Tampa cops urge city’s vulnerable to take shelter amid storm worries

TAMPA — A trio of Tampa police officers ambled up a concrete path through the grassy courtyard in the River Place apartments, steps away from the Hillsborough River.

Detective Sgt. Dimitri Angelakopoulos asked a woman who stood on a balcony smoking a cigarette how high the river got during Hurricane Helene. The woman pointed to some picnic tables, no more than 20 yards from the riverbank, and said water had covered the tops.

The sergeant eyed the tables, then gazed up the balcony as he did some unsettling math about how much higher Hurricane Milton could take the river.

“If we get 15 feet of storm surge, it will be at the top of that bannister,” he said, pointing to where the woman stood.

All day Monday and Tuesday, Tampa police worked the streets, making sure the city’s most vulnerable residents knew about the storm and urging those lingering in evacuation zones to go elsewhere. As routine patrol calls morphed into storm preparations, there was a palpable tension amid words of warning that previous storms were merely a test.

“I’ve been here my whole life,” Angelakopoulos said. “Storms worry me. But for some reason, this one has me a little bit extra worried.”

All of the department’s 1,000 officers are expected to work during the storm. They were told to prepare to stay a minimum of three days. Maybe more. Air mattresses and sleeping bags lined the floors of the department’s East Tampa district office. Some used to working nights were told they’d have to adjust to working days.

For Angelakopoulos, who’s been with the Tampa Police Department more than a dozen years, storms have become part of a routine, both personally and professionally. He and his wife, who also works for the department, have a 7-year-old and a 15-year-old, who spend the storm with family friends while Mom and Dad work. They’ve gotten used to it, though it’s still hard being away from family in such a dire situation, he said.

“Everybody has lives and families,” he said. “It sucks. But it’s what we signed up for.”

If not for the hurricane, he’d be analyzing crime statistics and preparing reports for a weekly intelligence meeting. Instead, the detective sergeant rode the streets Tuesday in East Tampa in an unmarked white pickup truck.

At the River Place apartments, where first-floor residents left after flooding from Helene, he looked on as officers helped carry the older woman’s wheelchair to a truck. They gave her a ride to Middleton High School, where she could safely wait out the storm.

Later, the sergeant spotted a couple who gazed out from another building, near an almost-empty swimming pool.

“You guys know what’s coming?” the sergeant asked them.

Yes, they said. “We were here last week.”

“This is going to be much, much worse,” the sergeant told them. He tried to persuade them to leave. They said they had to stay, that the man was in charge of maintenance.

The sergeant walked back to his truck, frustrated.

“They’re the ones that are going to call us at 1 a.m. and say, ‘Hey, the roof’s blown off!’” he said. “What are we going to do?”

When winds reach dangerous speeds, officers stop responding to most calls. Those considered a high priority, like death or serious injury, may still see officers rendering assistance. But if conditions are too risky, emergency call takers may have to tell residents to wait until the storm calms.

As Angelakopoulos cruised the East Tampa streets Tuesday, he eyed the mostly vacant undersides of Interstate 4 overpasses, where a day earlier homeless people had been warned of the storm.

“A lot of them are taking it seriously,” he said.

Along a narrow street north of Ybor City, the sergeant rolled down a window. He pulled up beside a man with a bushy beard, wearing a flannel shirt and pushing a wheelchair that held a gallon jug and other items.

“Have you heard about the storm?” the sergeant asked.

“I heard about it,” the man said. “Is it true?” The man said he stays in an abandoned house nearby. The sergeant tried to convince him not to stay there, but the man seemed noncommittal.

“I’m telling you right now,” he said, “if you’re out here when that storm hits, you will have the worst day of your life.”

As Angelakopoulos pulled away, he phoned another officer, told him to check on the man, to get him to go to a shelter.

“You try your best to convince them,” Angelakopoulos said. “But if they’re not willing to go, there’s not much you can do.”

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