DAVIS ISLANDS, Fla. — Right on the water on Davis Islands sits one of the most critical parts of our community: Tampa General Hospital.
"We are a 100-year-old hospital on an island, and we're also the most acute, highly specialized hospital in the region, so our patients are the sickest," said TGH's Vice President of Facilities and Construction, Dustin Pasteur.
Despite its location, Pasteur says evacuating during a hurricane isn't an option.
"There are not enough hospital beds to take our critical patients, moving them is more dangerous than protecting in place," he said.
Since 2021, the hospital has used Aqua Fence to protect the facilities.
"[It] is a deployable flood wall system that takes our elevation on campus from eight feet up to about 15 feet above sea level. It takes our team about three days to install it. About 60 guys are out here all day, sun up to sundown," Pasteur explained.
Typically, Davis Islands isn't too impacted by storms, but as we see a shift in flood patterns, the hospital isn't taking any chances.
"The first time we actually saw water around this campus with any magnitude was last year with Hurricane Idalia. We had about two and a half feet of water right back here where we're standing," he added.
The fence isn't the only safety measure.
"We've got two generator plants right here behind me that have 100% redundant power for the campus. So if we were to lose TECO power, we would be able to generate our own and we have some redundancy in case we were to lose an engine. And we even have two redundant fuel sources, so we've got diesel and natural gas available for those. We've got redundant water, so if we were to lose city water, we have a well system that will allow us to keep our air conditioning running and have drinking water. And we bring in 14 truckloads of food and supplies that we loaded into the hospital yesterday so that we can weather about five days worth of storm."
The hospital got a head start on preparation, hoping to make their response during and after the storm stronger.
"I remember last year, Idalia took this same path, and it came really fast, and we felt like we didn't have enough time to fully prepare. We ended up getting it all done, but it was a huge lift to be able to get that," he said. "So this year, on Sunday night, we decided that Monday we're just going to start putting up the Aqua Fence, when really the storm track hadn't even been identified."
Elsewhere on the island, people are preparing to evacuate.
"I've got to get my mother out of there," said Linda Falk-Howard.
Linda Falk-Howard tells us Debby was the first time she's ever struggled to move around the island she's lived on her whole life.
"I tried three different ways. I live on East Davis. She lives on Riviera. We could not get to her house," she said.
Now they're all evacuating to the ballast point area with Lloyd Mazer.
"I take it seriously. This one, they look pretty definite on where it's going to go, so I don't think we're going to have a bad wind. That's the surge that we're worried about, and that's why we're not going to stay on the island," he said.
Meteorologist Denis Phillips provides an update on Hurricane Helene.
