Hurricane 2020: Use social media to stay in touch with the Tampa Bay Times

This hurricane season, the Tampa Bay area will face a potential double whammy from the possible impact of both a named storm and the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In both cases, the Tampa Bay Times is dedicated to providing you with the latest information on several social media platforms.

Hurricane Dorian in 2019 showed us that a hurricane doesn’t need to make landfall on the Gulf Coast to threaten our region, so being able to stay up-to-date is vital.

In the event a named storm is on the way, we’ll post news stories, photographs, videos, evacuation updates and more on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Reddit.

The season starts Monday. Here’s what you need to know.

Follow us at these accounts:

Facebook: www.facebook.com/tampabaycom/

Twitter: www.twitter.com/TB_Times

Instagram: www.instagram.com/tampabaytimes/

Reddit: www.reddit.com/user/TampaBayTimes

On Facebook, we have a group dedicated to hurricane news and community discussions, where you can post your own information, ask questions and interact with other members. You can join by going to www.facebook.com/groups/timeshurricane/. Keep in mind that we will change the name of the group whenever a major storm threatens Florida, so you also can search for our group by the storm’s name.

On tampabay.com, we’ll keep track of how getting supplies, evacuating or hunkering down may be changed by COVID-19 precautions. All of our coronavirus news can be found at www.tampabay.com/coronavirus.

We also have a web page dedicated to hurricane preparation, tracking the latest storms, local emergency orders and evacuations, and covering the aftermath at tampabay.com/hurricane.

This year, we’ve added a new feature to tampabay.com, allowing readers to receive desktop notifications about the most important stories we’re publishing. You can turn these notifications on when you come to the site and a pop-up window asks if you’d like to get them. Click “allow” when you see the box in your browser, and you’re all set.

We also can keep you informed through our news app, which provides mobile push notifications through your phone or tablet. You can download it through your favorite app store, or go to www.tampabay.com/times-apps/. You can then customize the app to get the notifications you want in a storm, including weather alerts.