Thank you for helping others with common sense, it takes a village ..

Start by getting SUMTER spelled correctly = no P. You'll be fine - many people panic! I would say tornadoes spawned off this hurricane is a concern. Other than that nothing major will happen from the hurricane - it slows down over land.

Know Your Zone Find Your Zone | Florida Storms

Sorry, that’s just yankee dumb. Look at a map. Surge is a function of the gulf/ocean. Do we live on the ocean/gulf?

it's Lake Sumter please....NO P. You lived in Westhampton Beach on LI? And you never experienced a hurricane before? Strange

Well, you made it through the hurricane.....Wednesday morning. We hardly ever get much from the hurricanes. That is why so many people move from living near the beaches to here. At our house, we only got 1/2 inch rain and hardly any wind. Hope you are enjoying your visit. Hope the weather gets better for your visit.

If you heard the train noise it is at tornado. Go to a totally enclosed area with no windows

Laughing. Understand that TV weather reports make things seem as far bad as possible. They are alarmist. They report the worst possible effects to keep you anxious and watching. For more accurate weather, go to Weather Underground online and search for The Villages. The current forecast is that we will get about ONE INCH of rain over the next 24 hours from this storm, with winds of 25-35 mph.

The ocean is, what, sixty miles west of us? No storm surges. When Hurricane Irma dropped 12” of rain, no houses in The Villages were flooded, due to the outstanding engineering for run-off control.

Before the storm, don’t rush to the store and buy huge amounts of water and toilet paper. You aren’t likely to need it. Just keep some on hand. Do fill the car with gas, in case there are supply problems between here and Tampa for a few days. Don’t buy a generator. You won’t need it. If a hurricane goes over, stay inside in a room with no windows, like one of your bathrooms. But it won’t. After it passes, stay in your house for a day, ideally, to give the grounds department time to pick up palm fronds off the streets.

Also remember if you had to worry about storm surge here in the villages in the center of the state where you would have to go on your roof waiting to be picked up by helicopter, it would be all over for Florida because the rest of the state would be under water.

Sad to see that FOUR people saw fit to correct the OP's spelling, as if that mattered to the issue. Cut some slack, folks.

And by now, you've seen what the outer bands of a hurricane are like. Exhilarating weather, a bit windy, some rain. No need for the panic spread by the 24/7 news.

I've been through two dozen hurricanes, and only one was worth doing a lot of prep. That one was in Pensacola, 120mph overhead in the eye wall. Yes, it took weeks of cleanup afterwards—but we were completely safe through it. Because we're 100 miles inland from either direction, the odds of anything major here in The Villages is extremely low.

If the wind where you are isn't going to be above about 90mph, then just bring in the loose objects, stock some water, ride it through and enjoy it.

[QUOTE=ehonour;2251264]Sad to see that FOUR people saw fit to correct the OP's spelling, as if that mattered to the issue. Cut some slack, folks.]

Agreed! back off the spell checkers! Yes, my Mom just called me from Spanish Springs and said it is sunny, but windy...all is fine...stand down...

Always one in the crowd to correct the spelling of Sumter.

Nice dog. By now you know that almost no action needed to be done for this hurricane. The hurricanes the last 2 summers have been strong because the water surrounding Florida has been record HOT. That record heat is likely to keep getting worse for at least the next 7 years. If you plan on being a snowbird and have 2 homes (one up north) then Florida is OK and The Villages has a lot of activities.
.........But, with only one home, I would recommend looking at Tn or the Carolinas, where you could have a much more comfortable summer and likely it would be less expensive there.

Formerly known as cherry lake. :throwtomatoes:

I been here 9 years and summers are always hot in mid 90’s. IMO the humidity bothers me more than temperature and closer to equator.