Equ had a wonderful idea to have a thread like this so that HP can keep track of those of us effected by this massive storm. Equ, I hope you don't mind this fellow Floridian started this thread *I honestly couldn't resist after reading your post*.

While a lot of my friends are evacuating the state (stay safe and off the major highways and interstates as much as possible...they are gridlocked), Ryan and I have gone to his parents' home which is in a Non-Evacuation zone. The ONLY TIME this zone would be evacuated is if a hurricane smashed into Tampa Bay at a Category 5. At present time, all reports are saying for my area that the storm will hit us as a Category 2 or 3 if that (I have also seen reports that we would only have Tropical Storm weather as opposed to actual hurricane force weather...we shall see). So we will be riding this storm out here. Our boat is secure in the marina and quite frankly, we probably did more preparation to our vessel than anyone else in the marina except for the multi-million dollar mega yachts. So we have higher hopes that she will be alright when we can get back over there. Yes, I'm scared of this storm. I have never experienced anything like this before and it's quite nerve wracking. However, we are in a very safe place in an all brick house. If for ANY REASON the storm changes and we are forced to evacuate, an update will be posted.

So following Equ's idea, all those who could potentially be effected by this monster, post your updates so we all know you're safe!

We're leaving beachside tomorrow and heading towards Orlando with our pets to ride out the storm

Eek!  Stay safe all of you that are effected!

I'm in North Carolina, while I'm not on the coast if it comes this way we will have heavy rain.. possible winds of 70mph. I can't imagine how everyone is feeling that's in the direct path of Irma :[

Please try and stay safe everyone ♥

Paints since 6-8-14

No mind at all, Absinthe, thank-you for doing this and passing it along!

Also glad you are all safe from Irma! :)

Stay safe, everyone!

youll be fine auda!
70 winds are scary but those are just party winds ;)
stay safe flordia Irma is a bad word and got bumped back to a 5!

It's windy and been raining off and on all day but I must say it feels so nice out

Just wait for the skeeters in a week

Hope everyone gets out safely and stays safe!

I am also in NC, we are expected to experiance the end of Irma, 60mph winds and lots of rain! Will keep you posted :)

Update from your friendly neighborhood Green Fairy:

Ryan and I are staying at his aunt's house. We are in Belleair Bluffs in a non-evac zone *unless we got hit directly by a Cat 5*. She is out of state for a wedding and invited us to stay here. So both of us and the 2 dogs are here at the house. We don't have internet so any updates here are coming from my phone *which is why you won't see me in chat until the storm is over and I have internet again*.

So far...rainy and grey. A little wind but nothing huge yet. The eye is projected to come right over us very late tonight/very early tomorrow, so I probably won't be sleeping much. The storm has been downgraded to a Cat 3. She is still very unpredictable, but the guys and girls at NOAA and the National Hurricane Center are doing their best every hour to give us an update as to what's happening. I'm basically at ground zero in the Tampa Bay area. Pictures will follow after the storm for those of you who aren't on Facebook with me.

A 3 is scary but do able!

stay safe dear!

Good morning HP.

Day after Irma. Staying awake last night through the eye wall and eye of this storm was crazy. It was loud, the wind was wild, rain, power transformers exploding left and right...the good news is damage was minimal around us. We had a power outage at the house around 10pm and it's still out. We have visited our boat and it sustained no damage. 

There's still high winds, but nothing like we felt last night. It's mostly gusting, not sustained. Driving down from the house to the boat, several trees down, one powerline down, fences messed up, branches in the road. From what I'm hearing, this storm was a wild card all over and made landfall 7 or 8 times as a hurricane. It has now been downgraded to a tropical storm. 

I hope all of this has made sense. I'm running on very little sleep and dealing with Ryan being...well...Ryan.

I am so glad that you guys and the boat are ok.  -snugs-

Glad you guys made out Ok!

We came home Monday morning to some minor damage and some water in the house and we lost one fish.  Plus we have spotty cell service, no power, and no water which sucks in September when it's 80 degrees out so there's no escaping the humidity

I've got Roux on facebook and she's alright. Just has no power. Aqua is alright but no power last I heard.

It really sounds like Irma couldn't make up her mind where she was going at the end there. I don't even know where she actually hit because there's so much talk about multiple tornados in the aftermath.

Link Tree

I actually wasn't without power too long, about 3 days.

It came back on for me sometime Tuesday afternoon-evening. We have a lot of down trees, but nothing serious, the trees that did come down, actually did miss houses, some cars are lost, but just cars, they can be replaced.

All of my friends and family are ok. I have some friends further South that still don't have power, but they were more effected by Irma than I was. I myself have part of a tree down in my yard, but that's it. We didn't get much flooding at all. I mean, some roads were under water, but the next day, if you have some trucks that sat higher up, you could go down those roads (yay for big trucks!)

I was also lucky enough to have a generater durning the storm, and oddly enough, my TV (DirecTV) didn't really go out. I mean, It did for a few minutes when the rain really pickedd up, but other than that, as long as we had the tv and DTV box plugged in, we had cable so we were able to watch Irma the whole time as she made her way back East from the West coast.

I want to say she actually made landfall in the Naples area?? But I'm not sure. My grandma is in the New Port Richy/Tampa area, and she did ok, lost power, but they were able to get that back up and running pretty quickly as well. 

As far as I know, a lot of places have already drained of water, or are just about drained, so that's always good to hear.

With my job, I get phone calls from all over America, and I got quite a few from the Miami area, and they seem not to be as flooded as I had actually thought they would be.

Back home on the boat with power and internet!