We got a warning shot, but did we get the message?
By ROBERT TRIGAUX
Published August 23, 2004
We must recognize what can happen 10 years hence if the proposed growth of our state becomes an accomplished fact, and if one of our densely populated areas is hit by a hurricane of (such) proportions or one of greater intensity.
Now here's a timely warning for a Tampa Bay area still grateful after Hurricane Charley redirected its Category 4 assault to other parts of Florida.
Too bad this statement was made 44 years ago. We still have not grasped its full economic meaning.
State hurricane experts issued their concern about the coming clash between big storms and big growth in 1960 after Hurricane Donna rocked, by today's measure, a modestly populated South Florida. Thirty-two years later, that worry was long forgotten when Hurricane Andrew pummeled a vastly larger Dade County in 1992. Andrew left behind $15.5-billion in insured losses, 180,000 homeless and all but nine of the area's 6,600 mobile homes in shreds. Yes, nine.
By the time Charley roared across Florida from Sanibel to Daytona Beach - becoming the second most expensive hurricane in history - Andrew's lessons were fading, too. As for Donna, that is ancient history in Florida.
As long as people remain obsessed with living and building near Florida's coastline, hurricanes will arrive with increasing venom. The next storms may not pack more punch. There will simply be a lot more in their way to knock down.
Most of the 3-million folks in the larger Tampa Bay area do not realize just how lucky they were to avoid Hurricane Charley. Researchers in 2002 estimated a Category 5 hurricane (one notch up from Charley) striking the Tampa Bay area would cause more than $25-billion in insured losses - 60 percent higher than Andrew's hit in 1992 - and more than $50-billion in total losses.
The clean-up, restoring electricity and re-establishing basic services would take weeks, even months. Reconstruction, job recovery and a financial rebound would require years. Insurance rates would soar, even with safeguards and subsidies put in place by the state after Andrew. (Nearly 50,000 vulnerable mobile homes can be found in Pinellas County alone.)
As for regaining the metro area's economic momentum, that's anybody's guess.
"Andrew did not approach the catastrophic losses of life and property the nation will face when a major hurricane makes landfall at a large population center" - including Tampa-St. Petersburg, writes former National Hurricane Center director Bob Sheets in his 2001 book, Hurricane Watch: Forecasting the Deadliest Storms on Earth.
"It could take up to six months to re-establish basic infrastructure," Sheets says. "Overall economic recovery could require decades."
Decades seems a bit extreme. Yet the magnitude of the Tampa Bay area's damages would be topped only by a major hurricane's making landfall at just two other metro areas in the country.
Number one: A single, major hurricane striking the heart of Miami and Fort Lauderdale. Such a storm would generate insured losses topping $61-billion and total losses of more than $120-billion.
Second on the list of worst metropolitan hits would be New York City, sustaining an estimated $26.5-billion in insured and $53-billion in total losses. New York is, of course, much larger than the Tampa Bay area. But it would suffer only a bit more damage because any hurricane hitting the Big Apple would likely be weaker in force than one striking the bay area.
So say projections by AIR Worldwide Corp., a prominent catastrophe-modeling and weather-risk management company in Boston. The list is based on the potential frequency of hurricanes and exposure, property values and the vulnerability of the structures.
Look at the rankings and you might wonder: Where's Jacksonville? Surely a large Florida city on the Atlantic is vulnerable and would sustain higher losses than a Myrtle Beach or Norfolk.
Not so. "Believe it or not, the Jacksonville area is at relatively low risk considering its location," AIR Worldwide spokesman Mike Gannon said. The angle of Florida's coast line and the nature of storm tracks work in that metro area's favor. Since 1900, only one hurricane has hit in the vicinity of Jacksonville.
AIR cautions that its estimates of insured losses were derived in 2002, so the damage numbers already underestimate the real price tag from a major hurricane.
Consider the Tampa Bay area's growth since 2002. Major condominium towers rise in downtown St. Petersburg and on Sand Key along the beaches. Big housing developments continue to blossom from Brandon to New Tampa, east of I-75, and throughout Pasco County. Tampa's Corporate Center buildings are built near International Plaza.
Expanded terminals at Tampa International Airport. New roller coasters at Busch Gardens. The Ford Amphitheatre at the Florida State Fairgrounds. They are all recent additions.
The economic targets of hurricanes only multiply with time.
So do the costs. If Hurricane Andrew were to hit South Miami and follow the same route it did in 1992, the cost of the storm would be nearly twice what it was just 12 years ago. That difference reflects the sharp increases in the price of building materials, labor and newer construction standards, plus the extensive expansion of homes, businesses and people in south Dade County.
On Thursday, Gov. Jeb Bush and Tom Gallagher, Florida's chief financial officer and the state's insurance commissioner when Andrew hit in 1992, met with about 20 leaders of the insurance industry to discuss Charley's damage at a conference room at Tampa International Airport.
As detailed by St. Petersburg Times business reporter Jeff Harrington, Gallagher asked for a show of insurance hands. How many agency executives in the room had been there after Andrew? Few responded, a reminder that much of the insurance industry's collective first-hand memory of Andrew's devastation has been lost in the state.
Tampa Bay Partnership CEO Stuart Rogel remembers Andrew well. He rode out the '92 storm in Miami Beach where he was running the city's operations center at the time. With communications and power out, it took two to three days for people in Miami to even realize how much damage Andrew had caused only a few miles to the south.
The state and its businesses are getting better at preparing for storms, Rogel said. "This time around, people were planning for the storm," he said. That can make all the difference in the critical 72 hours after a hurricane.
The Partnership, which serves as the Tampa Bay area's regional marketer of economic development, notes on its Web site that the organization was coordinating storm relief efforts with its sister groups in areas hurt by Charley.
Rogel acknowledged the extensive national and international coverage of Charley could adversely influence businesses pondering relocation to sunny Central Florida. His group has not received any calls of concern, though Rogel said they are monitoring the situation.
The Tampa Bay Partnership felt compelled to add on its site - Tampa Bay is open for business - in case there was any confusion after the storm.
Rogel is not surprised the Tampa Bay area ranked No. 3 for possible damages.
"If Charley had hit this population center, it would have been very difficult," he said.
Just ask any Floridian who personally experienced Charley. Or Andrew. Or Donna.
