Gettin' out of town, part III

Well, we're back and I'm posting this from my den, thanks to the
generator roaring outside, Bellsouth's rapid restoration of service, and
the incredibly capricious nature of hurricanes. Flying back Friday
afternoon, I found the ATC system back to normal and an advisory TFR in
place over MS, AL and the FL panhandle. The weather was fine and it was
a nice VFR trip.

The last-hour jog that Ivan took to the east made all the difference for
the Mobile Bay area. There are a lot of trees down, but I have seen
very little serious damage in Mobile proper or over here on the eastern
shore. Even though we were on the "good" side of the storm, I expected
far worse based on seeing the west side of the eye wall of a cat. 3
storm pass directly over my neighborhood. Communities just north of us
suffered far worse damage, even though they are farther from the Gulf.

Down on the beach, the Redneck Riviera is a wipeout, of course. It was
probably the hottest resort real estate market in the country until
Thursday, with millionaire's getaway pads and luxury high rise condos
crowding each other right down to the beach. The ones that aren't gone
completely look pretty sorry this morning.

Pensacola, on the "bad" side of the storm, got hammered. One story I
think the networks are really missing is the loss of the Interstate 10
bridge just east of Pensacola. Having this vital artery severed is
going to have a major economic impact, I believe, as there just isn't
any good alternate route. East-west traffic on the back roads and state
highways is going to be a nightmare for months.

Mobile Downtown airport was hardly touched. You can see a couple of
pictures I took over at alt.binaries.pictures.aviation. The C-150 was
the only damaged aircraft I saw on the field, and it probably would have
been ok if one tiedown had not failed. A Navajo parked right next to it
was untouched. Aside from the destruction of the drive thru shelters
where I used to keep my plane, the only other structural damage I saw
was to one end of UPS's building.

Thanks to everyone who posted good wishes. I feel extremely lucky to be
sitting here typing this in my undamaged home - many folks just a few
miles away were not so fortunate.
--
Dan
C172RG (back) at BFM

"Dan Luke" wrote in message
...

Thanks to everyone who posted good wishes. I feel extremely lucky to be
sitting here typing this in my undamaged home - many folks just a few
miles away were not so fortunate.
--

Thanks for all the reports, and glad you got home safe.