The Bucs, Charley and Elena
(August 17, 2004)

A hurricane has its sights on the Tampa Bay area forcing the largest evacuation in history. Even local television stations are forced to leave their studios. Residents watch the storm wobble and wonder if the area's long hurricane drought is over. A Tampa Bay Buccaneers preseason game becomes a footnote in the story. Sound familiar? Hurricane Charley? Actually, this describes Hurricane Elena in 1985.

Over that Labor Day weekend, Elena looked as if it was going to hit the Mississippi area. Then, a frontal trough pushed the strong category one storm towards the west coast of Florida. A category two storm heading to Tampa Bay with ten coastal counties ordering the evacuation 100's of thousands of people. In the end, the Tampa Bay area was sparred. Again, this was Elena, not Charley.

Hurricane Charley was projected to landfall at the mouth of Tampa Bay and those at points east thought they would be out of harm's way. Even though there were inland wind warnings, and the actual storm path was within the forecast swath, many were expecting a coastal event. While training near Orlando, the Bucs were worried about the folks back in Tampa Bay, Charley's path took the storm right over central Florida.

Training at the Disney sports complex at Celebration, the Buccaneers witnessed the fury of the hurricane first hand. Head coach Jon Gruden talked to the media the morning after the storm. "It was wild, it was unbelievable. The force that was displayed last night was something I had never seen and it's amazing that the damages were not maybe here what they might have been. When you drive to practice and you see 1,200-1,500-pound palm trees ripped out of the ground and thrown around the street, hundreds and hundreds of them, it lets you know how lucky you are to make it through the night. I just hope everybody's okay. I really feel for the people down in Fort Myers and the places that were really hit hard by the hurricane."

The Bucs were scheduled to play the preseason opener on Saturday, but the game was moved to Monday night. It was obviously a minor inconvenience compared to what those in the devastated areas of southwest and central Florida are going through. The Bucs, along with Florida's other NFL teams, are working to help with the relief efforts.

During Charley, just like Elena, television stations were effected by the evacuation order. Back in the 1985, WTOG (Channel 44) had to leave its studios. WTOG was broadcasting the Bucs preseason games at the time and a tape of a loss to the Washington Redskins was about all that was taken to a remote broadcast location. WTOG showed that tape continuously over the weekend. The Redskins' charter was the last flight out of Tampa International Airport before it was closed for almost two days.

Last weekend, just as almost two decades earlier, a Buccaneers preseason game is footnote in this area's hurricane history.