The localized thunderstorms here never cease to amaze me. When I left the driveway the other morning it was dry and sunny at my house, but one mile straight down the road is was POURING down rain and foggy/misty! That always amuses me. The same held true with yesterday's storms. It thundered and rumbled and threatened for hours last night, but Navarre only saw .02 inches of rain, and the beach, hardly that. Although there was quite the light show off shore from 11pm- 2am!
It's that time of year in Florida. The afternoons become so sultry that the cicadas don't even bother chattering away. So steamy that storms pop up in the blink of an eye, and clear away just as fast. The heat index early this week promises to keep up searching for a cool place to hide, with highs around 110 again. (True temps in the lower 90s.) There is a chance of storms every day. The GOM is quiet for now, but a Low pressure that promises to form off to our EAST on the tail of a cold front has tropics watcher's attention. It is not uncommon for these to develop into short notice tropical blows. So, we'll all watch for that as it forms off to our east and moves west towards LA (that's Louisiana for our out of town visitors) on Tuesday.
As for the beach, it looks lovely again. Waters are calm this morning, but surf will be increasing today. Due to the direction of the winds and currents, the rip current risk will be on the increase as well. So keep an eye on the flag warning system and educate the guests on their meaning. A passing reminder to swim near the lifeguards never hurts either.
BP continues to pump cement down the well. So far all reports are on the favorable side. I've even noticed the media has slowed down on any reporting. CNN.com no longer has the oil issue as a permanent resident on their home page in the upper left corner. In fact, there is just one tiny mention near the bottom: "Oil Spill is Over, right?". Foxnews.com has nothing on their homepage. The Santa Rosa County Emergency Management has stopped issuing daily news blasts. Weartv.com, which is local, still has it's coastal crisis link on the homepage, but the news behind the link is non-existant. It's a collection of links to aid sites. Be it a tiresome old story, news weariness, apathy, or disinterest in the oil since the well is capped and it's no longer spewing crude into the Gulf, the oil is still of interest here.
We aren't being bombarded with questions on and off the beach everyday, but we still need to be aware of the situation. While the surface oil seems to be a non issue, there are still tarballs washing up in places, and will continue to do so. (not here in abundance) And there is oil from the landfall in June that gets uncovered with heavy surf. And then there is the issue of BP oil payments.
That is becoming the new story. I'm getting more and more questions on the beach about that as I interact with more and more people from MS,AL, and LA that are coming out here for their "quick before school starts" vacations. They ask how BP is dealing with payments out here. They wonder if FL is being treated like those in the more heavily hit zones to our West. Some think it's not fair that FL got money at all. Some in FL think it's not fair that the $ given to FL went to tourism for the WHOLE state, and not just the panhandle. Now with BP announcing that payments will not be made for the month of MAY for Florida, before the oil hit, things are steamy on that front.( http://www.nwfdailynews.com/news/claims-31720-florida-losses.html ) And round and round it goes. This is one of those situations that you just need to listen. People really need to vent, and bounce their opinion on someone and know it's being heard. If you share your opinion on the matter, make sure you say it's YOUR opinion. :)
The great circle of life. Sigh.
Even though it's hot enough out to melt tar, I hope you all are able to get out and enjoy the beach. Being out there everyday, and dealing with heat indexes of over 100 since early June, I'm really starting to look forward to November-February. Then we can all complain about it being so cold that the lizards are falling from the trees!
Have fun, be safe, and share the knowledge!
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