The hotel was forced to close for a total of 32 days in September and October despite a carefully conceived hurricane plan that includes the use of emergency generators to provide electricity when utility power fails.

During and after Hurricane Frances, The Breakers discovered that its emergency-power systems were far from invincible. At the height of the storm, one of The Breakers' four generators started to overheat as hurricane-force winds pushed hot exhaust back into its equipment room. Later, after Frances had passed but before utility power could be restored, a shortage of diesel fuel left the hotel concerned about replenishing its supply, which lasts for approximately 72 hours.

The Breakers has weathered many storms since it opened in 1896 as the opulent flagship of railroad baron Henry Morrison Flagler's hospitality empire. Today, his descendants still own and operate the hotel, and its 560 guest rooms and suites still epitomize luxurious hospitality. For 2005, it earned ratings of five diamonds from AAA and four stars from Mobil Travel Guide.

Built in the Italian Renaissance style, the hotel occupies a 140-acre site that rises just 16 feet above sea level along half a mile of Atlantic Ocean frontage.

Hurricane Preparations
The Breakers management has an emergency plan that it updates annually. Because the hotel stands on a barrier island facing the ocean, the plan anticipates that local officials will issue an evacuation order when a hurricane approaches. Staff members know their assignments well in advance.

After first securing their own families and dwellings, employees designated to stay in the hotel during a storm occupy vacant guest rooms. The food-and-beverage service stocks provisions to sustain this storm contingent for several days. If roads on the island and bridges to the mainland are blocked, they may not be able to return home immediately after the storm passes.

Because the plan also anticipates that electric service from Florida Power & Light Company (FP&L) will fail, the hotel has four emergency generators: a 250-kW Caterpillar, a 150-kW Caterpillar, a 100-kW Cummins, and a 75-kW Onan. The generators run weekly under full load for 15 to 20 minutes, and are watched to be sure a normal transfer of power from the utility occurs and the generators can carry the hotel's emergency systems. "Connected to one of our generators are a microwave oven to warm food and a television so we can monitor storm weather forecasts and radar," says John Bradway, director of strategic marketing.

When hurricane warnings are issued, the hotel's facility-management staff completes a 40-point checklist of hurricane-preparation tasks that can be performed without disrupting guest services. They include taking down the flags that fly from the hotel's towers, filling the generators' diesel-fuel tanks to capacity, and testing the generators.

A Guided Tour
The two Caterpillar generators are located in the basement of the main hotel building. "Protections are in place on the north side of the hotel to prevent stormwater from entering the basement," says Ken Wise, director of facility management. "Stormwater lift centers with submersible pumps connected to the Caterpillar generators are at the hotel entrances. These pumps were built by a variety of manufacturers and are designed to handle some sand and muck. We have several extras on hand. None has failed during a hurricane."

The Onan generator is at ground level in a separate structure, the Family Entertainment Center and Italian restaurant.

The Cummins generator is connected to a stormwater lift station and large stormwater pumps in lakes on the hotel's golf course, where runoff from buildings collects. These pumps help move water off of The Breakers' property and into Lake Worth on the nearby Intracoastal Waterway.

What Frances Did
"As Hurricane Frances approached Palm Beach on September 2, the hotel closed and sent all guests away. A crew of about 20 staff members, including 7 or 8 facility support staff members and 12 security staff, set up to ride out the storm," says Bradway.

The group spread out through the entire property in work crews to make last-minute storm preparations that would protect the property. They walked through all of the buildings, following specific instructions for the facility-management team published in the hotel's hurricane-preparedness manual.

"Each of us was assigned a guest room, but we did not have a lot of time to sleep," Bradway says. "When Frances stalled over Florida's Atlantic coast for most of a day, we slept in shifts in rooms on the opposite side of the hotel from the direction of the approaching storm winds."

Some facility workers were assigned to the hotel's generators. As the storm stalled, they encountered an unforeseen problem. "Our big 250-kilowatt Caterpillar generator started to overheat," says Bradway. "We had to move perishable food from one walk-in freezer to another. In half an hour, we moved as much perishable food as we could. What was not saved had to be thrown out."

Backpressure from the storm's winds caused the overheating. "The way the 250-kilowatt generator is located, the generator's exhaust is pushed out through louvers in a wall at our loading dock," Wise explains. "Hurricane Frances's northeast winds, blowing at 90 to 100 miles per hour, were pushing against the louvers, causing the equipment room and the generator to heat up.

"In the middle of the storm, facility staff members using flashlights removed some internal components from the louvers. They also moved some big floor fans behind the generator, and used sheets of plywood to direct and keep exhaust moving through and out of the louvers. As the storm's wind direction shifted, they moved the plywood accordingly." After Frances's eye came ashore north of the hotel, her winds shifted to the north, northwest, west, and eventually to the southwest.

Even before last year's hurricanes, The Breakers' five-year capital improvements plan called for replacement of the 250-kW Caterpillar generator, which was purchased in 1969. "It has done an outstanding job and has always been reliable," Wise says. "Once the backpressure problem was fixed, it ran for six days after Frances and two additional days after Jeanne."

Jeanne and the Future
For six days after Hurricane Frances, The Breakers Hotel had no grid power from FP&L, and was concerned about obtaining adequate supplies of diesel fuel for its emergency generators. Port Everglades in Ft. Lauderdale, where tankers unload fuel for the hotel's supplier, closed during the storm, as did several other Florida ports capable of receiving tankers. The result was a statewide shortage. For several days, the Federal Emergency Management Agency limited delivery of diesel fuel in Florida to hospitals and emergency centers.

The Breakers reopened for business on September 22, only to close again three days later with the approach of Hurricane Jeanne. This was a faster-moving storm, with the heaviest winds buffeting the coast for just six hours.

Once again, however, utility power was out for two days after Jeanne's passage, and a fuel shortage prevented the hotel from refilling its tanks. It could not reopen for guests until October 7.

Looking to the future, Wise says the hotel will install fans on all of its emergency generators to overcome wind-induced backpressure from outside the building.

Also, he says, "The Breakers hopes to use natural gas to operate its generators so they no longer depend solely on diesel fuel. Fortunately, The Breakers was able to obtain diesel fuel and replenish its supply. Our natural gas service was not interrupted in either Frances or Jeanne."

ROSALIE E. and GEORGE LEPOSKY are energy and technology writers based in Miami, FL.

DE - March/April 2005