Post Hurricane Ivan...another small step back to normalcy..

[stevenpensacola]

Gulf Power finally came by and fixed our street light which has been leaning and blinking off and on since the storm.

A small portion of Pensacola Beach has been opened! Nice to get back out there. Someone wrote a story in our paper about how they'd been feeling claustrophobic since the storm, but could not figure out why. It finally occured to her that it was due to the beach being closed. She didn't go that often, but just knowing that you could go out there at any time was always refreshing.

Our Blue Angels performed their homecoming air show this past weekend. Was a good release for a lot of folks. While watching them perform, it occurred to me how lucky I've been to grow up here. You never knew when you'd see the Blue Angels fly over in the diamond formation leaving for or coming back from a show, or doing their weekly practice over the naval base.

Enough ramblin'....

 

[JimB.]

Steve -

Glad to hear this & that things are (slowly) returning to some form of "normalcy" (although it will probably never be "the same").

I lived in P'cola a few years back when I was in my initial stage of flight training. It was quite painful to see the pix of the area. My partner at work also came to oyur area for a few days "post Ivan" with a DMAT team. She also reported back how your area got hit quite hard.

Keep up the good spirits.

 

[perdidobay]

While it will be a least a year before my condo is open again, so it will be that long before I have it again,I hear Lillians pizza on Perdido Key is open now!

 

[jgmklmhem]

Good to hear for you. My parents live in Pensacola ( near the I-10 bridge) and I grew up there. They are still missing parts of their roof...but the blue-roof crew or whatever got it all covered up and such. I was in P'cola for many a hurricane...but my parents have said this was the worst one they had lived through. I had a friend lost their entire home when a series of trees crushed it and it is not rebuildable. Hope all keeps going well. We are flying there in December and hope all is well.

 

[ADisneygirl]

I am glad to hear that some things are beginning to return to normal for you and those in your community. People forget that months after the hurricanes there are still people that are homeless from the storms. I feel for everyone affected by these awful, natural disasters. Let's all remember the unfortunate still suffering from those terrible hurricanes in our prayers.

 

[ladycollector]

We live in the Destin area, and just wanted to wish you guys well! I know you guys got hit harder than we did. Even though it was a rough first week or so.

 

[gottaluvPluto]

I am excited Joe Patti's is now open! I have not been to the beach, but plan to go this weekend for Xmas pictures.

Our insurance adjustor is also finally coming this week!

 

[huckster]

Glad to hear things are gettung back to normal

 

[ThAnswr]

Greetings from Hurricane Charley-ground zero.

Glad to hear things are slowly getting back to normal. Same here. A good 1/3 of the homes around me are still empty, but they're starting to get repaired.

It'll take a while, but we'll get our lives back.

 

[cajunmommy]

I heard a brief bit on the radio that the I-10 bridge over Escambia now has 3 lanes open. Did I hear that correctly?

That's some amazing feat of engineering & construction if true.

Glad to hear the Pensacola / Gulf Shores / Orange Beach area is on the mend. We so often hear about the devastation immediately after, but forget it takes so long to return to normalcy.

 

[stevenpensacola]

Originally posted by cajunmommy
I heard a brief bit on the radio that the I-10 bridge over Escambia now has 3 lanes open. Did I hear that correctly?"



To the best of my knowledge, the I-10 bridge still has only two lanes open (one lane each direction). The news was that the bridge was damaged so much that all four lanes cannot be reopened safely. The engineers do think it will be possible for the structure to support one lane of traffic, which would lead to a total of three lanes.

The "powers that be" are trying to fast-track the process of replacing the whole bridge.

We haven't been over the bridge since the storm due to the traffic back-ups. Have heard that it's taken folks more than an hour to get across the bridge. We just go around on highway 90.

Here's a link to the Pensacola News Journal commerative on-line edition:

http://www.print2webcorp.com/news/Pensacola/HurricaneIvan/20041030/p01g.asp

and photo galleries:

http://www.pensacolanewsjournal.com/news/guides/hurricane/galleries.shtml