PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — Residents in Pinellas County are preparing for possible impacts from the tropical system making its way toward Florida.
Many homeowners say they are a little concerned after experiencing flood issues with unnamed storms over the last month.
"To see that at the top, going over, and washing cars into it, yeah, it was concerning for sure," said resident Simon Edwards.
Just a few weeks ago, a regular afternoon storm caused major flooding in the neighborhood along Burlington Avenue in St. Petersburg.
"It started overflowing it was washing cars into it, it was crazy and that's nothing we had seen before…so clearly things are getting worse and that's quite alarming," said Edwards.
The Bear Creek Canal overflowed with debris, and water made its way into people's homes.
With a new tropical system heading towards Florida, residents are concerned.
"But then this last rain brought this huge flood, so it's definitely nerve-racking," said Tiffani Clemmer, another resident.
Tiffani Clemmer said she's preparing early.
"We are definitely trying to get rid of some things in our garage that we can move everything to the front of it, so in case of the rain coming into the garage, nothing is damaged, as well as getting sandbags to cover our front door and the area in front of our garage," said Clemmer.
Edwards has the same idea.
"We will get sandbags, I'll gas the cars up in case we need to get out. We will keep an eye on it and see where it's tracking," said Edwards.
"You kind of think of yeah, another storm, it'll blow past, it'll blow over, it wont hit us. We've been fairly lucky in this area, but you just can't take things for granted, you've got to prepare because otherwise you'll pay the price," said Edwards.
Pinellas County Commissioners are scheduled to consider a state of local emergency on Tuesday, and Pinellas County and St. Pete crews are cleaning out drains and ditches that tend to flood.
Clemmer is preparing for the worst and hoping for the best.
"It's a lot of replacing, and not being able to live in the home situation, and then as well as our cars of course. So it's definitely nerve-racking," said Clemmer.
Back-to-back storm events brought record storm surge, rainfall and winds to the Tampa Bay region. The question some are asking now isn’t where people should rebuild, but where we should let nature regain control.
