Residents of the state are well versed in what to do when a hurricane threatens: stock up on supplies, board up windows, or evacuate their homes and shops and get out of the way of the storm if it is a bad one.

Those who cannot afford to do so are evacuated in buses and lodged in shelters. When they return home afterwards, they have to deal with the clean-up and repairs.

The question facing Florida’s leaders now is how to maintain that strategy of mass evacuation this year, when people are being cautioned to practice social distancing? How will shelters be run in an era of highly infectious deadly disease, when the usual protocol is to put people side by side on cot beds in school gyms?

None of that will be possible this year, experts warn.