We were feeling comfort in having a good community around us until one of our neighbours told us that he was evacuating after putting up his hurricane shutters.
“We don’t care about stuff hitting the windows now — but at 140mph it’ll rip your roof off,” he told my husband. “We’re getting out now to stay ahead of it.”
As Hurricane Irma marches closer to Florida, power tools whirred as neighbours boarded up, lopped loose branches off trees, moved plant pots and other potential projectiles inside and tested their generators.
It is expected to hit Florida on Sunday and remain a category 5, the most violent. It will be the worst to hit us since Hurricane Wilma in 2005.
A friend with a weekend retreat