Most of us were pretty lucky with Tropical Storm Eduoard—a little wind and some needed rain. For some of my tropical weather-hardened former West End neighbors, the storm was a joke, and this image that poped up in my email sums up their sentiment (the photographer’s unknown to me but is a funny guy or gal).
I had an interesting perspective on this storm; for the first time in about a decade, I sat it out on the sidelines, at home with my family, instead of in the command center with other “E-1″ employees tasked with emergency duties. Hurricanes (and fires and floods and swarms of locust) aren’t part of my new duties. So the communication responsibilities were handled by others, by people I’ve worked with in my old office, and I thought they did a good job. The storm came up quick, the university responded with what I think were the right decisions in a timely manner, the messages got out, people on campus did what they needed to do, and in the end, it was all good practice.
The peak of the 2009 season is still ahead of us. My water is stowed, the batteries and cans of tuna are tucked away. I’ll keep having mixed feelings about being away from UTMB when/if things get bad. But if we do have another storm this season, I’ll take one like Eduoard (and a little spilled beer) any day.