Alex Boerner

Summer Wind

The summer of 2004 brought a record four hurricanes to Florida’s shores. Two of the four, Frances and Jeanne, directly hit the Treasure Coast within three weeks of each other, bringing residents a month of relentless conditions that many are still recovering from in some way.

Winnie Trudeau evaluates the duct tape job she applied to the outside of the front windows of her manufactured home in the Barefoot Bay mobile home community in Micco, FL. She was preparing her home for the impending hurricane and then leaving to stay with her son in Coral Springs, FL. Trudeau, who went through hurricane Irene in 1999, has a grim perspective of the coming storm. "I've worked hard all my life and now I'm going to lose everything. It's depressing. I don't know why I bother taping the windows because I probably won't have a house when I come back," she said.
   
Wayne Williams, of Vero Beach, sits in a crowded hallway at the Oslo Middle School, in Vero Beach, FL, where hundreds of people from Indian River County are being given shelter from hurricane Frances, which is scheduled to make landfall on Saturday. Many at the shelter arrived Thursday afternoon and evening, expecting an earlier arrival of the slow moving storm.
   
From left, Elisa Green, Yashira Estrella, 12, Cor'nasia Potter, 5, and Dottie Powers, all of Vero Beach, participate in a prayer circle the morning of Friday September 3, at the Oslo Middle School, in Vero Beach, FL, where hundreds of people were being given shelter from hurricane Frances, scheduled to make landfall on Saturday. "We started this praying yesterday, and you can see this hurricane is now all confused," said Powers, commenting on the fact that Frances dropped from a category four to a category three Thursday evening.
     
  
Cameron Schneider finds his cat underneath the sink as Hurricane Jeanne approaches.
   
Oslo Middle School shelter manager, Marie Blanchard, with the Red Cross, takes a power nap in the cafeteria during the end of lunch at the shelter. Despite the stress that came with managing hundreds of unsettled strangers who were forced to live together in a small middle school for an unknown amount of time, Blanchard and other Red Cross volunteers worked non-stop to make the stay at the shelter as comfortable as possible.
   
Denisse Rodriguez, 20, holds her head in her hands in frustration and exhaustion after being in the Oslo Middle School Shelter, in Vero Beach, FL, for three days since Thursday afternoon when people first started coming to the shelter. Many were frustrated as they tried to coexist in a small space with strangers, failing bathrooms, humidity seeping into the school pods, and police who would take smoke breaks while everyone else had to stay inside.
     
  
Louise Ebanks, of Vero Beach, FL, stares through the rain covered doors of the shelter outside into the courtyard of the Oslo Middle School Sunday afternoon, after the storm shutters were opened and people were allowed to leave the protective pods of the shelter in Vero Beach, FL. Heavy winds from hurricane Frances had passed, and people staying at the shelter were allowed to leave the campus Sunday afternoon at 3 pm, three days after the doors opened.
   
Matt Ratliff, of Vero Beach, uses a metal detector to search the beach in front of the Vero Beach Inn Resort Monday afternoon in Vero Beach, FL. The Vero Beach Inn Resort, already damaged by Hurricane Frances, was hit again by Hurricane Jeanne while about a dozen people, mainly employees of the Inn and their family members, rode out the storm in the landmark building.
   
Rebecca Davis looks up at the damage done to the ceiling of the house where she lives in the Laurelwood development in Vero Beach, FL, with her boyfriend, Mark Master. The ceiling in many of the rooms of the house collapsed after the roof took in too much rainwater from hurricane Frances to hold.
     
  
Michael Dancisin, 19, center, in green, squints as chainsaws begin to cut into the large trees that blocked the driveway to his grandfather's property on 27th Avenue in Vero Beach, FL, after they were blown down by hurricane Frances. From left are Mike Dancisin, Juan Bello, Michael Dancisin and Jeff Coleman.
   
Rebecca Davis, left center, finds a moment of laughter in the flood while her neighbors attempt to un-clog a drain in an effort to clear the water from the street.
   
     
  
   
Sally Constantini, of Micco, FL, takes a drink of water, trying to stay cool while waiting in line at the emergency disaster relief station near Barefoot Bay, FL, a mobile home community that was hit hard by the hurricanes. "I was hoping I could get a tarp or something. If my roof starts leaking again, I'm in trouble," said Constantini, whose home sustained roof damage. People began showing up earlier than 7 am for the relief. Brevard County Sheriff's Deputies and Red Cross Volunteers handed out water and umbrellas for people to keep cool until relief showed up around 12:30 pm.
   
"It's gold," said Christina Lape, of Barefoot Bay, who got a handfull of ice before the trucks containing bags of ice showed up at the emergency disaster relief site Tuesday afternoon in Barefoot Bay. People who waited in line received five bags of ice per family.
     
  
Sarah Whitehead, 7, rips open a bag of cereal while sitting in her parents' car with her brother, Sach Huskey, 3. The children and their parents, like many other residents, were left without a place to live after the hurricane, and have been living out of their car and in shelters. They were hoping to get more than just ice at the disaster relief site. For people who lost their homes, shelters still provided the best place for temporary housing said Cindy Flachmeier, Program Director for the Salvation Army Domestic Violence Program, who was helping out at the relief site. "It's a safe place to be, and there's food. It may not be the best food, but it's there."
   
Matt Guthrie, 23, makes his way through the fallen trees and flood waters on a road near the Wabasso Causeway that leads to the Indian River. Matt and his brother, Jesse Guthrie, 20, who are not residents of the barrier Island, were going to try to paddle across the river to get to the ocean to surf. "We're not trying to loot or anything, we just want to catch some waves. It's not every day you get to catch hurricane waves," said Matt.
   
Marjorie Hale, 25, of Sebastian, looks for shells along the Wabasso beach, where the only remnant of the convenience station left standing was a toilet.
     
  
   
  
"This is my apartment," says Pennylynn O'Farrell, as she throws pieces of aluminum siding into a large scrap metal pile at Mr. Scrap Wednesday afternoon in Gifford, FL. During Hurricane Frances and Jeanne, scrapyards took in unusually large amounts of scrap metal.
     
  
Michelle Tuz, of Vero Beach, went through 2004's hurricanes while simultaneously enduring chemotherapy treatments to fight cancer. Tuz attended a hurricane support group following the storms, which she credits for giving her the tools to deal with her situation at the time. A year later, and nearly recovered from both the hurricane damage and treatments, she says she has a modified outlook on life. "I do whatever I want, whenever I want to," says Tuz, who decided to run through a sprinkler while out for an evening walk around the Waterford Estates community where she lives. "Usually when you get upset it's not because of something you're doing, but because of what's going on around you. I have a little more tolerance for all people, because you really don't know what's going on with them. And even though you may have yourself all together, I realized that it can all be taken away from you like that, without any of your doing."