We didn’t bother to land in
Florida. Generally, we didn’t think much of Florida except as a place to be on
a beach, and there were much better beaches in the world. Thunderstorms high
above the peninsula gave us a decent view and served as the meeting place for
all of the other storm riders called in. Two dozen were already there. I saw a
lot of familiar faces, most of those from the states, but also a few from
Central and South America as Jack and Anna-Maria were still bringing Europe
with them.
“The CDAF is worse than we thought,”
I said to Esteban, from Panama.
“The CDAF?”
“Our official name for this thing
‘Cactus Dick Anal Fucker.’ Nat’s name was just too long and didn’t make a
decent acronym.”
Esteban looked away, then nodded.
“Si. So, why is it worse?”
“It may have had a kid.”
“It is spawning off storms?” He
began scrolling through radar imagery on his phone.
“One, and not where you think. Look
here,” I held up my phone with its animated radar. “See this spot here inside
the eye? The cloud cover looks denser, there. Then there’s an area around it that
looks thinner. Then here at the eyewall, it’s dense again.”
“Yes. So what?”
“So I think that we have a smaller
hurricane inside a bigger hurricane.”
“Madre de Dios.”