, and found one at a Home Depot in Boynton Beach, a couple of towns to the north. So after the office being closed for a week, we are now up and running again, be it at half-strength and in the dark, and without a.c. But enough to run 4 of the computers and a few lights.

So at home we've been living without electricity for 8 days. I had frozen a lot of big containers of water ahead of time, so we didn't need ice for several days. Then as they melt, they become water, so we didn't need water at all. (The tap water was unsafe to drink for about 5 days.) We had gassed up our cars and (last week) didn't have a generator, so we didn't need to stand in any gas lines either. Most of these people in lines for water and ice just didn't prepare and feel that the government has to be there at the snap of their fingers to help them and give them what they need. I do sympathize with older or ailing people that are unable to take care of their own needs. (I volunteered to help distribute stuff to shut-ins through our local Lutheran church, but not having a working phone line has made it impossible to coordinate so far.)

We managed our lighting needs with our solar garden lights and a small wheel-around solar panel , some batteries as back-up in case the sun doesn't shine, and we have a wind-up radio and flash light. After stirring cold water into my instant coffee on Tuesday, we decided to dig out the Coleman camping stove, and we've used it every day since. On Wednesday, we had a big BBQ, grilling our freezer foods. Grandma Marie (Marie Bertoni Benedict) and Jay (son) came over and enjoyed the afternoon with us. (We had a 7 to 7 curfew at night.) We've been doing fine and you just can't expect to have perfection when nature deals you a disaster. So you take cold showers (yikes!) and make do.

Our neighborhood is passable again. At first, fallen or broken trees were blocking the street, but now they just cover half, so that you can drive around. A lot of people on our street have fallen trees on their roofs, some have blown out windows. The Schneiders down the street had their entire patio doors including overhead glass windows blow into their family room. Everyone has some or many roof tiles blown off. One house down the street has roofing from the Boca Terrace condominiums on its roof. Everyone's screens are gone, some had collapsed screen structures. Sounds like a good business opportunity! Many older flat roofs are gone. It's started raining today and I know lots of people must be getting everything wet inside. Marie's complex also had a lot of roofing paper blown off, so I hope she won't have any leaks in the condo above her. I hope we stay dry, too.

On the streets, most stop lights are not working (or not there anymore), so 4-way stops are in effect. We went for a short drive in our part of town and found the Marina One boat storage building totally collapsed with all the expensive boats inside. The Publics shopping center is missing part of their facades. On Friday, Tom bought a gas-powered chain saw. He didn't seem to get a whole lot done with that electric-powered one he has! And predictions were for 3 more weeks of no power.

(Fortunately we did better than that, at least at home.) So a week's work in the yard has brought some order to things. Sporadic cell phone service came back on Friday, too. Kim (daughter) still has no power. The aluminum awnings on her apartment blew away, but her windows are intact. Paul Anderson still has no power. Curfew is 9 to 5 now. We don't have cable TV. yet. We can get out the rabbit ears if we want, beats the radio. So, we are fine

Report #3

As of today, we still have power and phone. Yesterday, when the power came back on, I went to the store to get some cold stuff like ham and cheese (a few stores have power now, and they have some perishables, but not all, for instance the store I went to had fresh juice and yogurt, but no eggs and milk.) Anyway, I went to the store, planning to restock our fridge somewhat, but when I got back home, the power was out again! Fortunately, my "blue ice" in the freezer had frozen in that time, so I just kept the stuff cold with that, and then after a couple of hours the power came on again. Keeping our fingers crossed!

The office still has no power (except from the generator) and does have phone, but the phone system is electric, so we just plug in a regular phone into the system that hangs in the copy room, and run for it when it rings. I just made up a couple of six-pack coolers with cold soft drinks and water, for Tom to take to work. It is very hot and humid there without a.c. We were fortunate that the weather was fairly mild the first week after Wilma (because of that cold front that was supposed to shear the hurricane down at least a category). But yesterday it was very sticky again.

Marie seems to be doing OK. She had her power and phone restored 5 days earlier than we, so it wasn't as complicated. Still, her 3 days is enough to play havoc with your frozen items. Anyway, she's a practical person and doesn't fall apart when there's a challenge.

The roofs of her condo complex will need some work after Wilma. Lots of roofing material lying around there. I don't know from which condos they originate. But we had a good rain today, so people should be finding out! I saw people putting tarps on the roof here and there, so they're paying attention (I hope). A few tiles off, too, but that's just cosmetic in the case of her condo. But she won't have to deal with it. The Board of the Condo Association should arrange for everything and she'll just pay a special assessment probably, watered down over many owners. The roof square footage per condo is small. Fortunately, there was little tree damage there, relatively speaking, comparing it to our community. As of yesterday, she didn't have cable yet, but otherwise seems to doing alright, with power and phone and all that, and supplies.

So we're doing OK. We actually felt pretty clever at times. Tom hooked up an inverter to his car battery and ran his blender on it for his breakfast shake! We even watched a little TV. on it, but it wasn't worth it, just people talking about where to stand in line for ice and water and gas, and emergency numbers (most people couldn't phone anyway). You can get that on the radio if you need it. But I think we're a little stressed. If you had no property, it would be more of an "adventure". Now it's a loss, and you have to overcome it. I'm fortunate that Tom is such a "can-do" guy, but he's also starting to feel his 61 years.

About the phone service:

We had phone service through the storm on Monday until Bellsouth ran out of battery backup power. (We have underground utilities in our community.) After the worst was over, I called Daniel (son at college) and my Dad in Holland, telling them we made it through the worst of it, and letting them know that I'd call back after it had calmed down some more so that we could go outside and inspect the damage. Then in the evening, when I tried to call them back, the phone didn't work anymore until yesterday (Tuesday), so that was 8 days of no phone. Marie had no phone for fewer days. Cell phones were very spotty. Nothing the first days for Tom (Sprint). Kim's phone did better (different location, different company). Tom's phone didn't work consistently until Friday and it was an off and on situation, trying to get a signal. (Myself, I'm too thrifty to get a cell phone, so far. I don't need it very much.

Report #4
Yeah, we're still cleaning up. Almost every tree and plant has broken branches or blew over, so it takes time. And we had quite a jungle. Our street is lined with tall piles and piles of broken branches and we hope they will pick it up soon. Last year with Frances it took 3 weeks, this time probably longer, because there is so much more of it everywhere. There used to be so many HUGE trees everywhere. It's so bare around our house! We're used to having all this lush green jungle and privacy. Now we can see the neighbors all around us.

Schools are planning to open up tomorrow after 2 weeks off. There are still 300,000 homes without electricity, but more than 3 million have been restored. In the beginning 98% of Palm Beach County (ours) and Broward County (the office's) was out of power. So we're making progress. We have 10,000 Florida utility workers working around the clock plus 8,000 from 33 states and Canada. It was so incredibly DARK when there was no power, no street lights. Amazing.

At home, after losing power during the hurricane, for a week we were still flipping on switches when we entered a dark room, just automatically, without thinking. Then we got used to it, and now I put up with walking into a dark room because I forget we have power. More and more stores are opening up again, though many are only partially stocked. Many stoplights have not been restored yet. These glass (lighted) signs that stores have along the street, they're all blown out, too.

There is a lot of roof damage around, like that one pic I sent you of the next door Boca Terrace condomiums, where the roofing paper just hangs off the buildings or has blown away. So even with the damage we have at home, we are fortunate that our roof doesn't seem to leak (knock on wood) and it could have been a lot worse.
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by Liesbeth Benedict (husband, Tom, is Marie Bertoni Benedict's son) - live in Boca Raton.
Marie (90) lives nearby - in Boca Raton.
Tom is an architect and owns his own firm in nearby Deerfield, Fl.

Children: Jay (Jason) living in the area, Kim living in the area, Daniel away at college.