I shuddered when Charley veered sharply west toward the area I'd just evacuated with my wife and two children (Fort Myers Beach) and neared landfall, I shuddered. I remembered all the billboards touting golf courses along U.S. Rt. 41 and on the islands of Sanibel and Captiva. What would the superintendents do to battle the storm?

Florida's west coast is a natural place for golf course construction, and architects and owners have take advantage of it. The Gulf of Mexico provides a beautiful backdrop for some, while retirement housing and manmade lakes create interesting layouts for others. I always figured it would be a perfect place to be a superintendent - plentiful jobs, great weather and a chance to go to the beach whenever you wanted.

That is, I thought that until I watched in horror as Hurricane Charley cut his path of destruction across the area.

Reports are that Charley may be the worst storm to hit the area in 50 years, and the early word from superintendents in the area supports that contention. As of Tuesday, superintendents on Captiva and Sanibel islands - which lay directly in Charley's path - still hadn't been allowed to return to the courses to survey the damage. Others, however, have already started the cleanup.

Jeff Brown, superintendent at the Lake Region Yacht & Country Club in Winter Haven, reported 700 to 800 trees down, with no power and water five days after the hurricane left. He also said his phone system worked intermittently. Brown received a similar report from Steve Ciardullo at Mountain Lake Country Club in Lake Wales during one of the times he had an operational phone.

Slightly south of the hurricane's direct path, superintendents reported hundreds of downed trees and a huge mess to clean up, though no structural damage. Jason DeMartino, superintendent at Audubon Country Club in Naples posted a message on the GCSAA's Talking It Over forum that his biggest problem - aside from more than 300 downed trees - was trying to manage the course in the heat and humidity with no pump stations. He says Charley ripped up his irrigation lines and wires, tore up his cart paths, turf, sidewalks and sections of roads.

But as bad as his and other superintendents' situations are, DeMartino also asked his colleagues to keep the residents of the area in their thoughts - "especially the thousands that are homeless and left with nothing."

USGA agronomist Todd Lowe, who watched Charley pass within 15 miles of his house and whose daughter's kindergarten debut has been delayed while her school is used as a shelter, said the damage is much worse on the ground than it looks on TV. He said he has tried to reach golf courses directly in the path of the storm to no avail because their phones and electricity are out.

"With so much damage throughout the county, I would imagine that many golf courses will be trying to help their communities first," Lowe said. "There are so many trees down that some of the chainsaws, chippers, front-end loaders and other equipment that many golf courses have will be used to help the communities (or possibly their employees) first. All of the neighboring counties are chipping in and helping people in need."

The full extent of the damage to area didn't hit me until I emerged from my hotel with my family, flew home on Saturday and saw the pictures of Punta Gorda and Port Charlotte on CNN. I again thought of the area superintendents, pulling the caps down tighter, setting their jaws more firmly and fighting through it as they do when faced with difficult situations. My thoughts go out to them in their time of need.

Golfdom Contributing Editor Joel Jackson contributed to this report.