ON MAY 23 Health First facilities and emergency preparedness directors addressed a gaggle of reporters and TV news media on the matter of the upcoming 2024 hurricane season, expected to be busier than most. From stocking supplies, adjusting surgical and office visit schedules, and enacting facility lockdowns – to staffing, evacuations and a return to normal business operations, every detail is planned for each year in advance of the six-month storm season to ensure patients, associates and visitors are safe.

The upcoming hurricane season is now 20 years removed from the historic 2004 season that lashed the state of Florida with four major hurricanes in just six weeks. This season is also widely predicted to be a heavy one.

With four hospitals dotting the Brevard County Atlantic coast – including Cape Canaveral Hospital, a mile west of the ocean, encircled by the Banana River – Health First leaders, physicians, nurses and staff regularly drill and plan for the realities of a destructive storm.

The upcoming Atlantic hurricane season is expected to bring above-normal storm activity due to near-record warm Atlantic waters, development of La Nina conditions in the Pacific, reduced Atlantic trade winds and less wind shear, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said this month.

READ the full feature in Florida Today HERE.

From stocking supplies, adjusting surgical and office visit schedules, and enacting facility lockdowns – to staffing, evacuations and a return to normal business operations, every detail is planned for each year in advance of the six-month storm season to ensure patients, associates and visitors are safe, and that resources and critical media services are available to the community once a storm passes.

Earlier this spring, Health First announced plans to build a new state-of-the-art Cape Canaveral Hospital four miles inland. It is designed and will be built to withstand at a Category 4 hurricane bringing catastrophic localized flooding.