In September of 2004, Hurricane Ivan was on its way to my area, and with it, destruction was to be in its wake. I was sheltered with the same fire department I used to serve in years back, and that’s when I met the woman who would one day be my wife. She worked for EMS as an Emergency Medical Technician. At the height of the storm Amanda and I sat in one of the leeward bays and watched trees coming down, transformers blowing and we were even making bets on which tree would go down next. Other times we would talk about life. I wasn’t interested in starting a relationship. That was one area where I had the least success, but I really liked her. She was, on the other hand, a married woman. What she didn’t tell me that night was that her marriage was on the rocks.
Ivan made landfall at the Florida-Alabama state line, but it was such a large storm with category thee to fur winds. Forty-five to fifty miles to the east was us. And it got nasty. About 0300, the pressure inside the building changed and that ominous sound of a freight train racked some nerves. We all knew there would be no trains moving during the hurricane. It had to be a tornado and it was to the east of us. Then the fire chief and assistant chief brought it to my attention that the roof of the building was buckling. The sounds of the rafters creaked and it made the hairs on my neck stand up.
I called a lieutenant on the radio to let him know were going to break into the school two blocks away. He said the Sheriff’s Office main building, completed in 1998, had suffered severe damage from losing the roof. The interior would later be gutted.
The fire chief and assistant chief loaded into my patrol car. We battled 100 plus mile an hour wind. That car drove smooth at 100 miles per hour. But even at 20 miles per hour, the car shook and shuttered the entire way. We broke into the school and set up shop in the cafeteria. It was the same elementary school I attended many years ago.
We went back to the fire house, and gave everyone the plan. Amanda, driving the ambulance would lead the convoy, and she would be followed by at least a dozen personally owned vehicles. My car would be the last to leave, in case one of other vehicles got into trouble. Then I had to take some of the guys back to the firehouse to get the trucks. One of the bay doors had blown in, but it was held up by one of the truck behind it. The first truck pulled out and went on its way. The second truck had to back as far as it could and the driver showed some expertise as he drove it out of the other bay at an angle and with his foot to the floor. He missed the sides by only inches.
I fought the wind and rain to my car. That was actually the scariest part for me. I was alone at this point, and realized I violated my own rule that no one goes out without a buddy. I took only two guys, so they bugged out that left me alone. Also, my radio was UHF and the fire department had VHF radios. No, cell phones were out so I couldn’t use them.
I got into my car, which was already running, and turned around to pull out. I made the left turn onto Ward Basin Road when a huge gust of wind caught my car and turned me sideways. The road was littered with debris of tree limbs, leaves and pine needles, so my rear tires were spinning. I eased off the gas and as I looked through my windshield I could see very large tree coming down, large enough to crush the car. It narrowly missed the back of my patrol car and I felt the road shake when it hit.
When the sun came up, the damage was far worse than I expected. Entire neighborhoods were destroyed and lives were lost. My own parents yard had flooded from storm surge that backed the Blackwater River for miles. The house was undamaged, exceot for some shingles. A large tree had went down in the back yard, and my dad’s boat was floating above the trailer. My son’s “Powerwheels Jeep” was floating around. I had to wade in waist deep water to retrieve it and put it in a better place. I didn’t go inside, fearing the worse.
The water receded later that day. To my parents’ amazement, the inside of the house wasn’t wet. Power was out, naturally, put somewhere above my parent’s home a water main had severed. They had no water. That night, I came home from work. My dad had a stress related attitude, and it wasn’t totally unwarranted. We lived through other hurricanes but this one brought us back to the stone-age. I told my dad to come outside. We leaned up against my patrol car and I told him to look up. With no power, no street lights and the area being under a curfew, there were more stars visible and they were much brighter than I have ever seen. My dad said it reminded him when he was an arrestor gear/catapult technician aboard the USS Ranger CV61 during the Vietnam War. He just stood there, looking up at the stars, and even managed to smile.
For weeks we were without power. Some places were without water. A lot of people lived on military meals ready to eat for weeks. I was no exception and I learned why the put the chewing gum in them.
As the weeks went by and things returned to normal, I didn’t see Amanda again. Oh well, wishful thinking. I had returned to patrol from the traffic unit, and I was assigned to the Pace area. I was dispatched to assist EMS on a medical call, and standing in the back of the Ambulance was Amanda. Our eyes met and we both smiled at the same time.
Amanda hailed from upstate New York. A huge baseball fan, particularly the New York Yankees, she could tell you what kind of pitches David Cone threw in his perfect game. She could tell you the batting average of just about every New Yankee batter, which Yankee pitcher’s had the best ERA’s and which of the opposing players were known as “Yankee Killers.”
At the time I met Amanda, I was a NACAR Fan. She new this and asked me, from time to time, if I were to ever drive a race car, which track I would love to drive. I told her that it would have to be Atlanta Motor Speedway. The NASCAR guys could get up 200 miles an hour on the front stretch, and that was one of my favorite races.
In late 2005, we would get hit by another hurricane. Dennis was a powerful hurricane, but it’s forward speed was much faster than Ivan. Ivan, which lumbered at a snail’s pace, obliterated the area. Dennis did do some serious damage, but it wasn’t as bad. Again, Amanda and I would be sheltered in the same location, this time it was a school.
When the storm cleared I got a call that my parent’s house, which was surprisingly spared during Ivan, took a direct hit from Dennis. The remaining water oak tree that actually leaned away from the house snapped 1/3 of the way up and slammed into the room of the house. I got there, took off my duty belt and uniform shirt, and began to clear some of the debris from the house
Amanda had called the fire department and they responded with chain saws and fresh bodies to help remove the tree from the house. After that one of my parents’ neighbors brought over some plywood to patch the large hole in the roof, and we used a red tarp to keep the moister out. The rest of the house faired well. Other than losing a few shingles Ivan left the house undamaged. Other homes in the neighborhood had flood damage. Dennis didn’t bring the floods, but the winds brought the damage. Along with the house, my dad’s boat shelter was a mangled wreck. My parents’ house was the only residence to sustain any damage from Dennis. Guess they had it coming.
Amanda and I had started dating earlier in the year. When I introduced her to my son, they hit it off great! In September, Amanda, Steven and I moved into a house together that she had purchased after her divorce.
I figured out why she kept asking me about what track I would love to drive. She got me the Richard Petty Driving Experience, in which I would get to drive a race-quality car (not at 200 miles an hour, though) around the track for eight laps with no one else in the car. It was my 2005 Christmas present and it was expensive. My Christmas present was even more so; an engagement ring. She I had already proposed to her and of course, she said “yes” but with the expenses of moving, her buying a Nissan Titan, etc etc we had to save up. On Christmas Eve, we went to the mall and when we walked up to Zales, I simply told her “choose!” She picked out her ring and had to show it to everybody.
The following March we were married and in April we went to Hampton Georgia to the Atlanta Motor Speedway. My son Steven couldn’t ride in the cars but he did get to ride in a van full of other kids at 80 miles per hour. That kid is fearless. I was the fifth driver. I got to number 5 Kellogs car. It was based on the Nationwide Series Car but it had a fiberglass body. The HANS device was mandatory since the death of Dale Earnhart Sr in 2001, and that included these cars. Top speed was only around 150, but most drivers would top out at around 130. This was fine with me, since my patrol car has gone even faster. I got in the car, got strapped in, and fired the engine. When the instructor car ahead of me pulled out, I was given the signal to go. Of course, I was the only fool to stall the engine. I re-fired the car and away I went. I went through the gears from pit road to the track bottom, and then moved up against the wall as I dropped her into fourth gear.
The turns are banked at 24 degrees, an the object was to lift off of the accelerator to let the front tires bite as we went into the turns, and accelerated as we reached the apex. At first I did that but I was falling way behind the instructor. I then got confident that the car would stick, so I pushed it harder. I came off of the turns against the wall. We ran high, low and middle. On the last lap, the instructor signaled for me to put the car into neutral and coast the rest of the way in. My top speed was 156 miles per hour, but came in even slower than some other guys.
After we left the speedway we went to Six Flags for a few hours and then headed home. We were pooped.
I looked at the picture of me standing next to the racecar, and the video my wife’s friends had made. I didn’t realize how fat I was. Oh well, things will never change.
But then, nearly four years later, it happened. My fear had come true. I had suffered a heart attack.
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