background. plenty of businesses boarded up. this area, the geography, if you were just to look at a map of this part of florida, the big bend, it's in the shape of a "c." it catches all the water from approaching hurricanes. that is why this region is so susceptible to storm surge. and also considering that much of the area is without the helpful nature of some of the sea islands that protect so much of the coastline of florida. there's st. george's island off the coast. if you go a little further to the east, then you're without the barrier island. that means that it is very likely that we'll see the storm surge of 13 feet. that's what they're calling for. we know what that means. that's 13 feet above any particular location from where you're standing. that would easily inundate homes up through the first floor. i saw a hurricane storm surge benchmark from hurricane dennis back in 2005.