The 13th annual Hurricane Preparedness Expo at the Port St. Lucie Civic Center will be on Saturday, June 1, the opening day of the North Atlantic storm season. Christina Proulx, the city’s emergency operations administrator, said the Civic Center will be filled with educational seminars, opportunities to meet county and city emergency-management officials, and vendors.
“It’s nice to be able to walk through the showroom floor and say, ‘Wow, I’m going to need this,’ or ‘Wow, I need that,’” she said.
In a separate conversation, Dennis Pickle, the manager of the St. Lucie West Services District, said people need this and they need that – whether or not they know it yet. The only thing the North Atlantic hurricane season needs to show them is time.
He was the assistant city manager in Panama Beach for 25 years. When Hurricane Michael hit the Panhandle community last year, Pickle went up after the storm to check on family and tour the damage to learn lessons to bring back to St. Lucie West.
“That’s by far the worst one they had up there,” Pickle said. “It teaches us to be better prepared. We sometimes think the big one really isn’t coming, but it can. After seeing that, I tell people definitely have your hurricane plans.”
The annual reminder to have seven days of supplies including non-perishable food, medicines, pet supplies and especially bottled water often gets drowned by the fact the municipal water seems to never be affected by hurricanes. Pickle said uprooted trees and tidal surge during Michael blew out all the water systems in Bay County and people ran out of bottled water fast.
“In Mexico Beach, (Michael) blew the water tower down,” Pickle said. “It was a 100-foot-tall water tower and it physically fell down.”
Hurricane season runs June 1 to Nov. 30. Typically, August and September are when the greatest number of and strongest storms hit. But subtropical storm Andrea kicked off the season with an early appearance in late May.
On May 23, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Prediction Center held its annual news conference to offer insights on the 2019 storm season.
The forecasters said to expect a near-normal season with two to four major hurricanes – those with winds exceeding 110 mph. The average season has 12 named storms and six hurricanes. About half are counted as major.
Of course, emergency planners most love to say “One.” No matter how slow a season, one storm can spread immeasurable destruction far and wide.
Proulx said the city is ready.
“Just today we did our kickoff meeting with our (emergency operations center) team,” she said.
“We have dedicated staff from each department that sit in.”
New to Port St. Lucie this year is two weather stations. One is at city hall. The other is at the Civic Center.
The stations’ main benefit will be in the early stages of an approaching storm. As winds hit certain speeds, various county and city functions and facilities open or close. The city’s communications team will publicize the local weather conditions as they deteriorate. Sarah Prohaska said the communications team is ready to repeat its previous award-winning hurricane performances in getting neighborhood-by-neighborhood information out.
“Yes, the (city’s website) and our Facebook page are the best sources for up-to-the-minute updates during an emergency,” she said in an emailed response to questions.
The city’s website is www.cityofpsl.com.
The Hurricane Preparedness Expo will be 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., at 9221 SE Civic Center Place, Port St. Lucie. Planners expect about 2,500 visitors. More than 60 organizations and businesses will be on hand.