Hurricane Milton Banter

[Bubbler86]

1 hour ago, canderson said:

It's a fabric roof - structure looked fine from video (catwalks still there even). If not, Oakland has a stadium they can use. 

If that happened, the Tampa area would lose Billions in Red Sox/Yankees tourism. 

[gallopinggertie]

1 hour ago, canderson said:

It's a fabric roof - structure looked fine from video (catwalks still there even). If not, Oakland has a stadium they can use. 

The roof is made of fiberglass coated with Teflon, so I’m not sure if it’s accurate to call it fabric. Also, I’d be concerned about water damage to components of the structure as rain falls on it. 

[NeffsvilleWx]

2 hours ago, Wannabehippie said:

Are you away from the water? That is a huge factor in the premiums. Right now they are jacking them up in places that are right on the water, and are in major flood zones from storm surges.
 

2 miles from the coast, “lake” (drainage basin) in our backyard.
 

so not really. Which is kind of what I was hinting at. There are underlying reasons why properties are more expensive to insure, and there SHOULD be — but that doesn’t really seem to be part of the conversation.

 

What we’re seeing now is a reaction to climate change. Or more accurately, an industry updating its risk profiles near-real-time as the climate changes  vs a regulatory body that doesn’t even want to acknowledge that climate change exists.

[Floydbuster]

Storm surge is different because of so many factors. I remember we didn't see the dreaded storm surge with Hurricane Charley, even though it hit Charlotte Harbor, FL as a 150 mph Category 4 hurricane, because it was so tiny, fast moving and was only a Category 4 for about two hours prior to landfall. Hurricane Ian was the same intensity and the exact same landfall location, but was much, much larger in size, slower moving, and had hours and hours as a Category 4 and 5 to build the disastrous storm surge.

[Wannabehippie]

1 hour ago, canderson said:

It's a fabric roof - structure looked fine from video (catwalks still there even). If not, Oakland has a stadium they can use. 

The stadium in Oakland might be in even worse shape than the Trop. Know to flood at the drop of a hat, leaky pipes everywhere. facilities in terrible shape.
But I don't know if the Trop can be used without the roof in place, even if the catwalks are still in place.

[jm1220]

25 minutes ago, Floydbuster said:

Storm surge is different because of so many factors. I remember we didn't see the dreaded storm surge with Hurricane Charley, even though it hit Charlotte Harbor, FL as a 150 mph Category 4 hurricane, because it was so tiny, fast moving and was only a Category 4 for about two hours prior to landfall. Hurricane Ian was the same intensity and the exact same landfall location, but was much, much larger in size, slower moving, and had hours and hours as a Category 4 and 5 to build the disastrous storm surge.

A lot has to do with size as you said, since larger size means more water moving. More intensity obviously means more water moving as well, and the higher the intensity plus size means obviously a higher surge. The track of the storm matters, since a storm heading perpendicular into a shore will tend to maximize surge vs one tracking near parallel. But then you have to factor in local effects like where bays, inlets and harbors funnel water in and the slope of the shelf. There's a reason Tampa Bay, NY Harbor and Lake Pontchartrain are considered huge risk surge areas, because they are great at funneling the water in from a surge and maximizing it. Sandy was a high end Cat 1 but gigantic in size and about 10mb lower in pressure at landfall than Milton, which meant a huge amount of water moved, into a very bad area for surge due to the upside down L-shaped NY Harbor, lots of bays and inlets to funnel the water and a long sloping shelf. Sandy also tracked in a way that drove the surge NW directly into the harbor. Part of the impact is just the luck of what tide the surge hits during. Sandy's peak surge was during a full moon high tide which in my town added 4-5 feet on top to what it would've been at low tide (storm tide was 10 feet roughly where I lived then and even higher in places in NYC and certain spots in NJ around funnel shaped inlets). You pointed out Charley, and Andrew 1992 wasn't really known for surge other than a small part of Miami due to its size primarily and factors specific to SE FL.

The E coast of FL isn't as susceptible to surge because the shelf is very close to shore and you generally don't have all these bays and inlets to funnel the water in. But of course any low lying location is susceptible from the right storm at the wrong time. 

Generally the IKE number as bdgwx posts often is a good indicator of the surge potential with the storm since it combines wind speed with overall storm size. 

Here's a good article explaining the different factors. Storm Surge Overview (noaa.gov)

[jburns]

5 hours ago, NeffsvilleWx said:

There's a lot of nuance to Florida insurance that is often omitted from conversation. Location and age of structure are 2 of the big ones.

One nuance is the companies aren’t paying.

 

 

PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla., June 25, 2024 —Weiss Ratings, the nation’s only independent insurance company rating agency, revealed today that three large providers of homeowners insurance in Florida closed nearly half of their claims last year with no payment whatsoever to policyholders.

Dr. Martin D. Weiss, founder of Weiss Ratings, commented, “In the wake of increasing property damage from storms and record insurance company bankruptcies, this high rate of claims denials is severely compounding the hardships for Florida homeowners.”

 

Among the large providers of homeowners policies in the state, Castle Key Indemnity Company denied 47.1% of the claims it closed last year, State Farm Florida Insurance Company denied 46.4%, and Castle Key Insurance Company denied 46%.

However, Citizens Property Insurance Corporation, a state-sponsored entity holding the single largest share of homeowners policies in Florida, failed to submit data requested by insurance commissioners regarding claims closed.

In addition, three smaller providers of homeowners policies also failed to make any payment on over 40% of their claims closed in 2023: Kin Interinsurance Network (denying 44%), American Integrity Insurance Company of Florida (43.9%), and PURE Specialty Exchange (40.5%).

Click here for full list of insurers in Florida with their denial rates on homeowner claims.

“Aggravating the crisis, both the insurers and authorities have hidden critical data that consumers urgently need to make informed decisions about which companies to rely on,” Weiss added. “At the same time, most insurance company ratings are bought and paid for by the insurance companies themselves, biasing the grades and painting lipstick on a pig, while keeping the public in the dark.

“But what’s most surprising of all is that some of the companies in Florida with the highest denial rates do have the financial strength to afford to pay a much larger portion of their closed claims.”

The 2022 MCAS national survey of claims payment problems, published by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, validates Weiss’ findings. It shows that, among the 50 states, insurers in Florida not only denied the largest percentage of unpaid claims, but also had the nation’s largest percentage of unprocessed claims and the second largest percentage of claims paid only after a 60-day delay. However, the NAIC reports only state-by-state averages and does not disclose its MCAS data on individual companies.

Weiss concludes, “The public can’t even begin to cope with the property insurance crisis until both the industry and the government provide full transparency. Strong truth in insurance legislation is urgently needed.”

To check their insurers’ current Weiss Safety Rating, reflecting each company’s financial strength, consumers can go to https://weissratings.com/en/insurance.

 

[NorthHillsWx]

IMO the storm did exactly what you’d expect a cat 3 to do. I think some hyperbole was due to the extreme strength of the storm earlier in its life, but that tiny 1 mile eyewall wasn’t going to have any impact on landfall impacts. This is a novel concept, but sometimes a major landfall can be just that, a major landfall and the exact impacts one would expect. Every major isn’t going to be Helene or Katrina, but this was a highly damaging storm and did exactly what a low-end cat 3 should do- 8-12’ surge in eyewall, 100-115 mph gusts just inland. The tornado outbreak, however, was exceptional. This storm likely will be retired due to its historic strength and widespread damage in Florida. So far Florida receives an A+ for hurricane prep for all 3 storms this year. Desantis, love him or hate him, is very effective at managing hurricane impacts in Florida. 

[NeffsvilleWx]

19 minutes ago, jburns said:

One nuance is the companies aren’t paying.

 

 

PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla., June 25, 2024 —Weiss Ratings, the nation’s only independent insurance company rating agency, revealed today that three large providers of homeowners insurance in Florida closed nearly half of their claims last year with no payment whatsoever to policyholders.

Dr. Martin D. Weiss, founder of Weiss Ratings, commented, “In the wake of increasing property damage from storms and record insurance company bankruptcies, this high rate of claims denials is severely compounding the hardships for Florida homeowners.”

 

Among the large providers of homeowners policies in the state, Castle Key Indemnity Company denied 47.1% of the claims it closed last year, State Farm Florida Insurance Company denied 46.4%, and Castle Key Insurance Company denied 46%.

However, Citizens Property Insurance Corporation, a state-sponsored entity holding the single largest share of homeowners policies in Florida, failed to submit data requested by insurance commissioners regarding claims closed.

In addition, three smaller providers of homeowners policies also failed to make any payment on over 40% of their claims closed in 2023: Kin Interinsurance Network (denying 44%), American Integrity Insurance Company of Florida (43.9%), and PURE Specialty Exchange (40.5%).

Click here for full list of insurers in Florida with their denial rates on homeowner claims.

“Aggravating the crisis, both the insurers and authorities have hidden critical data that consumers urgently need to make informed decisions about which companies to rely on,” Weiss added. “At the same time, most insurance company ratings are bought and paid for by the insurance companies themselves, biasing the grades and painting lipstick on a pig, while keeping the public in the dark.

“But what’s most surprising of all is that some of the companies in Florida with the highest denial rates do have the financial strength to afford to pay a much larger portion of their closed claims.”

The 2022 MCAS national survey of claims payment problems, published by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, validates Weiss’ findings. It shows that, among the 50 states, insurers in Florida not only denied the largest percentage of unpaid claims, but also had the nation’s largest percentage of unprocessed claims and the second largest percentage of claims paid only after a 60-day delay. However, the NAIC reports only state-by-state averages and does not disclose its MCAS data on individual companies.

Weiss concludes, “The public can’t even begin to cope with the property insurance crisis until both the industry and the government provide full transparency. Strong truth in insurance legislation is urgently needed.”

To check their insurers’ current Weiss Safety Rating, reflecting each company’s financial strength, consumers can go to https://weissratings.com/en/insurance.

 

 

oh no doubt. And our elected officials made it even harder for us to collect what we’ve paid for.

Myriad problems without one easy solution.

 

[cleetussnow]

3 hours ago, lilj4425 said:

Did Lt. Dan survive?

yeah he did

[LongBeachSurfFreak]

13 minutes ago, cleetussnow said:

yeah he did

My coworker is obsessed. He couldn’t believe he was alive. I tried to explain yesterday he would be ok where he was. Guys certainly interesting and now famous. 

[JACKASS]

20 hours ago, buckeyefan1 said:

Those questions are usually answered in the main thread up until it's go time. Once the system is within a couple of days of impact, there are just too many posts at the same time for the knowledgeable people to answer. I wish I had an answer. We used to be able to 5 post people, but haven't had that option in years. 

What happened to the 5 post option?

Way too many posters here need to be put on it.

[jm1220]

1 hour ago, LongBeachSurfFreak said:

My coworker is obsessed. He couldn’t believe he was alive. I tried to explain yesterday he would be ok where he was. Guys certainly interesting and now famous. 

I’m sure he’ll monetize it somehow and upgrade his boat. 

[EWR757]

Most insurance companies, even large and popular names simply won't pay adequate adjustments on claims.   They will fight for months and years.   Most customers will eventually give up, some will fight back with adjusters, mediation and potentially litigation. 

 

The business is changed and insurance is much more profitable than it used to be, because quite frankly the insurers do everything they can to avoid paying claims.  

 

AllState's motto was once "you are in good hands".   They now fight you, their customer, with boxing gloves. 

 

Ethical insurance companies are few and far between.   Getting insurance is easy (even in FL), getting a reasonable payout on a large claim is quite another. 

 

It's a shame these practices are legal.  

[GaWx]

5 hours ago, NorthHillsWx said:

IMO the storm did exactly what you’d expect a cat 3 to do. I think some hyperbole was due to the extreme strength of the storm earlier in its life, but that tiny 1 mile eyewall wasn’t going to have any impact on landfall impacts. This is a novel concept, but sometimes a major landfall can be just that, a major landfall and the exact impacts one would expect. Every major isn’t going to be Helene or Katrina, but this was a highly damaging storm and did exactly what a low-end cat 3 should do- 8-12’ surge in eyewall, 100-115 mph gusts just inland. The tornado outbreak, however, was exceptional. This storm likely will be retired due to its historic strength and widespread damage in Florida. So far Florida receives an A+ for hurricane prep for all 3 storms this year. Desantis, love him or hate him, is very effective at managing hurricane impacts in Florida. 

 To add to tornadoes, winds, and storm surge, the rainfall in central FL was highly anomalous considering the storm wasn’t large or slow moving. The rainfall rates were extreme with St Pete getting 5” in one hour! This lead to a record for any single day (records back to 1914)! The flooding in central FL was awful, including at Daytona, and still is ongoing.

[JACKASS]

My point couldn’t be proven better.

[Chinook]

It's 11 degrees in Florida and they didn't even mark the pressure on the map

[Roger Smith]

I've noticed that bogus station several times recently, always sub-20 deg. It's probably a wrongly coded lat-long for a location in the subarctic (27 N 82 W perhaps it's really 82N 27W which would be in n.e. Greenland? or some unintended upper air report? 

Off topic, but seeing a massive display of aurora borealis here. 

[SnoSki14]

Turns out I was right that if Milton made landfall south of TB as a weakening hurricane, FL would do just fine...and they are. 

Maybe stop making everything a worst case scenario because 99% of the time it's not that. 

[DDweatherman]

1 hour ago, SnoSki14 said:

Turns out I was right that if Milton made landfall south of TB as a weakening hurricane, FL would do just fine...and they are. 

Maybe stop making everything a worst case scenario because 99% of the time it's not that. 

While I hear what you're saying, maybe you should ask the people affected how they feel about that statement. Of course the worst case doesn't happen in many cases, but we are in a world where it's better to be safe than sorry, especially when you're talking double digit storm surges in one of the most surge susceptible metro areas in our country. That same area is one of the quicker growing regions in the US as a whole. 

[gallopinggertie]

1 hour ago, SnoSki14 said:

Turns out I was right that if Milton made landfall south of TB as a weakening hurricane, FL would do just fine...and they are. 

Maybe stop making everything a worst case scenario because 99% of the time it's not that. 

I’d suggest having more nuance, Milton wasn’t the worst case scenario but plenty of communities in florida aren’t “just fine” right now either.

[SnoSki14]

1 minute ago, gallopinggertie said:

I’d suggest having more nuance, Milton wasn’t the worst case scenario but plenty of communities in florida aren’t “just fine” right now either.

I meant the state as whole will fare okay. Sure local hard hit communities will face issues but this won't be the disaster the media said it'd be. 

[jm1220]

2 hours ago, SnoSki14 said:

Turns out I was right that if Milton made landfall south of TB as a weakening hurricane, FL would do just fine...and they are. 

Maybe stop making everything a worst case scenario because 99% of the time it's not that. 

In Port St Lucie, Fort Pierce, Wellington, Punta Gorda, Siesta Key etc people should just relax because “FL did just fine”? What a load off their shoulders! 

[jm1220]

1 hour ago, gallopinggertie said:

I’d suggest having more nuance, Milton wasn’t the worst case scenario but plenty of communities in florida aren’t “just fine” right now either.

There was absolutely 100% a need to prepare for the worst case scenario because a tiny change in track would’ve brought the eye into or N of Tampa Bay, and predicting the wind speeds is hard to say the least. It hit Cat 5 twice. It wasn’t overhyping or sensationalizing at all to say it could’ve been a worst case scenario. And the places it did hit directly are still heavily populated. Tampa/St Pete also had widespread flooding and wind/power damage. St Pete had its heaviest rain in an event ever. 

[EWR757]

16 minutes ago, jm1220 said:

There was absolutely 100% a need to prepare for the worst case scenario because a tiny change in track would’ve brought the eye into or N of Tampa Bay, and predicting the wind speeds is hard to say the least. It hit Cat 5 twice. It wasn’t overhyping or sensationalizing at all to say it could’ve been a worst case scenario. And the places it did hit directly are still heavily populated. Tampa/St Pete also had widespread flooding and wind/power damage. St Pete had its heaviest rain in an event ever. 

I strongly disagree.   There are risks and consequences associated with "preparing".   

Many educated people I know did not understand this storm would begin to dissipate before it made landfall.  Many people prepared for a CAT 5 and that was NEVER in the forecast.   

 

Sometimes reacting causes more problems than sitting quietly. 

[NeonPeon]

1 hour ago, SnoSki14 said:

I meant the state as whole will fare okay. Sure local hard hit communities will face issues but this won't be the disaster the media said it'd be. 

You've started strawmanning "FLORIDA WILL BE WIPED OFF THE FACE OF THE MAP, THIS IS THE END TIMES" and now are in the position of waving away significant destruction, even as it's being uncovered.

Stop responding to stupid media by having diametrically opposed equally stupid opinions. Stop characterizing the most extreme opinion as definitive. That is why public discourse is broken.

Try ignoring the sensationalism, listening to the calm, intelligent voices, then you can have an adult conversation. Or, carry on, I guess. 

 

[NeonPeon]

20 minutes ago, EWR757 said:

I strongly disagree.   There are risks and consequences associated with "preparing".   

Many educated people I know did not understand this storm would begin to dissipate before it made landfall.  Many people prepared for a CAT 5 and that was NEVER in the forecast.   

 

Sometimes reacting causes more problems than sitting quietly. 

The educated people you know can't read a weather forecast then.

Preparing for the worst here meant a very normal track deviation of just a few miles in either direction causing the worst of a storm surge to go into one of two bays, it had nothing to do with the storm being stronger than forecast. 

[jm1220]

19 minutes ago, EWR757 said:

I strongly disagree.   There are risks and consequences associated with "preparing".   

Many educated people I know did not understand this storm would begin to dissipate before it made landfall.  Many people prepared for a CAT 5 and that was NEVER in the forecast.   

 

Sometimes reacting causes more problems than sitting quietly. 

There was no possibility that the predictions for weakening before landfall would be wrong and instead it would’ve come in as a strong Cat 4 let’s say? It was a definite that the storm would weaken? And 120mph Cat 3 storms aren’t dangerous? Or there wouldn’t be a SLIGHT deviation in the track to bring it NW of Tampa instead? All this was just known days ahead of time and I guess there was no need for people around Tampa to prepare or evacuate. It’s such an inconvenience after all right? 

I’m just glad some here don’t work in emergency preparedness. 

[jm1220]

There was clearly no need for people on Treasure Island let’s say to prepare for the worst and evacuate. They should’ve just stayed home. We’ve never seen situations in the past where the official track could be off by 30 miles or the intensity forecast is off for any of a multitude of reasons. It was obvious 48 hours out that they and Tampa would be fine and the media/emergency officials were overhyping!!! 

[dseagull]

3 hours ago, SnoSki14 said:

Turns out I was right that if Milton made landfall south of TB as a weakening hurricane, FL would do just fine...and they are. 

Maybe stop making everything a worst case scenario because 99% of the time it's not that. 

Sensationalism sells, especially on the heels of a highly publicized and terrible disaster just a week earlier. 

 

But "prepare for the worst, hope for the best" is always a good policy to live by.  Or the 7 Ps... "Proper Prior Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance," in that one should never let their guard down, especially regarding weather.  

 

In the end, people are going to do as they wish.  It's still a free country.  As a first responder, I can't emphasize how important it is to remain fluid, but at the same time direct with communication.  That's literally the most important part of emergency planning coordinator.  This only becomes convoluted when politics or sensationlism enter the equation.  

 

The windshield wiper approach simply doesn't work with the public.  Florida did a great job as a whole in terms of communicating with the public.