Years to Build Florida Panhandle Post-Hurricane Michael “New Normal”

Furious Cat-5 Hurricane Michael decimated the Florida Panhandle a year ago last week. The evidence: 30 years of landfill created by 5 hours of storm. As shown below, Michael leveled Mexico Beach and St. Joe Beach,…

…caused severe flood and wind damage to Port St. Joe to the east, and…

…destroyed vast swaths of much more heavily populated Panama City to the west.

Days after the hurricane, when cell phone service was just restored, I asked my girlfriend Gretchen if she wanted help cleaning up her place in Port St. Joe and a day later I was on my way.

If you’ve ever seen the remnants of a powerful natural disaster for real, you know the pictures here don’t come close to doing justice.

The people on the Florida Panhandle are resilient, they’re strongly woven in faith and community, and they will, no doubt, work together over the next 5+ years to create their new normal. Here’s how it looked in Mexico Beach and the surrounding area when I visited last week.

As you can see, it’s going to be a long haul. Keeping up spirits while facing the daily challenge of creating that new normal is tough.

At VOmax, one of our primary purposes is connecting with and giving back to community. You can join us by both wearing Florida Panhandle solidarity on your backs and providing financial aid where the rubber hits the road as $20 from every performance tech tee, shown below and sold at a reduced price, goes straight to Hurricane Michael relief through the Florida-based George and Amelia Tapper Foundation. Please click this link directly to the shirt order page.