Hurricane Matthew, October 6, 2016 · · PAGE 30.

October 6, 2016: This page contains images of the property taken before Hurricane Matthew approached the Melbourne, Florida area with the eye passing about 20 miles offshore in the Atlantic Ocean.  Winds at the Melbourne International Airport peaked around 70 MPH.  The airport is located about FIVE miles north of our home.  This photo shows the rental car I used during a company road trip that began on Saturday morning, September 24, 2016 and ended with my return late Wednesday night, October 5, 2016.  The winds were starting to pickup as I took this photo at 6:52 PM on Thursday, October 6.  The highest winds are expected between 2 AM and 4 AM on Friday, October 7.  All our vehicles were moved to the north end of the old golf course access road to get clear of the "fall zone" if any of the big trees should be uprooted by the expected high winds that were forecast to be as high as 140 MPH if the EYE of the hurricane should come here.

I was using forced flash in the photo above.  That is why you see all the reflectors on the car, and the one I have adjacent to the storm drain are all glowing in the image above.  The image below shows the storm shutters closed and locked in front of the living room windows.

I had some thoughts about the boat moving around if the winds get strong enough.

I wanted to show the lawn was relatively clear of any Spanish moss from the trees.  There was a thunder storm here a few days before I returned home.  I picked up the debris from that one and had it all in my trash can before the start of the hurricane winds.  The focus is soft on this image because of the fading light as sunset approaches.

Here is another view of the boat and its trailer.  A smaller trailer is chained to the bigger one.  The red reflector from my bicycle is glowing in the garage.

This view is looking southwest showing our vehicles away from the "fall zone" of the trees in the yard beyond.  They are all parked on the asphalt road that ends here.  There is a drainage ditch not seen here just west of the vehicles.  A lot of water flows off the golf course via that ditch and the large concrete culvert that runs under our yard and driveway and underground to the Tillman Canal behind the lots and homes on the south side of Meadowbrook Road in front of our house.

The moss in the trees is being blown by the north wind from the approaching hurricane.  The tall grass beyond the cars at the edge of the asphalt and before the drainage ditch is also being blown south by the wind from the north.  The cars are pointed into the wind and close together.

Here is my last photo before sunset and getting inside to ride out the storm that will come overnight.  The gutter down spouts were all checked before we headed in for the night.  I checked the ones we could see from the Florida room during the storm and they were flowing well.  I had the foresight to rake away any leaves that would restrict the drainage from the down spout at the NW corner of the Florida room.