Tampa Bay: Hurricane Season Starts June 1st Are You Ready?

Animated Hurricane Charley Radar Display

Hurricane Season, It’s about that time of year again. Are you prepared if the big one heads for Tampa Bay?

Of those 10 predicted storms, NOAA expects three to six hurricanes to become Category 3 storms with winds of more than 111 mph.

With Pinellas County being a peninsula, if a big hurricane made it’s way up the Florida coastline striking Tampa Bay at high tide it would do unprecedented damage.

The strong wind would push the gulf of Mexico up into the bay and with no place to go it would swamp most of Pinellas and Hillsborough County’s.

We dodged the bullet in 2004 when then Hurricane Charlie was making a bee line to Tampa Bay when it suddenly made a right turn into Captiva Island tearing them and several other Florida coastal communities to pieces as it moved inland doing a lot more damage.

TBO.com produced this animated flash movie showing what downtown Tampa would look like under a 20 foot storm surge. You can also view another flash animation of the disappearing Tampa Bay land mass as the storm surge rolled in, leaving only a small part of Pinellas county above water. CLICK HERE to see this display. (opens in new window)

There would be not much of a chance surviving a hurricane strike of this severity, so it’s best to make your evacuation plans early. Be sure to know where all your important documents are and be ready to leave as soon as possible. Don’t wait until the last minute to gas up your car, do it well ahead of a storms predicted landfall. In a mad evacuation rush gas stations would have long lines and could even run out of fuel.

Movie Of Tampa Bay Under 20ft Storm Surge

If i were to evacuate i would stay off the interstate highways. I-4 and I-75 would be jam packed. I would have my route out of the area mapped out well in advance on smaller US Highways, State and County roads where there would be much less traffic.

Be sure to have plenty of cash on hand. In a power outage credit card terminals will not work. Cash will be king if you need food, lodging, or anything else that plastic will not buy when there is no power or terminal data connection.

If you have pets, cats, birds, even dogs, be sure to have carriers ready so you can take them with you. If the big one hits Tampa Bay they probably wouldn’t be here after the storm passes. So make evacuation plans for them too.

I was born and grew up in St Petersburg back in the early 50′s. I must say that we have been real lucky dodging major hurricanes so far. But this century is supposed to be the century of natural disasters.  So it’s best to make your evacuation plans early.

The storm names for the 2011 hurricane season are: Arlene, Bret, Cindy, Don, Emily, Franklin, Gert, Harvey, Irene, Jose, Katia, Lee, Maria, Nate, Ophelia, Philippe, Rina, Sean, Tammy, Vince, Whitney. In the event that more than 21 named hurricanes occur in the Atlantic in a season, additional storms will take names from the Greek alphabet: Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, etc.

If the forecast proves accurate, the 2011 season would be less active than 2010 which produced 19 named storms and 12 of those became hurricanes. Three of those became major hurricanes, all in September.

Last year was the third busiest season on record and the 12 hurricanes were the second most in a season. However, no hurricanes hit the United States coast in 2010. Florida was hit by one tropical storm last year.

This year’s prediction is lower than the one NOAA NHC issued before the June 1 start of the 2010 season. The season ends Nov. 30.

Be prepared just in case the big one hits. Check this website for Tampa Bay Area storm preparedness and evacuation links on the left sidebar.

Here is some old TWC footage as Hurrican Charlie came ashore.

Here is a video from the Discovery Channel About Hurricane Prediction.