Hurricane Sandy crossed directly over Jamaica from South to North. On the north coast, holed up in a hotel two floors above sea level with generators at the ready, though we worried about the antennas at the contest station site, we were safe and dry ourselves. The hurricane passage was actually pretty boring from our perspective, though probably less so for the guests evacuated from the beach-level rooms and from neighboring low-lying hotels.
The winds blew all the deck chairs into the pools. The staff told me that if the winds are predicted to be much higher than these were, they deliberately PUT the chairs into the pools rather than attempt to chain them to the fences. They won't blow around and damage anything if they are underwater. The worst surf was after the storm passed north of Jamaica, since we were on the sheltered side during its approach. This wasn't a problem for the more-usual hotel guests, who simply swam and played in the pool rather than deal with the high surf. The ham radio station antennas survived intact, and the Montego Bay airport reopened within a couple of days.
The storm, though, wasn't through with us. Its passage north along the US east coast closed all the airports and stranded us in Jamaica for two extra days until we could get a flight out by way of Orlando instead of heavily-hit New York. There are, of course, worse places to be stranded by weather, and we've been stranded at some of them.
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Last modified 27 November 2012