Overview

Hurricane Michael is a category 3 hurricane that threatened northern Florida and the Gulf Coast of the United States in October 2018.

Background

On October 8th, 2018, the National Hurricane Service announced that Hurricane Michael could make landfall on October 10th, 2018 "as a Category 3 hurricane, with sustained winds of at least 111 miles per hour."^[1]

Developments

Official Response

Shortly after the storm was detected, government officials spoke to their consituents about the severity of the storm. Governor Rick Scott said, "This storm will be life-threatening and extremely dangerous."

That day, Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum suspended his gubernatorial campaign to focus on the storm.^[2] He said, "This will be a life-threatening event. We’ve got to ensure that folks are being smart in the aftermath of the storm, that they keep themselves and family members safe until after the first responders can get in and obviously the recovery process will start after that."

That day, three Florida counties ordered evacuation in anticipation of the Hurricane, including Gulf County, Wakulla County and Bay County.^[3]

Online Presence

Prior to the hurricane's landfall, people online joked about the hurricane, photoshopping images of other cultural "Michaels" onto images of the hurricanes path. For example, Instagram ^[4] user @bloodybreakdown photoshopped an image of Michael Myers from the Halloween series of horror films onto the hurricane's path (shown below, left). Instagram^[5] user @threadishshop posted an image of photographs of Michael Scott from the American television comedy series The Office photoshopped over the hurricane's path (shown below, right).

Search Interest

External References