Let’s talk about a few facts. Billionaire party enthusiast Richard Branson owns a private isle in the Virgin Islands. Branson’s island sits squarely in the path of Hurricane Irma, one the strongest storms the Atlantic has ever seen. Rather than retreat to a safer location, Branson has collected a mysterious group of “young people” for a “sleepover” in the wine cellar on his private island. They’re gonna ride it out.
Image: Wikicommons / giggel / Getty
This is all true information. The hurricane should be pummelling Necker Island, the aforementioned private isle owned by Branson, at the time this post was published. On the eve of the storm, Branson detailed his plan for a wine-soaked, game-filled slumber party for Hurricane Irma on Virgin’s blog. “The atmosphere is eerie but beautiful,” he wrote.
The eerie part makes perfect sense. With a hurricane of historic proportions bearing down on Branson and his young friends, it only takes a glance at the photos of the scene on Neckar Island to realise that this plan is weird as hell. It also seems idiotic and, to a degree, mysteriously sinister. Look:
Just experienced a night of howling wind and rain as Hurricane #Irma edges ever closer – everyone calm & upbeat https://t.co/tF84SPx7aB pic.twitter.com/lbM0bdHxCv
— Richard Branson (@richardbranson) September 6, 2017
Now is a good time to point out that meteorologists spotted Irma forming in the east Atlantic nearly a week ago. They mapped out the probable path of what they expected to become a major storm, and it seemed almost certain that Irma would plow right into the Virgin Islands. Hundreds of kilometres northwest of Neckar Island, all Florida counties declared a state of emergency nearly a day and a half ago, long after hurricane warnings had been issued in Puerto Rico. So this storm was hardly a surprise to the folks in the Virgin Islands, including ultra-rich adventure-seeker Branson.
I’m not an expert on disaster preparedness. However, I do have some doubts that retreating to an underground wine cellar as storm surges threaten to cause widespread flooding is a good idea. Hanging out next to unobstructed windows that appear to be reinforced with masking tape also seems unwise. Here’s another image from Branson’s Hurricane Irma bunker:
I haven’t had a sleepover quite like this since I was a kid. Wonderful team here on Necker all well https://t.co/tF84SPx7aB #Irma pic.twitter.com/DnnfUaeXhd
— Richard Branson (@richardbranson) September 6, 2017
Then again, maybe this room isn’t where the storm-time slumber party is happening. Branson’s last tweet before the storm:
Expecting full force of Hurricane #Irma in about 4 hours, we’ll retreat to a concrete wine cellar under the house https://t.co/tF84SPx7aB pic.twitter.com/wMUDoX3O4v
— Richard Branson (@richardbranson) September 6, 2017
And here’s a video taken in the British Virgin Islands during the storm:
RIGHT NOW: This is what’s happening on the British Virgin Islands @CBCNews @CBCAlerts @andrewcbc | #hurricaneirma2017 #TrackingIrma #Irma pic.twitter.com/Q7vOI0ECSC
— Jeff Harrington (@JHarringtonTV) September 6, 2017
We’ll see what happens to Branson and his young friends. It remains unclear why all of these people were on the island when the hurricane hit. Maybe Branson wanted to stay and some of his staffers had to stay, too. Perhaps they weren’t able to evacuate in time and figured the wine cellar would be safe enough. It’s possible that this is something stranger, like a game that rich people play during natural disasters.
We can’t know the truth until Branson emerges from his boozy bunker — hopefully safe and sound — and explains. With any luck, he’ll write another blog post about his brush with Hurricane Irma. As for anyone else in the path of the storm, get out of the way if you can.