WAKULLA COUNTY, FL — With hurricane season days away, the Wakulla County Sheriff's Office is hosting its first-ever Brewing Prevention and Preparedness sit-down discussions for residents.
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Deputies will be at Lunar Bay coffee shop in Crawfordville from 9 a.m. to noon on Friday, May 29, to answer questions and talk through hurricane preparedness in a more intimate setting.
Capt. Brett Surace of the Wakulla County Sheriff's Office said the format is intentional.
"We host a lot of events where we're hosting the event, or we are part of partners in different events where we're at, but there tends to be a lot of people there. We have interactions, but people really don't have that intimate setting where they can really ask personal questions or talk a little more in depth about their situation," Surace said.
Wakulla County is a coastal community that is especially vulnerable to hurricanes, both from wind and water. Emergency management officials say storm surge is among the most serious threats residents face.
Jennifer Nagy, the Wakulla County Emergency Management Director, said residents need to understand the difference between wind and water dangers.
"What people really, really need to focus on is the dangers of storm surge, and we're in a very surge-prone county. So, our evacuations are based more on our surge zones than they are on wind. While wind is important and it's dangerous, we generally tell people that you can hide from the wind, but you have to run from the water, right?" Nagy said.
Nagy also cautioned against assuming storms will miss the area.
"Sometimes there's a misconception now that they're all going to turn, they're not going to hit here, and that's strictly not true, right? What you should take away from that is there's little deviations in track can make a big difference in damage, but what that also means is the storm could have been headed towards Taylor and turned towards us, right?" Nagy said.
Residents say the opportunity to ask questions before a storm hits is valuable. Victoria McCrelass moved to Wakulla County in late 2024 from South Florida and said she has not yet experienced a hurricane in the area.
"For me, being new in the area, I really need to like know where are those evacuation centers and zones? I'm used to that in South Florida, having to be aware because I was close to the coastline, and then up here I feel like I'm not so familiar with this coastline and how the weather affects it. So that's my biggest thing. I kind of want to just know where that fast place to go is," McCrelass said.
The sheriff's office says it hopes to hold more of these discussions throughout hurricane season to continue getting information out to residents.
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