This Week on the Island 09/25/2005

"There's a church in Key West called the St. Mary's Star of the Sea Roman Catholic Church. In 1922, a nun built a "hurricane grotto" on the grounds of the church in memory of the 600 who died during the great Atlantic-Gulf hurricane of Sept. 10, 1919, a Category 4 hurricane that made a direct hit on Key West (before storms were named). The nun vowed that as long as the grotto stood, Key West would not suffer the brunt of another hurricane.

"Key West residents regularly make pilgrimages to the grotto to pray for protection from hurricanes. And so far, the grotto has worked--no Key West resident has died from a hurricane strike since the 1919 hurricane.

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'This week on the Island' is written by Doug Bennett and is an update to friends about happenings in Key West last week. Everything is true except for those parts that are lies.
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The Weather: Rita, the third hurricane to 'visit' Key West this hurricane season, came this week. Lots of wind and a little rain. Hurricane Rita was 300 miles wide and moving at about 10 miles an hour. Calculate that and you can see that Key West was in the storm for over 30 hour. The eye of Rita passed 50 miles south of Key West. The worst of the storm was after the eye had passed and we started getting wind out of the south clocked at 85 MPH. The eye of Katrina passed 50 miles north of Key West with winds in Key West at 80 MPH and was very wet and flooded the city, and the eye of Dennis passed 60 miles west of Key West with winds of 75 MPH.

Key West, You have got to love it
'Meet me at the end of the road' - Conky Tonkin'- Jimmy Buffett
Doug Bennett
Lat 24.5597N, Long 81.8016W