by Michael Snyder, End Of The American Dream:

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.  Hurricane Michael was supposed to be a relatively minor storm as hurricanes go, but it just kept getting stronger and stronger as it approached the Florida panhandle.  And when it finally did make landfall, it was an absolutely monstrous storm with sustained maximum winds of 155 miles per hour.  If those winds had reached 157 miles per hour, it would have been a Category 5 storm.  It truly was a “lawnmower from the sky” that shredded just about everything it encountered as it slammed into a part of the country that was very ill-prepared for a storm of this magnitude.  Hundreds of thousands of people are already without power, and as you will see below, one major outlet is warning that “most of the area will be uninhabitable for weeks or months”.

It would be difficult to overstate the devastation that this storm has caused.  Brock Long, the head of FEMA, is calling Michael “a hurricane of the worst kind”…

Even those jaded by hurricanes have never seen anything like this.

For the first time, a Category 4 hurricane slammed into the Florida Panhandle. And it’s bringing an onslaught of deadly hazards.

“Unfortunately, this is a hurricane of the worst kind,” said Brock Long, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

I have driven through the Florida panhandle, and especially in some of the more rural areas it is a glimpse into a way of life that most of the nation has long forgotten.

But it is also a region that is full of very old houses and buildings, and those structures were never designed for a storm like this.  In Panama City, some residents gathered at a local hotel to ride out the storm, but Hurricane Michael nearly reduced it to rubble…

People whimpered and prayed, babies cried, children called for their mothers and all the while, bit by bit, the hotel that was saving them from Hurricane Michael’s howling was falling apart, brick by brick and roofing tile by roofing tile.

The hurricane’s eyewall came through Panama City shortly after noon Wednesday, shearing trees in half, twisting roofs from their supports and tossing truck trailers and RVs like toys.

Hurricane Michael will soon be a memory, but the damage caused by this storm will be felt in the Florida panhandle for a very long time to come.

According to the Weather Underground, much of the region “will be uninhabitable for weeks or months”…

Catastrophic damage will occur: Well-built framed homes can sustain severe damage with loss of most of the roof structure and/or some exterior walls. Most trees will be snapped or uprooted and power poles downed. Fallen trees and power poles will isolate residential areas. Power outages will last weeks to possibly months. Most of the area will be uninhabitable for weeks or months.

Please keep the people of the Florida panhandle in your prayers, because recovery is going to take an extended period of time.  The following are 10 mind-blowing facts about Hurricane Michael that show just how powerful this storm really was…

-Hurricane Michael made landfall with maximum sustained winds of 155 miles per hour.

Read More @ EndOfTheAmericanDream.com