Wilma threatens Florida with 110-mph winds (AP) Updated: 2005-10-24 08:37 Wilma would mark Florida's eighth hurricane since August 2004 and the fourth
evacuation of the Keys this year.
Fewer than 10 percent of the Keys' 78,000 residents evacuated, Monroe County
Sheriff Richard Roth said.
"I'm disappointed, but I understand it," Roth said. "They're tired of leaving
because of the limited damage they sustained during the last three hurricanes."
By Sunday evening, tornado warnings were already posted for parts of
southwest Florida, and the hurricane's outer bands began lashing coastal areas
in Wilma's path. A waterspout was spotted off Key West.
A dog peeks through a hole in the wall in a
locked up house in the evacuated coastal town of Boca de Galafre, as
Hurricane Wilma passes near the western province of Pinar del Rio, Cuba
October 23, 2005. [Reuters] | It was markedly
different than conditions Sunday morning in the Keys, when sunshine beckoned
boaters onto the water and many residents went about their normal routines.
"We were born and raised with storms, so we never leave," Ann Ferguson said
from her front porch in Key West. "What happens, happens. If you believe in the
Lord, you don't have no fear."
Some 100 Key West parishioners attended Mass at a Catholic church where a
grotto built in the 1920s is said to provide protection from dangerous storms.
Ray Price took his usual stroll down Duval Street to check out the ocean.
"Another day in paradise," Price said.
Some people shared that attitude on the mainland. At a park for recreational
vehicles in Fort Myers Beach, Leonard Hasbrouck stood bare-chested as a fire
truck rolled by blaring a warning.
"Mandatory evacuation," a firefighter shouted into a loudspeaker. "You are
hereby ordered to leave your residence by the board of county commissioners of
Lee County, Fla."
"They came by yesterday," Hasbrouck said. "I told them, 'I'm not going to ask
you to rescue me.'"
Tropical storm-force winds of at least 39 mph were expected to begin late
Sunday, and the core of the hurricane was forecast to slice across the peninsula
Monday, speeding northeast at up to 25 mph.
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