Funny, I lived in Florida for 5 years and never experienced a hurricane. When I lived in Shanghai China we had a typhoon( the Pacific version of a hurricane) and that was pretty crazy. Fortunately it wasn't too big but it did drop a shit load of rain. Something like 15 centimeters in 24hrs. I was living in a dorm at the time and to get out and go to class we had to wade through 3 feet of water.

The worst natural disaster I ever lived through was the 1989 San Francisco earthquake. Our house was only about 5 miles from the epicenter. I was at work when it happened and it was fucking nuts. Everything was total chaos afterwards and it took me 3 over hours to drive the 20 miles back home. Listening to the radio on the way home made it seem like the end of the world "San Francisco's Marina District is on fire", "We have reports that downtown Los Gatos has been destroyed", "Downtown Hollister an Santa Cruz have been destroyed", "The Bay Bride has collapsed", etc etc. Having been through that I can really empathize with the people in New Orleans even though I know their situation is far worse.