Hurricane Milton made landfall in Siesta Key, Florida, as a Category 3 storm on Wednesday, Oct. 9.
On Oct. 8, an X post with over 2.6 million views claimed Waffle House, a popular restaurant chain with more than 1,900 restaurants in 25 states, set up a storm center ahead of Milton.
“Waffle House has a Storm Center with an entire operations team that is so good at their job they assist FEMA during hurricanes,” the post said.
Many people who commented on the post questioned if Waffle House really has a storm center.
THE QUESTION
Does Waffle House really have a storm center?
THE SOURCES
- Waffle House
- Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp
- Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
- Njeri Boss, vice president of food safety and public relations at Waffle House
THE ANSWER
Yes, Waffle House really has a storm center.
WHAT WE FOUND
Waffle House is known not just for serving breakfast 24/7, 365 days a year, but also for its disaster preparedness. The company confirmed to VERIFY that it operates its own storm center in “a real conference room converted for our crisis response” at its headquarters in Georgia.
“We have responded to hurricanes and the like for more than 30 years,” said Njeri Boss, vice president of food safety and public relations at Waffle House.
On its website, Waffle House says it decided to beef up its crisis management processes after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Seven of its restaurants were destroyed and 100 more temporarily shut down, but company executives saw business skyrocket at locations that reopened quickly.
After Katrina, executives developed disaster preparedness manuals for their restaurants. They also purchased portable generators and portable mobile command centers to help their restaurants stay open during a disaster.
Because of Waffle House’s preparedness for extreme weather conditions, communities often watch the restaurant chain to gauge how an area is faring during and after a storm on what is unofficially called the “Waffle House Index.”
Waffle House says there are three color-coded levels on its so-called index:
- Green means the restaurant has a full menu, a signal that damage in an area is limited and the lights are on.
- Yellow means there is a limited menu, indicating power is running from a generator, at best, and there are low food supplies.
- Red means the restaurant is closed, a sign of severe damage in the area or unsafe conditions.
VERIFY previously reported that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) also uses the “Waffle House Index” as an unofficial unit for measuring a weather event’s severity.
In a now-deleted blog post from 2011, Craig Fugate, who was the head of FEMA during the Obama administration, said he used Waffle House to determine how quickly a community might be able to get up and running again after a disaster while leading Florida’s emergency management efforts in 2004.
On Sept. 11, 2018, Waffle House shared a photo of its storm center on X, formerly Twitter, ahead of Hurricane Florence. The next day, VERIFY partner station WXIA took a trip to Waffle House’s headquarters in Norcross, Georgia, to get a behind-the-scenes look at how the company was preparing for the storm.
On Oct. 8, 2024, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp visited the Waffle House storm center and shared photos on his official X and Instagram pages.
“Today I had the opportunity to visit the @WaffleHouse Storm Center as we continue to recover from Hurricane Helene and prepare for Hurricane Milton,” Kemp wrote. “Thank you to the Waffle House Operations Team for your great work to prepare and inform the public during times like this.”
Waffle House closed many of its Florida locations before Hurricane Milton made landfall, indicating damage to the area is predicted to be severe.
“Our mission remains to keep our Associates out of harm’s way,” Boss said. “Locations in areas predicted to be in the path of the storm and likely to suffer significant damage, or where mandatory evacuations have been ordered are places where preemptive closures are taking place as a safety precaution.”
Boss says the company will continue to update its X and Threads accounts with status updates on closures, locations with limited menus and to provide details on when its restaurants will reopen.
The Associated Press and VERIFY partner station WXIA contributed to this report.
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