[meteorite-list] Greg Shanos- Inside the Cone of Uncertainty

[Kevin Kichinka]

Team Meteorite

Life surprises us with circumstances beyond our control. A flat tire
or worms drilling into the ripe tomatoes is enough to cause many
people to scream, "why me?"

One enters a brave new world of despair when the BREAKING NEWS on TV
warns of the approach of a monster hurricane and the Cone of
Uncertainty is shown centered over your beach house, with a possible
tour inside of the eye of a Cat 5 hurricane included free of charge.

It could be worse. What if this update arrived just after the
electricity came back on while the storm surge of the last hurricane
was still thumping and slapping against your front door?

Greg Shanos, our go-to guy for everything regarding organic molecules
in carbonaceous chondrites had just endured a near miss from Hurricane
Helene, but just like that, it was game on again, and he was going to
get one roll of the dice to possibly save his life.

Greg is a Doctor of Pharmacy and has a life-long love for the Florida
barrier island of Longboat Key, an offshore American tropical
paradise. The island is a skinny string of seven square kilometers of
sand and is one meter above sea level.

One.

According to WIKI, Longboat Key was first scouted by Spaniard Juan de
Añasco around 1530. When his party reached land the indigenous
residents fled, leaving their Longboat in a bayou. For the next three
centuries only fishermen and pirates wiggled their toes in the sand.

A hurricane scraped Longboat Key down to ground seashells in 1848, and
the damage was such that there is no more recorded history until 1880.
Another hurricane in 1921 airmailed a US Post Office to a new address.
Incredibly, those are the only recorded storms to have touched this
hyper-vulnerable isle.

There is a related legend. The Seminoles claimed that the Tocobaga
tribe had put a spirit charm reaching from Tampa Bay south to what is
now Englewood that warded off "heavy winds". Located in between,
Longboat Key has prosperously developed un-flustered for the last one
hundred years, surrounded by the smooth, green waters of the Gulf of
Mexico .

Not that danger didn't lurk nearby with regularity. In the last 200
years the Florida mainland has had around 500 hurricanes passing left,
right and center.

On September 23, 2024 Helene formed from a region of scattered
thunderstorms in the Carib Sea east of Costa Rica. It blew by Longboat
Key as a Cat 3 a few days later. Greg sent me this email of his first
encounter with a hurricane.

"We almost lost our house. The water in the canal rose 7 feet, but
fortunately it receded without any damage. The street in front of the
house was flooded with water from Sarasota Bay. We lost electricity
for 17 hours. The food was still semi-frozen and edible. Water has
already been turned back on. I just had the internet restored. This
was just a tropical storm here; the winds were not bad, and we only
had 2 inches of rain in two days.  It was the STORM SURGE that caused
all the devastation.  Fortunately, our house was spared.
Unfortunately, this was not the case for many others. I feel for
everyone who had their house flooded from the storm. I see furniture,
mattresses, refrigerators, washing machines etc in the front yards of
many homes for pickup, especially on St Armands and Lido keys. It
makes me wonder why I was spared and not them?  Now I know what is
meant by survivors' guilt."

Helene made landfall in Perry, a coastal town in Florida's Big Bend,
and continued north-east to North Carolina, leaving behind the rubble
of obliterated American dreams and 227 deaths.

I have enjoyed a friendship with Greg for more than twenty-five years.
We share our interests in meteorites and both of us have traveled to
multiple solar eclipses, but now we began to write to each other as
another storm  exploded in the Gulf. 'Milton' was a milktoast name for
a killer with evil intent.

For years I have been blown around by all classes of these storms and
thought Greg might appreciate some advice. My experiences began with
three years of typhoons, the Pacific Ocean name for hurricanes, while
renting a tin-roofed, plywood house in the barrio of Santo Domingo in
south-east Luzon in the Philippines during the 1970's as a US Peace
Corp Volunteer.  No matter how savage the winds I never lost
electricity then, because there was none. Neither was there immediate
contact with the world beyond the shadow of nearby Mayon Volcano other
than telegrams hand-delivered from Manila. When the sideways rain
began to fall and the winds blew hard it was like standing in a car
wash. There was no time to run and no place to hide. You practiced
what they now call 'hunkering down'.

>From 1979 to 2005 I lived part time in Fort Myers, Florida, growing
weary of the seasonal storm scares as the local news began earnestly
hysterical eyeball-rewarded coverage with every dark cloud coming off
of Africa.

In 2004, Charlie's local 105mph/170km/hr winds arrived at my door when
it unexpectedly made a ninety degree right turn in the Gulf cutting
North Captiva island in half, and delivering a body blow to Fort
Myers. It did structural but not fatal damage to my house, although my
long-nurtured tropical forest was leveled and drowned.

The good news for me was that Meteorite Motorheads Blaine and Blake
Reed happened to be driving back to Colorado from Miami after
purchasing a Jaguar, not a cat, but a 1996 XJS with a Chevy engine and
transmission, and they stopped with the vehicle in tow and kindly
helped me reinstall a long wooden fence.

The bad news was that two best buddies, Bill and Glenn, lost their
homes and their businesses 20 miles away during Punta Gorda's 175
mp/280 km/hr climate hallucination. Bill's wife was a bank manager and
the storm 'removed' the building to parts unknown. An ATM powered by a
generator hooked to a satellite dish provided customer service.  When
I brought them food, fuel, ice and beer the next day, driving past
hundreds of military and electric utility vehicles, I suffered an old
timer's moment that made my brain puke as I couldn't locate their
street among the flattened landscape, homes crushed leaving only a
concrete foundation, fat ancient oak trees splintered in half and
metal power poles twisted into pseudo war debris. When I finally found
my way I was invited to a block party of neighbors grilling the last
Rib Eyes rescued from their non-functioning freezers. The luxury of
electricity was at least a month away. Homes without air conditioning
in the 90F degrees/90 % humidity of Florida August become efficient
mold farms inside.

On October 5, I sent Greg an email with a map that showed Hurricane
Milton making landfall just north of Longboat Key as a Cat 3 and
running up Tampa Bay. I didn't mention that this was pretty much a
worse case scenario for him. I titled the email  "Not another one". He
calmly replied:

"Kevin:
Yes, headed NNE, expected to hit St Petersburg, Tampa and North of
those cities. - Greg"

I didn't know if Greg understood that the storm surge and the worst
winds would arrive from south-west of the landfall. I looked at the
map again and knew that an island 1m above sea level covered by eight
to ten feet of storm surge would appear from rescue helicopters like a
lot of roofs in a weird place for people to sit.

If the water was a little higher nothing would appear at all.

And the storm only needed a slight wobble to the east to go directly
over Longboat Key. Someone could die....

I wrote back to Greg, this one entitled  "Run from the Water". I
didn't want to be alarming and use the harsh 'evacuation' word which
suggests that one is abandoning everything left behind.

For these days of drama I was at home in my mountaintop sanctuary in
western Costa Rica watching CNN on my sat dish. The Mayor of Tampa is
warning, "If you do not evacuate, you will die." Miami's most
respected weatherman, who had covered all of the storms hitting
Florida since the 1980's was next, "Hurricane Hunter planes are
reporting the fastest drop and lowest air pressure ever measured for a
Gulf Hurricane. The death and devastation this storm will cause...."
he suddenly stopped talking.

The old man is crying. He knows what's next.

Time was of the essence. Greg had to throw the dice for the second
time in two weeks. One represents "Do I Stay" and the other "Do I Go".
Whatever didn't happen during the last one hundred years wouldn't
matter if after they leave his hand and rattle around the table they
come to rest as rock 'n roll snake eyes.

Back on CNN radar displays five supercell tornadoes on the ground in
central Florida, a size previously unknown here, dropped from the
first rain band which has already reached the Atlantic Ocean. Three
tornadoes are near Fort Myers. One is running over Arcadia, Florida,
central Florida cow country where my buddy Bill moved after Charlie
upended his life in 2004, a last resort shelter as there were no
habitable structures left in Punta Gorda to rent or purchase. I'm
watching a real life horror movie in real time.

A CNN weatherman shows the predictive American and European weather
agency spaghetti models converging on the meatball that is Tampa.

I've now seen enough, of enough stuff I'd never seen before.

I wrote to Greg:
"It would be a good plan to reserve a 3rd floor hotel room or higher
on the east side of a building in Sarasota (or wherever) the day
before the storm hits your island. If Milton is slow moving and runs
right over your house you would regret still being there. You can
always cancel the room.... or enjoy a 2nd honeymoon there with the
wife. Bring your meteorites. -  K"

I suspect that for Greg, Longboat Key and his home have bonded into a
relationship meant to last until death do we part. And now he must not
wait another moment and must choose to run away from a high
probability watery demise when he'll be swimming with the fishies.

I was worried. I didn't know if he would leave.

Then I had an email....it was 11:20am on October 7, 2024.

"Kevin:
Evacuating now. Currently headed further north toward Tampa. - Greg"

I worried some more. Why was he going north to Tampa?  All roads would
be frozen in orderly gridlock with hundreds of thousands of
semi-terrified and fully-terrified people driving basically nowhere on
the Interstate cum parking lot, none with any sense of which direction
to go.

At 6:12pm another email.

"Kevin:
Denise and I are at my father-in-law's place. He lives on the 10th
floor of Bay Village independent living facility in Sarasota.  We are
safe; however, I am really worried about the house. I secured
everything the best I could. I sincerely hope we do not get any
flooding or wind damage.  My polyurethane fence came down during
Helene, it will go down again. If this is the only damage- I will be
very happy. - Greg"

Breath out. Breath in. Breath deep.

The storm is making landfall. If you are on the tenth floor of the Bay
Village facility you can feel it gently swaying.

Greg writes:
Wed, Oct 9, 1:35 PM
"Kevin:
Too close for comfort. Hoping for the best. Will lose electricity and
internet soon. This will be my last email until the storm is over.
Wish me luck.
Greg"

One recognizes such messages as the last one sent before the plane crashes.

The next day the Sun rose between the mountains west of San Jose,
creating flashes of illumination reflecting off of the blades of the
slow winding windmills on the highest ridges. It's 5:30am and the sky
is turquoise soon to brighten to a rich celestial blue, purified by my
higher altitude. I'm waiting with phone in hand for first contact from
Greg now that the storm has passed. How different our worlds were at
this moment.

Twenty-six hours after their FB website went down the Longboat Key
government page is back up. I see that the police and firemen had been
evacuated from the island and had now returned to duty.

Then I read the best possible news. I titled this next email, 'Luck of
the Irish'.

(OK, I don't believe that Greg is Irish, although thankfully we all
are one day of the year.)

On Thursday, October 10, 2024 at 03:50:33 PM EDT I wrote:

SUMMARY - Longboat Key experienced minimal damage from Hurricane
Milton with winds up to 110 mph and very little storm surge. While
some roofs and fences sustained damage, the island's basic
infrastructure remains intact. The South access via Ringling Causeway
is closed due to damage, and the only entry point will be through the
North access once cleared. Currently, there is no power, water, or
wastewater services, but crews are working hard to restore them. Thank
you for your continued patience as our community recovers.

I'M SO HAPPY FOR YOU. - K

Kevin:
"Thank you. Have not been home yet. I am using a hotspot. Battery
draining. You put my mind at ease. - Greg"

The next day Greg, his wife Denise and the cat Pumpkin went home. As
he turned onto his street and approached his home, Greg had to be
experiencing one of the highest levels of stress in his life. He
wrote:

"Kevin:
"On Friday October 11th we received a text stating that it was safe
for residents to return to LBK.  We arrived home at 8:30am and the
only damage was the fence! No water ever entered the house thanks to
the reverse storm surge.  We even had electricity back!  Turned on the
air conditioner. However, we did not have any water or internet. We
went back to Bay Village, packed up our stuff including my meteorites
and brought the cat back home. Pumpkin and I were pleased to be back
home safe and sound.

The reverse storm surge saved the day. Sarasota was in the eye of a
Category 3 hurricane with 110 mph/winds.  Landfall occurred at Siesta
Key first, which is only one island away!  Surprisingly, I had very
little damage. My polyurethane fence went down again. Absolutely no
flooding! That was my biggest concern.
We have electricity since we have below ground wires. Water was turned
on today then turned off since there was very little pressure.
Hopefully Sunday or Monday we will have water. I hate going to bed
without a shower. Still no internet. I am using a hotspot on my phone
to send you this email. Overall, very fortunate I still have a house.
We were very very fortunate to be in the eye! - Greg"

Siesta Key is another in a line of several barrier islands and can be
seen to the south from Longboat Key. The storm wobbled 60 miles/100km
south of the predicted landfall, the spaghetti completely missing the
meatball, though it was still powerful enough to strip the roof off of
the Tampa Bay Rays baseball stadium. (They deserve a new stadium
anyway).

'Reverse storm surge' means that the wind over the island was coming
from the mainland, pushing the water out to sea, not on to shore. This
indicates that when the storm lost traction for a Tampa landfall, it
followed an arc that, had it lost further momentum, could have made a
direct hit on Longboat Key.

My last email from Greg:
" It is a miracle that no significant damage occurred on the occasion
of having two hurricanes so close without any damage of note.  My
birthday is on October 18th- this is the greatest birthday present,
being in the eye of a category 3 hurricane with 110 mph winds and
living to talk about it and having a house that was left intact!"

Greg, can I rub your head for good luck?

And what about the meteorite collection? Greg writes:
"Packed all the stones. Left behind the irons since they were double
bagged in Hoppe's # 9 gun oil.  They were placed on a high shelf at
least a meter high."

******************************************************
Thanks to everyone for reading this account. If you are contemplating
a move to a zone with hurricanes or tsunamis I hope you consider
putting a little altitude between yourself and the water. If you need
convincing, take a look at the two videos of the devastation of Ft
Myers Beach, Florida two years ago. For many years that was my party
beach with many memories of good times. With a past girlfriend we
contemplated buying a home there, but the island traffic during
tourist season dissuaded us.

Although I sit here so far away, I still suffer a Pavlovian reaction,
some negative sense of doom when the weather news from the United
States focuses on another blob of clouds leaving Africa. This is why I
left Florida for calmer winds, feeling safer around earthquakes,
landslides and narco-traffickers.

In this instance, with the internet and CNN available and Greg being
the Man-in-the-Middle, I felt close to events that seemed so near and
familiar and horrible. I wrote this for Greg as a birthday gift and a
dramatic chronology that led to a remarkable conclusion. It is a
memoir for this true gentleman and his family.

Greg is a long time contributor to x-Meteorite Magazine, the Meteorite
List and so many other worthy causes. I hope that this off-topic story
will be welcomed by the worldwide audience of the Meteorite List.

Here are three videos and one real estate ad. The first two are so
extreme with the highest winds at landfall and storm surge to the
second floor that I consider it 'Hurricane porn.'

The first nine minutes is boat destruction, the damage to the town of
FtMyers Beach begins at minute 9, don't miss it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Cw9ae_E7bo#ddg-play

Don't know what storm surge can do to a barrier island? Ft Myers
Beach, Florida two years ago. Watch the water rise and rise and
rise......
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=al8yTiCVfro

Video of Longboat Key after Helene. Mild with little damage.
https://www.heraldtribune.com/videos/news/2024/09/28/aerial-view-of-longboat-key-after-hurricane-helene/75427926007/

Marked down $695,000/32% a few days after Helene on Longboat Key. You
gotta know when to hold, you gotta know when to fold.
https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/5930-Emerald-Harbor-Dr-Longboat-Key-FL-34228/45794996_zpid/

Kevin Kichinka ........ MARSROX at gmail.com