Last 48 Hours of Hurricane Matthew - Skimming Florida

The path that Hurricane Matthew took up from Haiti to the Bahamas and then up the coast of Florida is interesting, as very few hurricanes take this path.  Here's the "last 48 hours" gif from the University of Wisconsin's Space, Science, and Engineering center.  It really shows you how close the aggregate predictive spaghetti models were in showing where the hurricane would go along Florida.

I found myself studying this predicted path historically...  the day before the hurricane.  I wanted to see how many times a hurricane has skimmed Florida.

Hurricane Hazel in 1954 came between Cuba and Haiti but stayed out to the ocean more, then made a direct hit on North Carolina.

Hurricane David in 1979 devastated Dominica, direct hit West Palm Beach in Florida, then walked up the coast in a similar path.

This data may seem insignificant, but in today's world with endless data available at your fingertips, we are smart enough to not make decisions based on fear alone...   we make decisions based on data.    Unless you're at the coast and subject to deadly storm surge, your decision to evacuate, prep, not prep for a hurricane is really left up to you.  Homes down the street from me did nothing to prepare, and were just fine with the Category 3 Matthew 70 mph winds.  If the storm brought the 119 mph winds that were predicted hours before the hurricane arrived, they would have wished they had boarded their windows as we did.

Hours before the hurricane, I was studying past hurricane paths.  I know the spaghetti models are sophisticated predictive tools that I should trust... but the cone of paths they span are less than accurate.  The explanation for variation?  "If the hurricane makes the slightest wobble, it will mean the difference between a windy stormy day and devastation".  How's that for decision-making data?