Overview

Hurricane Ian is a Category 4 hurricane threatening Florida, Cuba and the Southern United States in late September 2022. After Hurricane Fiona, it is the second major hurricane to form in the 2022 Gulf of Mexico hurricane season. Following widespread news coverage of the storm approaching the coast of the U.S., Hurricane Ian generated significant memes, discussions and other online posts referencing it, including memes about meteorologist Jim Cantore, Florida Man jokes, hurricane snacks, etc.

Background

Hurricane Ian began developing from a tropical wave of moisture and heat that crossed Africa around September 6th, 2022. On September 12th, the storm formed in the waters off Bermuda and was officially named.^[1] The storm gathered intensity as it drifted north and west, and by September 27th, it was a Category 3 hurricane lashing the western part of Cuba, leading to up to 12 inches of rain in a few hours (shown below, left).^[2]

Predictions show Hurricane Ian making landfall in Florida sometime on Wednesday, September 28th, 2022, possibly getting even stronger before it arrives (shown below, right). The federal government and Florida state authorities urged residents to prepare.^[3] On September 28th, the storm was then updated to a Cat 4 hurricane.^[9]

Online Reactions

Beginning around September 23rd, 2022, as Hurricane Ian was upgraded from a tropical storm and named, discussions and increasing news coverage began to appear online, as well as memes and other jokes from users on social media.^[10] Particularly in Florida around the week of the 23rd leading up to Ian making landfall on the 28th, Floridians especially started to react online to the storm.

Floridians Brace For Storm

Online, many in Florida and elsewhere shared reactions to how the storm impacted their daily lives beginning around late September. For example, Instagram user omgitswicks, who received just over 32,000 views in two hours on September 27th, 2022, shared their reaction to the amount of time the storm took to make landfall with a lackadaisical demeanor.^[7] This sentiment from Floridians is commonly observed during hurricanes approaching Florida by users online, such as Hurricane Irma in 2017.

On September 27th, 2022, the college humor-themed Instagram meme account collegebangerstampa also shared mixed feelings about the storm's arrival and the interruption of regular life, earning almost 600 likes in less than a day (seen below).^[8]

Ron DeSantis References

Many early reactions online focused on the personality of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, whose attention-grabbing actions (like busing migrants to Martha's Vineyard weeks before the hurricane) and rumored candidacy for the 2024 presidential election helped to place him in the spotlight as Hurricane Ian approached his state. Some posters, such as Twitter user @NoUseForTrump who received over 20,000 likes in a day for their September 26th, 2022, tweet (seen below, left), compared the help offered to Florida by the federal government as the storm neared Florida to DeSantis' perceived lack of cooperation with the Biden Administration.^[4] Others joked about assigning gender-neutral pronouns to the hurricane and involving it in the culture wars, such as Twitter user @natsechobbyist, who received over 36,000 likes in a few hours for a tweet to that effect on September 27th, 2022 (seen below, right).^[5]

Accidental Fox News Penis

During a September 26th, 2022, news broadcast, Fox News meteorologist Bryan Norcross described and illustrated the likely path of Hurricane Ian. In doing so, he inadvertently drew a shape that many commenters online took to be phallic, leading to much merriment and mockery. For example, on September 27th, Twitter^[6] user @MikeSington posted about the gaffe, receiving over 2,600 likes in less than 24 hours (shown below).

Fox News Weather turns Hurricane Ian into a penis…with testicles. pic.twitter.com/dQc1JAECEx

— Mike Sington (@MikeSington) September 27, 2022

Waffle House Closure

On September 28th, 2022, it was announced that the Waffle House corporation had closed down 21 restaurants in the Tampa surrounding region all the way up to Orlando, causing a panic amongst Floridians. This is because of the Waffle House Index, which indicates that if a Waffle House is closed, it's because the expected natural disaster is going to be catastrophic in nature. Memes about the Waffle House Closures quickly started to spread around Twitter, with the Twitter user @jswtreeman^[11] (shown below).

External References