Hope all our Florida friends are OK

The heading pretty well says it. Our best wishes to everyone in Florida and hope ole Charlie missed you.

Charlie pretty much hit us dead center, gusts over 100mph here in Orlando by the airport, lots of flying debris and uprooted trees. We fared much better than the folks down Port Charollette/Punt Gorda way. Everybody say a prayer for those folks who lost loved ones.

All of us X47 Flyers made it through OK. Fortunately, the eye passed just to the south of us and Charley had lost a good bit of punch before reaching us. No major damage here.

My two daughters in Winter Haven faired pretty well. They lost all the screen off the porches and have a palm tree across the chain link fence, but it could have been much worse.

Our thoughts and prayers are with those people on the Gulf coast that took the brunt of the storm.

I will leave the yard cleanup till Monday. I am going flying tomorrow.

Bill, your daughters are fortunate indeed. Winter Haven was hit pretty hard, saw a lot of damage there on the news last night. Seems a lot of tornadoes were spawned as the storm moved into the Dundee/Winter Haven/Lake Hamilton area. I live south of Clermont and about 20 miles west of the Kisimmee/Disney area and that area was slammed while we escaped with no damage at all. Hard to believe that twenty or thirty miles was the difference between the 75 mph winds that we got and the 110 mph winds that they got.
My heart however, really goes out to the folks in the Port Charlotte area. They paid for our good fortune. Charley came ashore with 145 mph winds and then had to travel 140 miles to reach us. That really took a lot of steam out of the storm. They are still looking for casualties in the many retiree trailer parks surrounding Puta Gorda area. They estimate that 100-150 people are still missing. My prayers go out to them

Clearwater, the original bulls eye, did fine. We had two extra family from the beach and bay staying with us, and two extra dog's to torture our little 5 Lb Yorkie. I was EXTRA relieved when it missed us, for slightly selfish reasons...because if it had hit us, we would have had house guests for MONTHS probably during the rebuild! My wife is suffering a little survivors guilt after seeing the body bags on the news this morning, but we really are fine. Wheeew... close one!

Hi Bob,
Thanks for the concern. We survived. Those of us on the Space Coast "dodged another bullet". Winds gusted to 75mph, sustained around 35-40mph.Lots of leaves and twigs this morning. Lost power 9:30 pm to about 3:30am. OTS Bill is flying tomorrow, Hmmmm.
Nah, I'll be doing more yard duty , if the rain stops.
Orlando area currently reporting $3 billion in damages.
Take care, give my regards to Pat and give a dog bone to Gigi.
Roger

My mom and dad live in Punta Gorda Isle half time. Fortunately they were here in California at the time of the hurricane. Mom got a call from a hangar neighbor of dads from the airport. He indicated the airport was a bad scene but the hangar row that housed his and dads airplanes kept it's roof. The old Stinson may have dodged the bullet.
No other news about the house as of around three o'clock, the power and phone systems were pretty sketchy still. They are hoping the storm surge was not above 10 feet. The house is on the water and the boat is on a lift, maybe.