Hurricane Info

Key West Eerily Quiet After Evacuation Order

KEY WEST (CBS4) ― The Florida Keys are pretty empty ahead of Hurricane Ike, where a tropical storm warning and a hurricane watch are in effect from Ocean Reef southward to the Dry Tortugas.

The few straggling tourists who stayed behind finally left town late Sunday. Michele Case is just one of the people who was forced out by the mandatory tourist evacuations in Key West.

"We have beer and drinks. They are kicking us out of town. We don't want to go but they are kicking us out," said Michelle Case to CBS4's Jorge Estevez on the busy Duval Street with her bags packed and ready to head into a cab with her husband.

"I know Ike is going to follow us back to Texas so we are all good," said Brian Case and he loaded up his yellow cab.
Brian and his wife are from Dallas and are afraid the storm will travel in their direction by the weekend.

Some 15,000 tourists fled, but most of the 25,000 residents have stayed behind, at least for now.

Some Key West store owners are waiting until the last minute to shutdown and instead are trying to profit from the storm. "We appreciate our government for starting things early but this is Key West, we take out own time," said Chris Robinson of the State of the Art T-Shirt and Novelty Sshop on Duval Street. The store owner even printed T-shirt with Hurricane Ike motifs. "My honeymoon was ruined by Ike," read one of the T-shirts.

"We hate to take advantage of a natural disaster but we are only exploiting ourselves here," said Chris Robinson. It appears to have been a fairly good idea because the T-shirts are a pretty hot item so far.

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