Voices From the Future | Tom and Lynda Ciano<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When Irma Knocked<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The Event:<\/strong>A tropical wave was born somewhere over west Africa on August 26, 2017. In the coming days, it gathered strength from the warm Atlantic waters. The wave eventually became a hurricane, hurricane Irma. Irma grew into an expansive category 5 storm with sustained winds of 185 miles per hour at its peak. It slammed into Cudjoe Key, Florida, on the morning of September 10, as a category 4. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n For Lynda and Tom Ciano,<\/strong> Irma\u2019s full-throated arrival at their home in central Florida was unexpected. Forecasters predicted the storm would hug the state\u2019s west coast. But the storm shifted track.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n \u201cThe radioman said, \u2018Arcadia, you\u2019re going to get hit hard,\u2019\u201d recalls Tom Ciano. Arcadia is a mere 40 miles from the Cianos\u2019 Lake Placid home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat was a real shock when we heard that on the radio, and the darkness made it worse,\u201d says Tom. \u201cThe electricity went out. We couldn\u2019t see anything. It\u2019s one thing to go into a cage with a tiger, and it\u2019s another thing to go into a cage with a tiger when it\u2019s dark.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n For 10 hours, unidentified objects pummeled the house. \u201cIt sounded like it was being destroyed,\u201d says Tom, a retired electronics technician.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Cianos home remained standing, sustaining relatively little damage, but their neighborhood was transformed, as was their outlook on their personal well-being and that of the planet\u2019s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I was afraid of the hurricane before it hit. I\u2019m really afraid of hurricanes now,\u201d says Tom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After the storm, cell phone service was nonexistent. Gasoline to power emergency generators was nowhere to be found.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Cianos say a feeling of isolation comes from not only the lack of resources but the helplessness of authorities and neighbors alike. \u201cThere\u2019s no one to help you because everybody needs help,\u201d says Lynda, 64, a retired entrepreneur.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lynda has been disabled since 2013 and recently underwent treatment for breast cancer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhen you\u2019re disabled, you feel helpless. During (hurricane) Charlie, I was taking care of people.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tom now looks after her and says he had felt a deep sense of responsibility when he prepared for Irma\u2019s arrival. It used to be that there was \u201ca little excitement\u201d when storms were headed his way. \u201cNow, there is terror. Just the hint of something coming here terrorizes you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then there\u2019s the overwhelming empathy for others hit by natural disasters, be it fires, floods, or tornados. Hurricane Maria, which devastated Puerto Rico just a few weeks after Irma left Florida, shook the Cianos. \u201cWe see that, and we sit here crying for them,\u201d says Tom. \u201cI can\u2019t begin to understand what it must have been like for the people of Puerto Rico who went through the hurricane (Maria), and then their real struggles began. I can\u2019t imagine that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Which is why they both believe they have little to complain about. \u201cWhen I think about those people in the fires in California, and what we went through, what do we have to complain about?\u201d asks Tom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Given the state of storms in the Southeast, the Cianos say they are planning to move to Arizona, Tom\u2019s home state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe definitely wouldn\u2019t have to be afraid of hurricanes anymore, flooding, tornados, earthquakes, or any of those things,\u201d says Tom. \u201cFire would be about the worst thing we would have to worry about. It would feel a lot safer that\u2019s for sure. We have a whole list of reasons to go there, and that\u2019s one of them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Both Lynda and Tom think that the Earth has hit a \u201ctipping point\u201d when it comes to climate change. They anticipate hurricanes becoming even larger and deadlier as evinced by the changes they\u2019ve seen during their lifetimes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYou start watching for hurricanes,\u201d says Lynda. \u201cYou become hyper aware of changes in the weather\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYou can\u2019t predict anymore how big these storms are going to be,\u201d says Tom. \u201cThere\u2019s nowhere to go because these storms are so big they cover an entire state. Basically, the whole entire state has to be ready. So, there is nowhere to go. That\u2019s a pretty wild thing to think about.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tom says he used to believe that climate change wouldn\u2019t take hold until somewhere around 2075 or 2050 at the earliest. But his outlook has changed. \u201cI think it\u2019s happening now,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI\u2019m very, very, very scared and concerned. I\u2019m almost glad that we\u2019re near the end of our lives. I really don\u2019t think we\u2019re going to fix this one. I think we\u2019re talking about trying to fix it. I think maybe what we need to talk about is how we\u2019re going to live with it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Both Lynda and Tom don\u2019t know what they would tell their grown children if they should ask for their advice. What they belive though is that \u2018there\u2019s nowhere to run to.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n You can see that the kids coming up are thinking about these things very seriously,\u201d says Lynda. \u201cWe never gave it a second thought when we were their age, but now we\u2019re giving it a second thought because we\u2019re seeing how much worse it\u2019s gotten in 30 years. I saw that we were going to have an El Ni\u00f1o this year. That\u2019s means we don\u2019t get as many storms here in Florida as usual. And I thought, oh, good. But then the weather man tells us that the storms that are going to develop are going to be really bad storms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ten years ago, you knew El Ni\u00f1o wasn\u2019t going to bring storms. You breathed a sigh of relief and went on, but now there\u2019s no sigh of relief.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n