Bicycling Through The Eye of Hurricane Michael

Tony's View

Riding our bicycle through mass destruction from Hurricane Michael with debris every where was quite an experience. It is amazing what a hurricane can do. We went through Tyndall Air Force Base first and it was completely destroyed. Below you can see some pictures of an air craft hanger that was completely destroyed. The other picture shows the barracks being destroyed with temporary tents to until repairs are done on the barracks. Michael was classified a level 4 hurricane although we understand it was really a level 5 hurricane because the official meters quit working before the highest winds hit.

You can see which way the wind was blowing from the way the trees fell. We went through miles of trees that were broke off right in the middle of the tree. We traveled about 20 miles through the Air Force Base. You can see in the Explosive Disposal Range sign that it looks like the explosives went off. It didn't keep me from going to the bathroom though.

 All the signs along the way were blown over and we saw this Bicycle Sharing Roadway sign blown over. We decided to take a picture. This is the area we were warned that it would be scary. The interesting thing is that all the speed limit signs were blown over. For you traffic engineers, we saw traffic signal mast arms blown over and still left that way for the last 3 months. We were amazed about how much debris we saw around. At the wine and cheese hour at the hotel, we talked to people and they said it is amazing how much improvement they made over the last 2 weeks. It must have really been a mess.  We saw a cool sign that talked about Air Force and Civil Engineering. Check it out. The Civil Engineers did their testing on Farmdale Rd. To do real testing, you have to do it on the farm. At the sign Joan saw this snake along side of the road.

Above you see a picture of a house destroyed and you can still see in their bedroom. If you were sleeping there, it would have been a real nightmare.
Below you see pictures of some areas that had lots of damage. We got to the point to where we had too many pictures. The boat below was one of many that have seen their best days. I thought the house that was shifted off the foundation by the wind was interesting.

 When they fixed the utilities, they just cut off the old and put in complete new and left the old stuff lay. The bridge to the right on our bike route was completely demolished, which meant we had to turn around. 😂

Mexico Beach is where the eye of hurricane Micheal went through. The whole area was devastated. Even the road was destroyed. They had signs that said the road was rough for 10 miles. The road was in bad shape and the bridges were in worse shape, with erosion from the storm surge causing problems. They did do a good job to get the road passable. We talked to some people and they said it wasn't even recognizable to what it looked like. We saw some signs just wanting to get back to normal and even the attorneys were looking for a way to make a buck in other people's troubles.

It was amazing in Mexico Beach the complete disaster. As you can see, the concrete piers were snapped in half. The reinforcing steel was snapped too. Interesting from the picture below to the left, the wood piers with cross bracing held up. The siding and the roof didn't hold up so well, but better off then the ones around it. When we got to Apalachicola, we went to Mass. The priest started his homily with three jokes, and they were cute and funny. He was retired and lived in the path of the hurricane. He said that he made it through with his sense of humor and relationship with God in prayer. He spend 20 years of his priesthood in Tallahassee Florida at Florida State University with college students.

The priest actually stayed in his house during the hurricane. He said that when he walked out of his out of his house, power poles were down and everything was a mess. When we left Panama City, on one intersection there were 4 fast food restaurants, one on each corner, Burger King, Wendy's, Church's Chicken and McDonalds. McDonalds was the only one open at this point. The others were still in shambles. 

Joan's Extras

Today's temperature was in the 70s so it was my first shorts day. It was also Tony's first day of super sweating. He had to stop several times to ring out his new bike cap. 

We rode 20+ miles along route 98 in the morning with mostly trees and nature before we got to Mexico Beach. Louie, our friend from yesterday, called this our gauntlet because he said there is nothing along that route and the vehicles drive fast. Louie is a motorcylist. Fortunately for us though, there was a nice bike lane shoulder. After lunch at the Sand Dollar Café in Port St Joe, we rode on one the nicest bike paths ever. ⇛
We rode another 20+ miles along route 98 through mostly trees and nature again. The big difference on this long stretch was that the trees in the first half were split by Hurricane Michael, and the trees in the last stretch of the ride were intact.