Social media was stunned this week by some Floridians who chose to ignore evacuation orders and ride out Hurricane Milton in their homes.
A man who became known as 'Lieutenant Dan' made headlines for planning to ride out a major storm on his yacht. Meanwhile, social media influencer Caroline Calloway shocked her followers by announcing she would be staying in a waterfront condo in Sarasota, Florida, just south of Tampa.
Joseph “Lieutenant Dan” Malinowski, who is missing his left leg, has a Biblical explanation for his stubbornness.
TikTok user Tampa Terrence said, “I don't go anywhere because the safest place to be is on a boat during a flood.” “We learned that with Noah. Everyone who remained on land drowned. Noah and the animals lived.”
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Tampa police are trying to convince local resident Joseph Malinowski (aka “Lieutenant Dan”), who lives on a boat in Tampa, to leave on October 9, 2024, ahead of Hurricane Milton. Mr. Malinowski was found safe on October 10. (Spencer Pratt/Getty Images)
Malinowski refused repeated evacuation orders and even rejected offers of help from neighbors. Tampa Police Chief Lee Varcoe visited Malinowski before the storm, but Malinowski insisted on remaining on the yacht.
News Nation reporter Brian Entin confirmed that Malinowski was alive and well aboard the sailboat after the storm. He posted a video just before midnight Wednesday in which he calls himself “Lieutenant Dan.”
Meanwhile, Calloway joked on her Instagram Story that the price of her books would “go up significantly” if she died in the storm.
“Order now,” she wrote.
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Influencer Caroline Calloway attends the 11th Annual Shorty Awards held at the PlayStation Theater on May 5, 2019 in New York City. Callaway was staying at her home in Sarasota, Florida, during Hurricane Milton. (Astrid Stawiarz/Getty Images for Shorty Awards)
Callaway explained her decision to weather the storm in an interview with the Intelligencer on Wednesday. She said it was partly due to a bad experience in the past trying to evacuate from a hurricane.
“The reason I’m staying here has to do with Hurricane Ian, which hit in 2022. I took shelter in my mother’s house in Northport, even though she lives further inland. It's very flat, and I'm on a floor three stories higher than mine. There was no water, electricity, or air conditioning in her house for three days. This is huge in Florida, even in late summer and early fall. It's a problem,” Calloway said.
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“The other 50 percent of the decision was because my grandma moved into this condo in the late 1970s. I've been coming to Sarasota ever since I can remember visiting her. And as a result, we've been coming to Sarasota a lot. We were able to get things done by some very old family friends who are in the building. They are all my grandmother’s friends that we inherited,” she added.
“My old friends Ruth, Terry, Holly and her mother Marianne are all still here so someone needs to check on them,” Ms Calloway said.
She went on to explain the logistical challenges she and her family would have faced had they tried to evacuate.
“You just have to choose between so many terrible options. Okay, so we're going to take shelter here, but then we leave, leaving all of our neighbors behind. And we're stuck in traffic. I can't drive. Remember, I spent my late twenties in England or in the West Village and never got a license, so I have to wait until my mom comes and evacuates. Assuming I couldn't leave until Tuesday morning, we probably wouldn't have been able to get out of Florida in time due to traffic jams. Well, we're in a different part of the state and the weather wasn't that bad, but what would you choose if you didn't have any neighbors? This is the method I chose,” she said. outlet.
Drone image shows flooded roads from Hurricane Milton in Siesta Key, Florida on October 10, 2024.
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As of Thursday morning, Callaway had not posted an update to Instagram for 11 hours.
