Evacuation from Cancun

We moved to the Best Western Hotel across the street from the convention center for the main ISN-ASN conference, even though it had been cancelled because of hurricane Dean bearing down on us. It was a real solid concrete hotel that had ratings of up to Catagory 4 hurricane and I was willing to hunker down and wait out the storm.

My advisor, Kelly Drew, was staying at the Presidente and was told she needed to evacuate to a shelter or to Merida, Mx. The hotel would provide a bus to drive us from Cancun to Merida, a four hour bus ride. So, we started packing up our stuff and would leave the next day at 1:00pm. I went shopping for hurricane survival kit supplies, that I usually get for hurricanes while I lived in Florida. This was going to be a Catagory 5 and I had already been through a Catagory 3 for Andrew in Florida. I didn't have drinkable water or electricity for weeks last time and I was not taking any chances for a Catagory 5 hurricane, which at the time had maximum gusts up to 225 mph. The Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale truely putts the amount of destructive energy this storm was bringing to Cancun http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/aboutsshs.shtml

People were leaving in droves and per Mexian Immigration over 32,000 tourists left Cancun via flights out. We tried to change our flights and get out of the path of the hurricane, but everything was booked up. There were no buses out and the only way out was through the Presidente private bus to Merida.
The harbour was shut down and people were getting their boats out of dodge. The next morning the winds and thunderstorms started rolling in and you could smell and feel the panic building. The roads were full of cars and people were buying last minute supplies, which were severely limited. You could not find one roll of duck tape in the whole town. Red Green would have been lost with out a paddle and duck tape. Flashlights and batteries were being sold at rediculous prices.