POTENTIAL HURRICANE IAN

To All FMCA Membership,

While we thought we made it through this season without any Hurricanes, it appears we have a potential storm breathing down our necks. The cone of uncertainty appears to be heading somewhere right above Sarasota to the Tampa Area all the way to the Panhandle. I expect tomorrow will start defining the true path of the storm. It is expected to become a Cat 4 at some point with landfall around a Cat 3. Depending on where in the state it hits, it could be a Tuesday all the way to Thursday of this coming week for landfall. Not a lot of time to put our plans in place.

Please make the necessary preparations to include fuel, water, food, generators, tools, materials and anything else you can think of you might need to keep work moving forward.

Also, prepare your project job sites to include removing unnecessary materials, loose debris and equipment. Move all boats to onland trailers and all barges to safe havens. Find tucked in coves or rivers that are positioned opposite of the severe winds so that there is land mass protecting your equipment from wave and surge action. Put your equipment in places where if something happens to it it won’t damage other personal properties. Allow for for rising waters in your tying off of equipment. Any permanent project framing needs to be secured as best as possible. Consider holding off on installing decking/seawall top caps that could allow wave action to impact it and destroy the structure. Protect any erosion points with sand bagging or rip rap. Haul off ALL of your stored new materials so you don’t lose them.

Consider your plan moving forward if you are impacted by the storm. Review your contracts immediately and determine all materials you will need in order to keep your current contract load moving forward. Then consider the new and repair work you will need materials for and consider buying in bulk to make sure you have enough to complete your work load. Evaluate your emergency work versus current contract load and communicate to all of your clients your plan going forward. They will be sympathetic and understanding to the situation. Just keep them informed!

While being competitors, consider helping out your fellow contractors near you that may have been impacted worse than you. We are all on the same team and in the same industry.

If your area is directly hit by this storm and you or your business is impacted, please let us know what you need and all members from around the state will rally together to do what we need to help you so that you can repair quickly and get back to moving your business forward. We are ALL in this together!!!

To monitor the storm better, here are some suggested sites on the internet and Facebook that will help you keep an eye on what’s going on with this storm. If you have any sites that are solid and not listed here, please send them to me to send out to the membership.

Hurricane Tracking Sites Below:
https://www.spaghettimodels.com/

https://www.tropicaltidbits.com

On Facebook:

Mike’s Weather Page
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid0NAsQSbvWHYYV4y3fihXZzBNK7AovfiDWvLf8mXXJTt6cPmYS71JMLfqTFXvYTrJrl&id=100044200397606

NOAA National Hurricane Center
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid0wn3xjpS3pxUYNEjNhKCAhe7RoVAgsUtrLm2r7xqt1AFTL15u8HCXjbaiRkmk9dgrl&id=100064875420537

Last, here is the Governor’s Executive Order pertaining to this storm:
https://www.flgov.com/2022/09/24/memorandumexecutive-order-22-219-amending-executive-order-22-218-emergency-management-tropical-depression-nine/

Please be safe! Wish you all well in this next week.

Sincerely,

John Loftis
President of FMCA