'We Dodged A Bullet': Punta Gorda Woman Waited Out Hurricane Irma In Marina High-Rise

PUNTA GORDA, FL — When Hurricane Irma was approaching the shores of Florida last weekend, it seemed like everyone in America was fearing for a loved one who would be impacted by the historic storm in one way or another. Florida is that one state where seemingly everyone knows someone who moved down there at one point in their life.

For one Punta Gorda resident named Margaret, she is that person her family and friends back home in the south suburbs of Chicago were worried about. Margaret, who asked for her last name to not be mentioned, grew up in the Chicago-area before moving to Florida's Gulf Coast some 18 years ago.

Despite living in a mandatory evacuation area, less than a mile from the Gasparilla Sound-Charlotte Harbor, Margaret decided to remain in the area during the storm. It's a decision she doesn't regret, but one she admits will not be made next time around.

Watch: Hurricane Irma's Destructive Journey By The Numbers

Predictions in the two days before the hurricane hit the Florida Keys indicated that the lower Gulf Coast may be getting the worst of the storm, with the Fort Myers-area where Margaret lives being right in that path.

"We dodged a bullet," she said. "God was good to us."

This wasn't Margaret's first rodeo when it comes to major hurricanes. She's also a survivor of Hurricane Charley in 2004, when she waited out the storm at her parents' home in nearby Port Charlotte.

"My mom and dad lost their house to Charley, and we were in that house," she said. "Before Irma came, I went by my condo and prayed to God that we wouldn't lose another (home) and thankfully we didn't."

Margaret's condo, which is located in the Burnt Store Marina less than a mile from the harbor, suffered some water damage but everything will be repairable she says.

"My parents house in Hurricane Charley... That became completely uninhabitable. We lost it."

Margaret says that while Irma was a "much stronger" storm than Charley, her area was actually more impacted by the 2004 disaster.

"But overall, Charley was small," she said. "It had none of the surge that Irma had. Irma was like a massive nuclear bomb that went off over all of Florida."

While thousands of Floridians living near the coast lines in Hurricane Irma fled inland, Margaret's plan was the opposite. The day before the hurricane hit, she went to stay with friends at a high rise building in the Grand Isle Towers (a building she called home for 14 years). That's right on the harbor that connects to the Gulf of Mexico.

"That building (the high rise on the marina) is newer and hurricane proof. It was as good as a shelter. I felt relatively safe there and was worried that my condo on the second floor would not be able to withstand the storm surge and would flood."
But, living in a mandatory evacuation area, why didn't Margaret just pack up the car and head north toward Chicago? Several family members and friends had offered her a place to stay days before Irma made her landfall in Florida.

"The fear is not being able to get back and see the damage at your own home," Margaret said. "It's the fear of the unknown, and not knowing what is happening with your stuff. Think about leaving your home and coming back only to find everything is gone."

Also, there were gas stations that "had no gas... and still have no gas" and a traffic nightmare ensued on all roads leading out of Florida.

So once the decision to stay was made, there was no turning back. Margaret was waiting out the storm of the century on the seventh floor of a high-rise with a view of the western shores of Florida.

The Gasparilla Sound-Charlotte Harbor is one of the deepest in Florida, and for that reason a popular docking spot for sail boaters. But during Irma, it all turned into just sand.

"My friend and I were in awe," Margaret said. "The water was all sucked out and the seawall exposed. We saw the tilted mast all tangled up. It was so bizarre. The mangroves (trees) that we actually thought were made of water were on their own surrounded by sand."

At that point, Margaret's fear shifted to anticipating the inevitable storm surge, but with her building at 9 feet above sea level it withstood the force.

Margaret lost all power during the storm, but was updated on its course by family in Chicago through the Zello walkie-talkie app.

"(My brother) David kept me comfortable by following the storm from home and letting me know when the eye had dissipated," she said. "That's when I went to bed. It's mentally exhausting to sit through something like this in the dark, with minimal updates on what is going on around you... That part was even worse with Charley because we did not have that app and were just waiting it out with no idea what was going on."

But even after the eye had passed, Margaret remembers waking up in the middle of the night to the wind that sounded "like a freight train hitting the building."

"That was the worst part," she said. "The storm was bad all day, but from 2 a.m. to 6 a.m. the wind sounded like nothing I've ever heard before."

"With this storm, the wind direction changed so suddenly. You could tell when and how it was hitting the buildings."

Less than a week after Irma passed the lower Gulf and ultimately weakened into a tropical storm, Margaret was on the phone outside her condo building "as if nothing unusual happened."

"I'm looking out the window at a sunny blue sky and you'd never know a storm just flew by," she told Patch Friday morning. "But I'm standing at a distance. If you look closer, you see the trees that are down, the debris, the pool that is green because of all the debris that fell in it and pieces of siding here and there."

Back at her condo that's a bit inland, Margaret said she returned Monday with "tears in my eyes."

"Some condos with end units had quite a bit of water, but overall they held up structurally well," she said. "I looked up to God before I left there (before the hurricane) and asked him not to take another house from us. On Monday morning I had tears in my eyes because he had listened to our prayers. Everything is replaceable."

Margaret is just one of the millions of Floridians the rest of the 49 states worried about last weekend. Her story is one of many that show the determination and pride of those in that state. A state that's long been a destination spot for the rest of the country with places like the Keys, Disney World and year-round beaches on both coasts.

Others who have lived in the state for longer have been through several more hurricanes than Margaret and may even decide to wait out the next one.

But not Margaret. Two is enough for this native Chicago South Sider.

"After Charley and after Irma, I promised my family that before the next named storm that comes to Southwest Florida, I am buying an airline ticket and coming back to Chicago," she said. "I'm not going to stick around for a third."

Top photo: A view from out Margaret's window while the hurricane was at its peak last Sunday. Provided