Wilma in Venice: wind, weirdness and wonderment
Overall, the physical damage in Venice could have been a lot worse; the psychic damage is apparently driving a few of our residents right over the mental edge
-- John Patten, 10/24/05
-- jpatten@veniceflorida.com

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For the most part, we were spared (again) the wrath of a major storm. Wilma's center came ashore in Florida to the south of us. Nevertheless, Venice was treated to winds up to 50 (maybe even 60) miles per hour for most of the night and early morning of October 24, 2005. We were told that the hurricane winds wouldn't be so bad but that the real danger was the threat of spin-off tornadoes.

Gaylord George's roof
The big damage happened to Gaylord George. George is a well known fixture in Venice, he retired from the Venice Fire Department in 1988. George's house had a tree fall on its roof in September of 2001 during Tropical Storm Gabrielle, which surprisingly caused minor damage to the structure. Wilma wasn't so kind. Apparently an unconfirmed tornado caused by Wilma ripped his entire roof off -- aluminum sheets, insulation, lumber, the whole thing. George was watching the storm on TV in his living room at around 6:00 AM when he heard the metal starting to tear and then felt the house starting to shake. George talked about it matter-of-factly, as though he was describing the minor trauma of a baseball coming in through a window from a game of streetball.

"Were you scared?"

"No, not really. I've been through a few storms before, I kinda knew what to expect."

"Oh horse manure. You must have been scared. I'd have been terrified."

"No, not really. It was really loud, though." George went on to describe the sound of the ripping metal and pointed down the street where most of his roof ended up.

Then Bessie, his wife, called out from inside of the house: "It shot me out of bed quick, let me tell you!"

About 20 or so neighbors pitched in to pick up all the debris and finish tearing the roof out. That work was finished by 10:00 AM. Watertite Roofing is supposed to start work tomorrow on the rebuild.

Above: What was left of Gaylord George's roof after neighbors helped clean up.

Gaylord waves to a neighbor

Harold's Place and Hackworth Realty
At about the same time Gaylord George and his wife were covering their ears, folks were eating breakfast just a few blocks away at Harold's Place on East Venice Avenue. Yes, they were actually open just as Wilma was making landfall to the south of us and up to 60 MPH gusts were rocking through Venice. To the wonderment of the early morning bacon and eggs crowd, suddenly Harold's Place had a skylight. Well, not a true skylight, but as close as possible under the circumstances, this presumably from the same unconfirmed tornado that had just visited Gaylord and Bessie. Whatever it was that was causing the damage, it skipped over most of the strip building and landed on the other end, ripping the roof off of Hackworth Realty.

Happily and amazingly, nobody was injured.

Harold Slater, inside Harold's Place. He was trying to mop up while rain was still dripping down from the ceiling when this pic was taken.

The outside of Harold's Place.

Hackworth Realty on the west side of the same strip building. The Stop 'N Shop store in between the two businesses had part of its roof taken off while the Grace Bible Church appeared to be unscathed.

Grove Terrace (HUD housing complex)

Hatchett Creek didn't flood, but it came close. Here, the water is almost touching the bottom of the bridge that leads into Grove Terrace.

Surprisingly, the only damage that I discovered was to this tree. Residents told me that the complex itself came out of the storm unscathed.

On the island

By 10:30 AM, as the winds were dying down to 30 and 40 MPH gusts, city work crews were already out picking up debris.

Park Boulevard on the island: this tree landed on the grass just a few feet away from a parked car. The car was untouched.

Bring out your weird

Meanwhile, the storm was bringing out the weirdness. Venice Police sealed off a neighborhood SWAT-style, this in response to a domestic disturbance call. Nobody was hurt or shot, so I'm not going into the details, but when you inadvertently wander into the middle of the above scene (and it's only noon), you know it's going to be a weird day.

The far end of the same street.

The cops got their man, nobody was hurt, end of story. Except that wasn't the really weird part. The weirdness came when I was finding out that it was just a bad day for an otherwise good family. As I am slowly discovering that there really isn't much of a story here (despite the Dog Day Afternoon road show), some lunatic started screeching at me, demanding that I explain to her who I am and why I am shooting photos.

She ordered me out of the neighborhood.

I wandered away from her and thought I had successfully ditched her. Then I forgot about her as the non-drama played out.

That was a mistake.

Later, as the scene was winding down, she caught up with me again. I tried to ignore her but she was a persistent nutter, going on and on at the top of her lungs about what wonderful neighbors she had and how she was trying to protect them from the evil photographer.

When that failed to impress me, she started yelling at the cops, demanding that I be arrested for standing on the street in front of her house. I don't know what the hell she was thinking but I had a sudden and startling epiphany: becoming the center of attention of a heavily armed, fully garbed and shielded SWAT team IS NOT A GOOD IDEA! I stood there with this stupid look on my face, trying to convey the message that I was trying to be unobtrusive but that it wasn't working. What do you do when a state hospital refugee targets you for a shriek attack and you are surrounded by a hell of a lot of firepower? While this dumbass may have had a suicide wish, I kinda had plans for the next couple of weeks and those plans didn't include a guided tour of heaven.

The cops told her that what I was doing was legal and I breathed a little easier and continued trying to ignore her. I figured that maybe she would go away, but no -- this dingbat was just getting warmed up. She started screaming at the top of her lungs into my left ear. The cops, obviously not in the mood for any of this, told me to come stand by their car and told her to go back inside her house.

The good news is that the cops didn't shoot me.

The bad news is that the cops didn't shoot her.

I should have taken her picture.

Damn, I hate those missed moments.

Stylish weirdness

Finally, some nicer weirdness, but weirdness nevertheless.

I stumbled on this house on the island: hey look -- designer hurricane plywood.

One question immediately springs to mind: WHY? What possible reason? In the middle of hurricane winds, who is going to see it? Why would anyone invest this amount of time and money into a cosmetic approach to disaster preparedness?

Ya gotta admit, though: it looks good. With other houses in the area not boarded up at all or plastered with plain-looking untreated plywood, this baby stands out with a bright and cheery statement: hurricanes are the ultimate fashion accessory. After all, if you are going to have to put the boards up time after time because Jim Cantorre at The Weather Channel just might be doing a personal televised appearance on your street, why not defy the gods of primeval nature with style?

Available at finer hardware and lumber stores, these boards come in a variety of bright designer colors. Also available but not shown in the pic: matching sheets, pillow cases and body bags.

John Patten is the head of Web Operations for Creative Pages, and has worked in broadcasting for over 12 years. He can also be incredibly rude at times.