Important phone numbers and websites

Pinellas County Emergency Management: (727) 464-3800
www.pinellascounty.org/emergency

Find your evacuation level:
(727) 453-3150 www.pinellascounty.org/emergency
/knowyourzone.htm

Register for special needs transportation: (727) 464-3800
www.pinellascounty.org/forms/special-needs.htm

Follow Pinellas County Emergency Management on Twitter: twitter.com/PinellasEM

Sign up for the Community Notification Service to receive text emergency information on your cell phone: (888) 689-8905

Set your Specific Area Message Encoding (SAME) equipped all-hazards alert radio for Pinellas County: Enter code 012103

If you know someone who would like to receive the E-Lert newsletter, have them visit www.pinellascounty.org/emergency
/subscribe.htm

 

Sally Says

From the Desk of Pinellas County’s Emergency Management Director

The E-Lert is back, and it looks like we are just in time, too.

After all, didn’t noted hurricane forecasters Drs. William Gray and Philip Klotzbach call for a quieter than normal season in the tropics for 2012? Heck, once June 1 passes, there won’t be anything for us in Emergency Management to do this year ...

If only that were true. It’s time for a quick history lesson of which most Floridians don’t need much reminding. Imagine if I could guarantee that we would only get seven named tropical systems this year in the Atlantic basin. That’s it, no more. Wouldn’t that be great? We could coast through the season without a care.

Funny, that’s exactly what happened during the 1992 Atlantic hurricane season. In fact, the first named storm that year didn’t even happen until the second half of August, and it struggled to even stay together shortly after it formed.

The name of that storm? Hurricane Andrew. Anyone in south Florida that year knows the terrible devastation the storm caused in places such as Kendall, Homestead and Cutler Ridge. Andrew became the costliest hurricane in American history and maintained that title until Hurricane Katrina surpassed it in 2005.

The moral of the story is it doesn’t matter how many storms are forecast, nor how busy the season is. It only takes one making landfall where you live to make a quiet season one to remember. Make your plans now, before a storm threatens the Tampa Bay area. Visit www.pinellascounty.org/emergency to learn how to make your plan should the worst happen.
Survivor or victim: The choice rests with you.

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Get your guide!

Planning to survive a disaster such as a hurricane can be a real challenge. After all, where should you start? What are those key essentials you need to consider? And, how will your plan encompass the needs of everyone in your family?

Get the answers to these – and hundreds of more questions – by reading the 2012 edition of the Pinellas County Surviving the Storm hurricane guide.

Inside, learn what Host Homes are all about, figure out what to do with Fido and hop on board with the Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority’s emergency evacuation plan. Phone numbers and links will connect you to a vast selection of county, municipal, state, federal and other resources to use in your planning.

Copies of the guide are being provided by your Board of County Commissioners as an essential public safety service as we enter this year’s hurricane season.
Pick up your copy at your local city hall, fire station, library or county facility – or read it online at www.pinellascounty.org/emergency.

While we hope you will never have to use the information contained inside, it’s as important as ever to be prepared well in advance of the arrival of a hurricane.

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Prepare to Survive returns

Last year, PCC-TV launched Prepare to Survive, a 15-minute interview show bringing you the latest information on disaster preparedness. This year, plans are to build on that success with the 2012 edition of the show.

Look for new episodes debuting on May 2, June 6, June 27 (Due to the Independence Day holiday), August 1, September 5, October 3 and November 7.

You can see Prepare to Survive by visiting www.pinellascounty.org/eseries. The presentations are archived online for you to view whenever you wish.

Prepare to Survive can also be seen on PCC-TV (Bright House Channel 622, Knology Channel 18 or Verizon Channel 44).

The eSeries is part of an initiative by Pinellas County to reach a wider audience through the use of emerging technologies. The county is also using email subscriber lists, emergency text notifications, social media and the new LiveChat featured on www.pinellascounty.org. These efforts join Pinellas County’s conventional outreach efforts.

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Unreimbursed insurance losses may be a tax deduction

If you experience a loss of personal property that is not entirely covered by insurance, a portion of the unreimbursed loss may be an allowable deduction on your federal income tax return. To qualify for the deduction, these losses usually need to be substantial. If you were significantly underinsured or had a large catastrophe deductible, you may have a sizable unreimbursed casualty loss. Generally, you can deduct the loss to the extent it exceeds 10 percent of your adjusted gross income, less five hundred dollars, according to tax experts. For a business loss, the rules are different, so it is advisable to seek assistance from your tax preparer.

Victims of a federally declared disaster may also qualify for a broad package of tax benefits under the National Disaster Relief Act of 2008. The first step in determining if you qualify is to substantiate your property loss by collecting all receipts and documentation. If you prepare your own tax returns, review the Internal Revenue Service website for information.

Visit www.InsuringFlorida.org for more information.

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Storms in History

Hurricane Able, May 15 – 23, 1951

The Atlantic hurricane season runs from June 1 through November 30 each year. That’s the period in which we see the majority of hurricanes and tropical storms cruising through the tropical Atlantic, the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico. Every so often, there are outliers. Hurricane Able in 1951 was the biggest example of why we need to monitor the tropics the closer we get to the start of the season.

Starting as a simple low pressure trough 300 miles south of Bermuda, the storm ran into favorable conditions, first becoming a subtropical storm, then later gaining fully tropical characteristics. As it moved west, it encountered the warm waters of the Gulf Stream ocean current, which caused the storm to intensify significantly. Able briefly threatened the east coast of Florida before completing a loop near the Bahamas. As it left this loop, the storm paralleled the eastern seaboard of the United States, passing a mere 70 miles east of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina as a Category 3 on the Saffir-Simpson scale of hurricane intensity, peaking with sustained 115 mile per hour winds. Once Able reached the cooler waters to the north, it weakened rapidly, eventually fizzling out near Halifax, Nova Scotia.

To this day, Able remains only one of four hurricanes to form during the month of May, and holds the record for the most intense hurricane to form outside the customary Atlantic Hurricane Season. Able’s timing and motion were so unusual, the National Weather Bureau referred to the storm as the Freak of Freaks in its post-storm analysis. For more information about this unique storm, visit the Hurricane Able (1951) Wikipedia page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Able_(1951).

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What does THAT mean?

The National Weather Service office in Ruskin (the one that covers the Tampa Bay area) had to switch their weather radar off for about two weeks this past February. Why would they do that during prime time for tornado formation in Florida? The answer has to do with dual-pol.

Dual polarization, to be exact. The old radar system was effective at finding where rain and hail were falling. The only problem is that the radar could only send out one kind of signal – a horizontal beam that scanned side to side. While it was great at finding where things were happening, the radar’s aim had to be moved up and down to get an idea of what was happening vertically in the clouds. This limited the radar’s ability to differentiate between precipitation and ground clutter or types of precipitation (rain vs. hail).

Dual-pol radar, on the other hand, scans both horizontally and vertically. By looking in both directions, the radar can gather more information, giving forecasters a much better look at what’s happening with the weather in a given time. This data makes identification of precipitation types and estimations of total precipitation amounts easier, allowing earlier detection of areas of extreme rainfall which will lead to improved warning times.
Visit www.srh.noaa.gov/tbw
/?n=tampabaydualpol to learn more about the dual-polarization upgrade.

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