Subject: Re: Hurricane Idalia and FL reinsurance
When discussing the current Florida hurricane and it's ,hopefully lower than expected, impacts, NOLA modestly added: 'As my username suggests, I have some experience with hurricanes, FWIW'.

As a New Orleans guy, NOLA has certainly had the opportunities to see hurricanes. I appreciate his insights on the reduced Florida impact based on where it went ashore.

I grew up about an hour's drive (before Interstate) from New Orleans. After finishing college in 1955, I worked in Baton Rouge, Houston, NYC, New Orleans, and back to Houston before retirement. Along the way I saw several hurricanes myself.

Perhaps some of our group wouldn't object if I reminisce about some of my hurricane memories over the decades. They might provide some insights that aren't top of mind when thinking about hurricanes.

My first experience was in 1947 at age 12. A major hurricane (near Class 5) dropped in strength before hitting the Mississippi Gulf Coast about 25 miles from our home as a Class 1 or 2. This was before they started giving storms names so it was simply called the 'killer 1947 hurricane.' Some 50+ deaths along its path.

We had some advanced warning, not up to today's level, but enough. Our little home was on the last hill before the Gulf plains so we weren't worried about flooding. But winds were a different matter. We had a large hickory tree only a few feet behind our home. So we, and nearby neighbors, decided we had better go to town. And we headed out as a small convey.

The men packed axes and a crosscut saw to bring along. It was well that they did, because we encountered a large pine tree blown down across US Hwy 11 ' which our homes faced. We were about 5 miles from town. US 11 was the main highway from Chicago to New Orleans at the time. But it was only a two lane asphalt highway even so. So the tree had to be removed to get into town. It was and we did.

Picayune was small back then. The local owner of the only hardware/lumber store had opened it as a shelter. It had large plate glass windows across the front that were starting to flex due to the winds. So the men brought lumber and plywood from the lumber yard and built a shield. Fortunately wind and rain damage proved minor. What happened on the Gulf Coast towns were very difficult. The storm surge damaged many old Southern homes and washed fishing boats almost a mile inland. A friend my Dad knew who was a fishing buddy from a fishing camp was washed along, climbed up a tree, and spent the night along with snakes.

Those memories stick.

Started work in Baton Rouge after college. Fairly small storms would flood the city, much worse than New Orleans. New Orleans, below river and sea level, had these giant pumping stations that could cope with then storm and hurricane rains And they did for a long time.

As the decades passed, we saw many hurricanes. Most were relatively small. But a few stick out. I was in Houston when Carla hit the Texas coast. It was so large it almost filled the Gulf of Mexico. Galveston suffered a lot of wind damage even though it was 120 miles from landfall further down the coast. That was the 'dirty' (wrong) side of the storm. That hurricane launched Dan Rather's media career as he broadcast nationwide from the cut-off island of Galveston. I was standing in an apartment doorway in Houston ' many miles inland. I saw the roof being peeled off the apartments across the interior yard while our apartment escaped damage.

After other lesser storms, we went to NYC for a few years. We returned to New Orleans shortly after Hurricane Camille hit the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Hit, hell, it almost wiped it out. We escaped that, but had great difficulty finding an apartment in New Orleans. So many people had lost their homes along the coast that apartments were sold out in New Orleans.

New Orleans well knew that if Camille had taken a slightly western track, they would have been wiped out. But a bond election to erect flood barriers across the entrances to Lake Pontchartrain from the Gulf failed to pass.

The apartment we found near the Lake was below lake level in the base case. When driving to work, I would go up several feet to cross over a bridge at lake level. Had the bond passed and the flood gates installed , the later damage from Katrina would have been significantly reduced. Where we lived was flooded.

We moved from New Orleans back to Houston. (Really missed the food). Again small storms but we moved to North Texas before the really big storms hit Houston in the years after Katrina. Harvey was particularly bad in terms of flooding. But we were long gone by then.

Based on what I recall over the years, bad hurricanes now are not unique. But there sure does seem to be more of them.