Our community took a direct hit from hurricane Ian.  My boat showed a wind speed of 95-mph before the anemometer blew off the masthead.  The local airport (KPGD) reported 139 mph steady one-minute wind readings before their instrument blew away. 

Comcast/XFINITY went offline Wednesday afternoon, September 28. Our electrical connection was down until late on Saturday October 1, and our water connection did not come back until Tuesday October 4. Our pool cage blew down, our boat was damaged, the food in the fridge and freezer spoiled, and a large commercial roof blew into our front yard from a 1/2 mile away - none of which was as annoying as not being able to fly in my virtual world. I tried flying in the offline mode several times but it was not much fun. 

 We just got service back at 20:30 UTC on October 12. I am pleased to report our 500 Mbs Comcast connection is now alive and well and my 2-week MSFS withdrawal is over. 

 

Ugh that sounds awful.  Do you guys need any food?  Are the fast food joints operating at all?  I would prep a meal but I don't think it would make it across country haha.

We are all good now - we did not suffer near the damage they did 45-miles south of here at Ft Myers Beach.  We were supposed to get 12 - 18 foot storm surge but at the very last minute the storm went a bit south.  All the water drained out of Charlotte Harbor (where we live) so we had little flood damage.

The sad part for our community is that Punta Gorda was an small old Florida village with neat old houses and enormous Oak, Mahogany, and Palm Trees lining the streets.  Many blew down and almost all lost limbs and all their leaves.  Now we have streets lined with five-foot high debris piles rather than beautiful old trees with canopies meeting over the roads.

It took us 2-years to recover from Hurricane Charley in 2004 and it will be almost that long this time. 

PS - we did not stay in town for the storm.  On Wednesday morning I planned on staying but when the storm surge forecast went to 12 to 18 feet (10:30 AM) we jumped in the car (literally - packed and left in 15-minutes) and drove SE to Fort Lauderdale.  Our house is one floor at 10' above high tide - no way I was going to take that chance.  

2 hours ago, TacomaSailor said:

 All the water drained out of Charlotte Harbor (where we live) so we had little flood damage.

So by the above, you mean it was essentially a "reverse" storm surge for Charlotte Harbor?  The flow and winds pushed the water out to sea?

How low did the water get in Charlotte Harbor?

I'm glad you made it, good move going to Ft. Lauderdale.  I would have probably only gone to some place like Sebring and not gone far enough.

My next door neighbor stayed thru the storm.  He said the canal bottom was exposed.  At a 0-foot tide I have seven-feet of water under my boat so I guess it was a minus 7' or so.  Pictures show the entire cove just west of the Tiki Hut was dry for an hour or so.  

I did not want to take a chance on going north and east on Hwy 17 - they were forecasting 20+ inches of rain for Sebring to Orlando - we got 15" in Punta Gorda.  I was afraid the roads would flood and we would not be able to get home.  And... we went to Boca Raton in Irma (September 2017) and it worked well.  Drove I-75 all the way and at times went 10-minutes without seeing another car. 

Hwy 17 did flood in Arcadia for three days - the Peace River was above it's record flood stage for over 3-days.