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To: JGoren who wrote (32761)	6/20/1999 10:15:00 AM
From: Jon Koplik	Respond to of 152472

Off topic - Florida hurricane stuff (from the land of Gregg Powers and me). Former hurricane tracker: Statewide building code's storm protection inadequate Sunday, June 20, 1999 By ERIC BURROUGHS, Staff Writer Collier County could be in big trouble if it were to take a direct hit from a hurricane under a proposed statewide building code, said Bob Sheets, former director of the National Hurricane Center, who spoke at the Coastland Center Saturday. "It will be a disaster for Collier County if it is put in as proposed," Sheets told the crowd of about 100 people gathered for a hurricane expo sponsored by WINK-TV. Sheets said that much of what Dade County has learned from the hurricanes of the 1940s and 50s and put into its code, and which other counties have also adopted since the destruction of Andrew, would be missing from the new state code. "Everything will be reversed if the statewide building association code is passed," Sheets said. Adequate hurricane protection for structures can come at a nominal price of an extra few hundred dollars, Sheets said. What's needed are homes made with concrete beam-stucco frames, as opposed to wood frames; reinforced steel tie-beams and columns; hip-roofs that are designed to fall away on all four sides; and shutters for all windows to protect against debris. With vivid before-and-after photos, graphic charts and first-hand descriptions, Sheets recounted the hard, first-hand lessons gleaned from mistakes undone by Hurricane Andrew. "One of the problems we had with Andrew was that you have all these people coming from up north who got used to these northern style homes, and the developers were all too glad to please," Sheets said. Sheets pointed to pictures of one community of multi-storied houses with basic design flaws for absorbing a hurricane's punch. These flaws included double-layered roofs and exterior wall insets in which strong winds get trapped and tear apart a structure. "They were well-constructed and had the straps that kept the walls in place. The problem was they started off with the wrong style of house," Sheets said. Sheets then read the story of one family's experience in a condo community as Andrew's eye roared through. As they took cover beneath the bathroom sink, walls creaked and tore. Emerging as the eye passed overhead, the family crawled past a grandfather clock that had been blown and imbedded in a wall. Eventually the family took shelter in a friend's condo. Sheets used the story to illustrate several points, such as the slow build of winds in a hurricane and how to take refuge. In the end, this community of 155 condos and more than 5,000 people was destroyed, resulting in four deaths and $55 million in damages. "And this resulted because the builder didn't want to spend $250 per unit to put the reinforced steel columns in," Sheets said. Sheets also explicitly told owners of mobile homes to leave "no matter what the manufacturer tells you" if a hurricane, or even a strong thunderstorm, is coming. He showed the ruin of one neighborhood of 9,000 mobile homes that Andrew laid flat - only nine mobile homes survived intact. A massive storm surge presents the greatest threat to Collier County, Sheets said, because of the extensive low-lying coastal areas and, correspondingly, the large number of people living in those areas. At the expo, Director of Emergency Management Ken Pineau was on hand with colored charts illustrating how far inland a storm surge will come if a hurricane comes in from the Gulf and strikes just north of Naples, with the southern edge of the storm center and the biggest surge directly pounding Naples. "The greatest killer in a hurricane is not the wind, but the storm surge," Pineau warned. A red stretch showed just how the storm surge of a Category 5 hurricane, the most powerful with winds greater than 155 mph, would reach well beyond I-75. "Right now we seem to be entering a period of increased hurricane activity over the next 20 to 25 years, just like during the 1940s and 50s. And instead of preparing we're going the opposite direction with building codes," Sheets said. © 1999 Naples Daily News.