posted Aug 24th, 2004 - It was a bizarre week for the NSL headquarters in DeLand, Florida. Hurricane Charley left a devastating trail on its way across the state, which included the DeLand area. Skydive DeLand was without electricity for days, homes of local skydivers were without water and air condition for several days. However, the NSL office, which is located very close to the airport, did not have any problems at all with Charley.

The weather strike came with a delay for the NSL. When most of the victims of the hurricane had recovered, the building with the home of the NSL was struck by lightning last Friday, August 20th. NSL computers and network were damaged, data and the internet connection were lost. It took five days of damage control to become at least operational. Tuesday, August 24th, was the first day that the NSL office was back in limited action.

Even though Charley did not hurt the NSL office too much, skydiving in Florida was still hit very hard. The August 14 - 15 weekend included a meet of the Florida Skydiving League in Lake Wales. Charley visited Central Florida on Friday, August 13, and was gone Saturday morning. The weather was then good enough to get jump planes in the air. However, the damage was already done and much worse than anybody had expected.

Even still on Friday morning, Charley had been on the way to the north on a path that seemed to spare the event location in Lake Wales. The hurricane was expected to make landfall in the Tampa Bay area and then continue to the north-northeast. Unfortunately, Charley changed its mind on Friday. The new travel plans began with a quite significant right-hand turn. The hurricane now aimed directly at the Florida Skydiving Center and never changed the direction again.

The results were devastating for the host of last year's USPA Nationals and several NSL/FSL meets. There was not much left of the hangar Saturday morning. To make it short at this point: there was no meet and no skydiving in Lake Wales, and it will take a while until the skydiving center will have fully recovered. The NSL News will follow up with more information and a story of Betty Kabellar-Hill very soon.

The Florida Skydiving League has scheduled a make-up event in Lake Wales for the upcoming weekend. All skydivers in Florida and from anywhere are invited to come out and play to show support for one of Charley's mostly hurt victims. Jump planes are back in the air over Lake Wales, management and staff have worked hard to get things under control. The drop zone and FSL management will be ready to improvise and run the event. Updates will follow very soon.