Word from Melbourne, FL during Hurricane Frances. Florida Tech moved all their better boats into the FIT gym on Thursday prior to the arrival of Hurricane Frances. All remaining boats that were stored outside were moved into the boathouse and the boathouse was boarded up.

Currently, we are in about 50+ mph winds with higher gusts. I live right on the river where we row at the 1500m mark of our practice course. This is one mile south of the Melbourne Causeway (US 192). The entire area across the river has been evacuated. Storm surge on the ocean is expected at about 6 feet with 15 to 25 foot waves on top of that. Could see the ocean get over the dunes into the wonderful beachfront condo world.

It is very gusty and windy right on the river. There is nothing to break the wind here with the river being 1.5 miles wide and only the barrier island between us and the ocean. We are about 12 feet above the height of the river and unlikely to have any flooding problems.

Waves are crashing to the level of my neighbors dock and also breaking just below the level of our seawall.

We feel reasonably secure, but the worst will come later today and tonight. Once the storm passes below us (which we think it will do and not hit us directly), the winds will shift the other way and hit everything from the other side.

Our men's coach, Marc Mandel, lives on the beach in Indialantic where much of the news crews are trying to broadcast from the ocean. He evacuated to the mainland into the GlassGard offices in downtown Melbourne. Both those offices and our home are equipped with 3M Scotchshield window film and can withstand substantial impact and wind forces.

If we remain with power, I will try to send and update later.

The river would be considered unrowable now.

See you all at the Head of the Charles if everything makes it through OK. :)