Florida's Hurricane History
by Jay Barnes
Second Edition

424 pp., 139 photos, 87 maps, 3 tables
$24.95 paperback, $39.95 hardcover
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You might say that Friday, August 13, 2004, was an unlucky day--unlucky for Southwest Florida residents who braced for the arrival of Hurricane Charley, the strongest hurricane to strike the state since Andrew landed in 1992. It was bad for all of Florida since Charley's appearance on that Friday the thirteenth began what would become a record-breaking year for hurricanes in the Sunshine State. It was even a bad day on the Chinese coast, where Typhoon Rananim, the most powerful to strike China in seven years, roared ashore, killing hundreds. But in Florida, all attention was on Charley, the first major hurricane to smack the state's southwestern edge in over forty years.


Mobile home owner Al Wheeler was surrounded bu the remains of his residence following Hurrican Charley in August 2004. Nearly every mobile home in the Riverside Drive area of Punta Gorda was destroyed by the hurricane. (From Direct Hit,, photo by Jonathan Fredin, courtesy of the Charlotte Sun)


Charley formed from a fast-moving tropical wave that crossed the Atlantic and moved southeast of the Dominican Republic on August 10. It continued westward across the Caribbean, reaching category 2 strength on the twelfth as it passed near Jamaica. It turned northwest and passed over western Cuba, then emerged in the southeastern Gulf of Mexico on the morning of the thirteenth. It passed by the Dry Tortugas by mid-morning on a northerly course that appeared to track toward Tampa. Sometime just after noon, a slight increase in southwesterly winds in the upper atmosphere nudged Charley to the right, sending it on a new course that would take it into Charlotte County. Mysteriously, a rapid intensification occurred just prior to landfall, as the storm's central pressure fell 0.65 inches in a matter of hours. Charley's small but powerful core made landfall at 3:45 p.m. at Cayo Costa and then again at Mangrove Point, just southwest of Punta Gorda. Satellite and reconnaissance reports indicated that the eye was only five miles in diameter at the time of landfall. By 5:30 p.m., the storm center was five miles west of Arcadia. At 9:15 it passed over Orlando International Airport, and before midnight Charley was passing off the coast near Daytona Beach, still maintaining hurricane strength. After a brief run up the Atlantic coast, Charley made landfall again near McClellanville, South Carolina, on August 14. It landed with sustained winds that were still hurricane force, and on the following day, it continued to buffet the Atlantic Seaboard with tropical stormÐforce winds and rains as far north as coastal New England.

When Charley exited western Cuba and approached Florida on August 13, forecasts called for the hurricane to spin up the coast to Tampa. Evacuations got under way, and almost 1.5 million people were asked to leave their homes. Even MacDill Air Force Base, the U.S. nerve center for the war in Iraq, was evacuated except for essential personnel. But the storm's early turn toward the northeast took it into Port Charlotte, and once again the Tampa metro area was spared. Many who fled Tampa traveled inland only to move into the path of the storm near Orlando.




Wally Galla inspects the damage to his boat after Charley's winds and waves tossed it off it's lift in Harbor Heights. (From Direct Hit,, photo by Jonathan Fredin, courtesy of the Charlotte Sun)


It took just over seven hours for Charley to spin across Florida, leaving behind a long, relatively narrow wake of wind-blown wreckage. The National Hurricane Center's official report on the storm suggests that sustained winds at landfall may have been over 145 mph with a pressure of 27.79 inches, based on satellite and aerial reconnaissance. The lowest barometric pressure officially measured on land was 28.47 inches recorded at the Charlotte County Airport in Punta Gorda, where a peak gust of 112 mph was also measured before the anemometer was destroyed. Unofficial recordings from a private mo- bile weather unit in Punta Gorda measured a low pressure of 27.86 inches and a gust of 127 mph. All along the hurricane's path, new wind records were set as Charley carved its way across the peninsula. Wind gusts were measured to 104 mph in Arcadia and 109 mph in Wauchula, but in many locations, no peak readings were available because high winds damaged or destroyed wind instruments. Orlando International Airport, some 175 miles inland from Charley's landfall, recorded sustained hurricane-force winds of 79 mph and a new record peak gust of 105 mph--a testament to the storm's enduring intensity. Because of Charley's fast pace and relatively small size, rainfall was not a serious threat to the affected region. Most stations reported less than 3 inches of rain, although over 5 inches were recorded in Sanford and over 6 in Gardner. The storm-surge effect, so often a deadly force in category 4 hurricanes, was modest along much of the southwest Florida coast. This was likely due, again, to the relatively small diameter of the hurricane and the fact that it had intensified so quickly that seas did not have time to build. Storm surges ranged from six to seven feet on Sanibel and Estero Islands. Tide gauges on the Caloosahatchee River near Fort Myers generally ran three to four feet above normal. Tornadoes were also a threat across much of Florida during Charley's passing. One touched down in South Daytona Beach in advance of the storm, producing a quarter-mile-long track that destroyed one home and heavily damaged several others. It also tore the roof off of a strip mall and started a petroleum fire when it ripped out two pumps at a gasoline station. One woman was injured. According to National Hurricane Center reports, at least five other weak tornadoes likely touched down in Charley's path, but assessing their impact was difficult because of the other wind damages caused by the hurricane.

Charley's overall impact in Florida was immediately compared to that of Hurricane Andrew. Although Charley's winds were not as powerful as the cate- gory 5 blasts that leveled portions of Dade County back in 1992, scenes of devastation in Port Charlotte and Punta Gorda resembled the earlier storm's aftermath in Homestead. And like Andrew, Charley had picked a busy spot--nearly 1 million people lived within thirty miles of the hurricane's landfall.


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