Teamwork During Hurricane Season

Teamwork During Hurricane Season

By Krista Lockhart
Planning
Storms
Hurricane Milton Damage

Tropical Storm Helene and Hurricane Milton challenged Central Florida. In both cases, Smart City activated its Natural Disaster Support Plan. With Hurricane Milton in particular, state and local officials raised a higher degree of caution for Central Florida. As a result, Smart City’s cross-functional emergency team met daily to ensure operational continuity for residential and business customers across our service areas in Orange, Osceola, Seminole, Brevard, Lake, and Polk counties.

Smart City field, customer operations, and network teams responded to customer service inquiries as they came in. While power outages caused delays in select service areas, our teams worked quickly to address customer inquiries. It’s worth noting that Smart City does not deploy field crews during storms, but as soon as weather conditions allow, our ride-out teams are dispatched.

While many at Smart City and the community stepped up to help, scammers are now working to capitalize on Hurricane Milton. Cyber scammers are preying on individuals that want to help. Many use AI to create fake photos of damage caused by Hurricane Milton. These images are designed to evoke emotional responses and help line their pockets through faux disaster relief campaigns. To avoid this, the Smart City Security team recommends donating through the official websites of well-known charitable organizations.

Thanks for your continued support. We still have a few more weeks left in Hurricane season, so here are some Hurricane Season resources:

Smart City Storm Center

Hurricane Preparation Checklist

Don’t Trust, Verify – Smart City Telecom