New Hurricane Season's New Fears

In 13 years with Louisiana's National Guard, Capt. Bryan Gardner has worked his share of hurricanes. He has rescued flooded residents, hauled out soaked debris and experienced what it's like to be greeted as a hero.

"These people just went through the scariest night of their lives, and they were thankful that we were there," he says.

Now Gardner is training for deployment to the war on terror. And while he couldn't talk about his final destination, he knows "the reception won't be quite as warm."

Gardner is far from alone; many troops who otherwise would be preparing for another hurricane season are overseas or on their way. Still, National Guard officials say those who remain on the homefront are fully capable of handling a big storm.

Nearly one-third of Louisiana's Army and Air National Guard troops are in Iraq or are getting ready to go overseas. North Carolina has sent 45 percent of its soldiers to Iraq or Afghanistan, the largest such call-up since World War II.

Of all the Gulf Coast and Atlantic states likely to be slammed by a hurricane, Louisiana's and North Carolina's Guards are the hardest hit by the war on terror. But even they say there are plenty of soldiers ready to respond if a hurricane strikes.

"Even with a large-scale disaster, that would not overtax our abilities in the state," says North Carolina Guard spokesman Lt. Col. Barney Barnhill. "We can handle any disaster that may come up."

Added Louisiana Guard spokesman Dusty Shenofsky: "We will never be in a position that our community and state manpower is so low that we cannot handle state emergencies."

Mark Allen, a spokesman at National Guard headquarters in Arlington, Va., says there is no legal requirement, but every state strives to have at least 50 percent of its guard personnel at home to meet all kinds of natural or security disasters.

In addition, states agree to help each other if they ever are short-handed. Those deals are usually among adjacent states. Louisiana has agreements with Mississippi, Texas and Arkansas.

North Carolina has agreements with Tennessee, South Carolina, Virginia and Georgia, but sometimes sends its Guard even farther afield: It sent troops to help California fight wildfires last year, even as Hurricane Isabel threatened.

The wartime pressure on Guard troops has come at a time when their responsibilities on the homefront in the post-Sept. 11 era have moved far beyond hurricanes and other natural disasters. They have been involved in patrolling airports and guarding ports, and have provided security for special events such as the Super Bowl and Mardi Gras.

"The National Guard is now 46 percent of active duty services, and are much more heavily relied upon in times of combat than we ever used to be," Shenofsky says. "And our missions just keep increasing."

North Carolina is tops among hurricane-prone states in both the percentage and actual number of Guard soldiers deployed. Of 11,500 troops, 5,200 are overseas, most in Iraq and about a dozen in Afghanistan.

Louisiana's Guard has 4,000 of its 12,500 troops either in Iraq or training for duty there. That leaves 8,500 at home - more than enough, officials say, to handle back-to-back storms such as those in 2002, when Tropical Storm Isidore was followed a week later by Hurricane Lili.

Other hurricane-prone states appear to be better equipped in case a big one hits.

Florida, Virginia and South Carolina have each deployed about a quarter of their Guard troops deployed. Alabama is at 20 percent, Georgia nearly 18 percent, and Texas and Mississippi have about 10 percent.

Florida's Guard currently has more than 3,000 troops deployed, out of 10,000 Army and 2,000 Air Guard members. Most of Florida's deployed troops are providing security for Air Force bases within the United States.

Even in the state's worst storm - Andrew, which smashed Florida with 145-mph winds and caused $30.5 billion damage in 1992 - only 4,000 troops were called in and most were home within a few weeks, says Florida National Guard spokesman Lt. Col. Ron Tittle.

Texas may be in the best shape of any big coastal state. Only 2,000 troops are deployed, leaving 18,000 that could be tapped to respond to a major disaster.

Lt. Col. John Stanford says the Texas Guard usually responds to a disaster on the scale of a hurricane with no more than 1,500 troops.

In Louisiana, there are still enough troops to make hurricane duty a volunteer job in most storms. The current call-up is, of course, mandatory.

Helen Wagenseller's second-story dining room is so close to the water's edge, she became seasick the first time she peered out the window.

Her home sits among 1,600 others on this tiny island created from the spoils of a dredging project and protected only by a shallow, 4½-mile perimeter sea wall. In the 35 years since it was developed, the island has escaped with only glancing blows from hurricanes, a fitting streak for what some see as a charmed spot.

"You'd be hard-pressed to find any place like it," says Wagenseller's husband, Bruce. "It's our little bit of paradise."

But lesser storms have already pushed the water within 2 inches of the top of the wall and residents who live in this eclectic mix of traditional two-stories and mobile homes know it wouldn't take much more to send a surge spilling over.

"It's kind of a sitting duck," admits Blaine Ellingson, the neighborhood chiropractor who wrote a book about the island 45 miles north of West Palm Beach. "I wonder how many times you can roll the dice and be missed."

More than 50 million people now live along the nation's hurricane-prone coastlines - nearly double the number since 1970 - and most are more than willing to trade the storm threat and skyrocketing insurance rates for postcard-perfect vistas.

But with every year that passes without a devastating storm, the odds increase that the luck will someday run out.

This year, noted hurricane forecaster Bill Gray predicted a 71 percent chance of an intense hurricane hitting the U.S. coastline, something that hasn't happened since Hurricane Andrew smashed into South Florida in 1992 with 165-mph winds - killing 43 people and causing $31 billion in damage.

"This can't keep going. Climatology will eventually right itself," Gray warned. "We're going to see hurricane damage like you've never seen it."

His 2004 forecast calls for nearly 50 percent more storms and hurricanes than the typical season, with 14 storms, eight of them hurricanes, and three of those powerful.

It also deems the East Coast and the Florida peninsula as most vulnerable, with a 52 percent chance of getting hit. The Gulf Coast, from the Florida Panhandle to Brownsville, Texas, has a slightly better chance of being spared but still faces a 40 percent probability of seeing a hurricane make landfall.

Despite the lingering threat, the pace of development in vulnerable places continues unabated.

Even in areas covered by the federal Coastal Barrier Resources Act - which discourages development by withholding money for flood insurance, road repair and disaster relief - the sounds of sawing and hammering echo across the dunes.

About two thirds of the town of North Topsail Beach, N.C. - including the town hall - is in the so-called "cobra" zone. Yet when Hurricane Fran destroyed 350 homes there eight years ago, the federal government approved $6 million to rebuild damaged infrastructure.

Last year, the town approved construction of 94 single-family homes and eight new duplexes, about quadruple the number OK'd two years earlier. About half of those were in "cobra" zones.

"It doesn't necessarily seem to be slowing down development," Town Manager Tom Betz says of the federal disincentive. "I think most real estate people will tell you it's location, location, location ... and oceanfront is a great location."

Joe Minor, a retired civil engineering professor from Houston, says new homes built to current international code standards should fare well during most big storms. But he says the codes are only as good as their enforcement, and enforcement tends to be better in places that have experienced a major storm - like Miami with Hurricane Andrew and Charleston, S.C., with Hugo.

"Outside of those two places, there hasn't been a hurricane in 20 years - a severe hurricane," says Minor, now a private consultant on wind-resistant construction. "And that means Houston. That means New Orleans. That means Mobile, Pensacola. That means Tampa, Jacksonville."

It seems only those who have lived through a big hurricane can really understand the disaster it wreaks.

Marjory Wentworth moved to South Carolina's Sullivans Island in 1989, six weeks before Hurricane Hugo blasted the coast with its 135-mph winds. The water was several feet deep on the first floor and it was a year before the house was repaired and could be lived in again.

"It's not about property damage. ... It's so destructive in so many other ways. Your life is on hold for so long. It changes you. It's like going through a death or surviving a horrible illness," says Wentworth, the state's poet laureate. "This island looked like someone dropped bombs on it. It's a very humbling thing."

Miami-Dade County, hit by Andrew in 1992, has developed the strictest new building code in the nation. Florida also set some tougher statewide hurricane standards in 2000. The comprehensive code is based on national models which outline high-risk areas for storm damage and cover roofing requirements, window protections, inspections and other issues.

But even in places where the memory of devastation is still fresh, there are gaps.

The town of Mount Pleasant, just across the Cooper River Bridge from Charleston, chose not to adopt the portion of the international code that covers wind-borne debris protection. Part of the reason was a provision requiring shatter-resistant glass.

"It's also ax-resistant," says building inspector Jeff Ball. In the case of a fire, "you'd have to chop the window all the way into the sash. Meantime, you're dying inside."

A study by Applied Insurance Research of Boston found that if all structures in South Florida met the requirements of Florida's new building code, losses would be reduced by about 40 percent in another Andrew. But experts agree that even the strictest codes that have reinforced everything from homes to traffic light poles could never make cities invincible.

To make buildings even safer, the Institute for Business & Home Safety in Tampa helped develop tougher standards that evaluate the risk cities face because of their location and the needs produced by threatening weather.

From Texas to Maine, these standards reduce the impact from the torrential rain, flooding, storm surges and devastating winds associated with hurricanes.

Some changes proposed by the institute, a nonprofit agency funded by the insurance industry, are as simple as using more nails or installing a thicker roof, says spokeswoman Wendy Fontaine. Other changes include strengthening the connection between the roof, walls and foundation, which could help distribute wind force throughout the home.

"Sometimes when we're buying a home, we look at countertops and carpeting, but we don't necessarily consider how safe the location of the home can be," Fontaine says. "We want to go to the mountains, we want to go to the shores. But that also poses a risk. So if you're choosing to live in harm's way, you can make wiser choices about how to build."

Dale Buchanan's newfound wisdom came at a premium.

Buchanan's Belle Fontaine Beach, Miss., home was heavily damaged by Hurricane Georges, which tore through the Caribbean, the Florida Keys and the Gulf Coast, in 1998. Since then, he has installed storm shutters and spent $18,000 to pour 2,300 pounds of concrete into a sea wall "to keep it from washing away in the next storm."

Still, his insurance deductible doubled to $2,000 and his premiums more than tripled to $2,800 a year.

"There's not much I can do about it if we get hit."