These past few days, the entire United States, the state of Florida, and my family have been shaken once again by Hurricane Milton from the Gulf of Mexico, which is making landfall in the densely populated Tampa area.
As a native of the South Central Coast, I was no stranger to the tropical storms that devastated my hometown since I was a child. When I immigrated to the United States, temperate hurricanes became a constant fear at the end of the year.
I live in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., which is relatively quiet and rarely affected by hurricanes. But 12 years ago, Superstorm Sandy swept through 22 states along the Atlantic and the islands in the Caribbean, leaving a deep scar and indelible fear in my heart. It was an erratic superstorm with terrifying destructive power, surpassing the hundreds-year-old sea dike system of the United States to go deep inland, flooding and destroying houses and infrastructure of old American cities. And right now, Hurricane Milton brings back those terrifying hauntings of natural disasters.
Milton is forecast at Category 5 (wind speeds of about 252km/h). From Monday to Tuesday, people rushed to supermarkets to buy water and food.
The government has divided the zones affected by the storm. Zones A and B are dangerous areas, so the police went around using loudspeakers to call for people to avoid the storm because many people refused to leave. People living near the sea have taken shelter.
Before evacuating, people in the surrounding areas bought sandbags to cover the roof with corrugated iron and wooden boards to block the windows. At that time, electricity and water were still normal. Only when the storm comes and floods, will the electricity be cut off to prevent accidents. But there are still many people living far from the sea who refuse to leave.
Many people agree to stay. Some of them are subjective because they are far from shore, the rest are afraid of leaving their houses, their biggest assets, without anyone to look after them. For the past two days, the highway has been jammed with traffic because people are driving north or down to Miami to avoid the storm. Many people who cannot go far go to shelters in schools to take shelter from the storm. This morning many people complained that “the storm only came in at 30 miles per hour and the wind blew the roof off, it’s terrifying. I wonder what will happen when the storm gets to over 100 miles per hour.”