Taking on New Adventures

Here we go again, I thought. Another hurricane quickly popped up and immediately the track had it dead on for Louisiana. While the track shifted west as the week wore on, it was clear: Louisiana was going to be the center of the eye….. again.

So on Monday, I got the call asking if I could produce hurricane coverage again. I said yes, and by Wednesday, we knew the storm would be somewhere west of New Orleans. Wednesday afternoon, I was told to take my team to Lake Charles on Thursday, as we’d be on the western side of the storm and there would definitely be damage to the area that had already been hard hit by Hurricane Laura, just 6 weeks before.

As the storm quickly made its way to land, it never really made the easterly turn that was anticipated. So Lake Charles, again, was hit pretty hard.

The winds for Delta were not nearly as bad as Laura. However, the rain was really different. The rain during Laura was a lot, but because of the wind, it never really seemed to be heavy. During Delta, it was most definitely a heavy rain. And that created some localized flooding in the area that we didn’t see as much during Laura.

The sounds were, again, pretty odd. In every storm, there is some noise, some weird pop, some weird howling that you hear, but don’t know where it comes from and probably don’t want to know. Delta definitely gave us some funky sounds on Friday!

It’s weird comparing two storms but so rarely do we end up in the exact same place, exact same hotel in the same year for 2 strong hurricanes. But to compare the two, Laura was just a mean wind that pushed the water around. Delta had some mean winds for a time, but they were actually manageable while the rain was just really wicked and seemed to drench the city more than it needed.

Overall, neither storm was “good”. Both brought their problems and scary moments. But regardless of which storm was “worse” or “scarier”, the people in the Lake Charles, Cameron, Jennings and other areas will have to pick up the pieces, some for the second time, and start the rebuilding process.