Thursday, October 23, 2008

Hurricane Omar was a Dooooozie

The story of Hurricane Omar is pretty intense, prepare. Forecasts said that the eye of the storm would pass our corner of the island late Wednesday night. By Tuesday-ish the storm was a hurricane, level 1-2.
I usually work Monday-Friday, 6:50am to 2:30pm. Monday I went to get the ice packs like usual at 6:10, but the guys said we were not going. Just William, the boat captain said this, there was a huge clap of thunder, and I understood. The sky was definitely gray, and it did, indeed, rain and thunder all day. I went back to sleep, and did my little puttering around things for the rest of the day (reading, watching movies, cooking, cleaning, playing with dogs).
Tuesday, I prepared as usual because it didn't look too bad outside. The guys said we were not going to the island, because of bad weather. It did not rain, and I kept thinking, its the calm before the storm. We learned Tuesday evening that we were definitely not going to Cayo Wednesday or Thursday. At this point, the storm was already a Hurricane, before it had even reached land, somewhere between a level 1 and 2.
Wednesday I slept in, no preparation. That was nice. Later in the day, Maria stopped by and said she needed to go to San Juan. Doreen, James Postdoc an I advised her not to. Though the hurricane was not supposed to hit the island until between 8 pm an 2am, an it was only 1pm, it would not be smart to go driving in the possible heavy rain. Everyone in the neighborhood began to prepare their houses for intense wind. The restaurant at the end of our street, on the beach, put up sheet metal in all the windows. Across the street the old woman left, and put sheet metal up on her door. Doreen, who lives in a trailer (a very nice one) decided to go to Keishya's house because it is further from the beach, and safer. I began closing all our shutters on the house. Our house is rather hurricane proof, in that it has no glass, only screen and metal shutters. In Katy an Josephs room, though, there are many shutters missing. In the living room, the shutters were rusted and could not be closed. Since we were expecting 70-100mph winds an rain, I put up a towel in the space where water could get in. Its true, while other put up sheet metal I put up a towel. What could I do?
Wednesday afternoon we got internet in our house!!! I took a long nap in the afternoon to prepare to stay up at night and listen to the loud wind. I prepared my room, taking books away from the window sill and such.
I took my "last" dog walk around 6. It was eerie outside, so quiet an all boarded up. It felt as if the wind was being pulled slowly but in great amounts.
At 8o'clock, we were watching Project Runway and the Presidential debates. I began to look at the weather on the internet. The hurricane trajectory earlier that day looked as if the eye was heading straight for Punta Santiago. At 8pm, the trajectory took the hurricane to the east of Puerto Rico island.
I went to bed at 11pm. It was a quiet night. When I woke up, there was no sign of anything having happened the night before. The hurricane had comppllleeetly missed us.
The suspense was terrible for me too!!! all week and hours of preparation for stupid Omar who completely missed us!
Thursday I slept in.
Friday, Saturay, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and tomorrow will be Friday, we've been workin. Because hurricane Omar was a doozie.