Caroline Calloway and the hurricane Milton as a blessing

On Wednesday, October 9, Hurricane Milton made landfall in Florida. Considered the most dangerous natural event to hit the state in the last hundred years, nearly six million people received immediate evacuation orders: one of them is Caroline Calloway.

The main character of the internet

Caroline Calloway is an influencer whose online presence is the closest thing to watching a car crash: a pathological liar, scammer, blonde, thin, and owner of a cat named Matisse. She became famous in 2013, the year she moved to Cambridge. In the early days of Instagram, Caroline Calloway documented her Gatsby-esque nights out, embellishing her photos with Hudson filters and lengthy captions, and that's how she gained fame. Later, in no particular order: she cashed a six-figure advance for her first book, School Girl, spent the money without delivering a single line, launched a homemade skincare brand called Snake Oil (!), organized creative workshops costing hundreds of dollars, admitted to forging documents to get into Cambridge, and finally self-published a memoir with the brilliant title Scammer. 

Hurricane Milton becomes a self-promotion opportunity

On Tuesday, October 8, the controversial influencer almost announced her own death: "If you've been following the updates on Hurricane Milton, I'm about to die," she stated in a video on Tuesday, a day before the devastating storm hit. "It's supposed to land in the Sarasota-Bradenton area. I'm in Sarasota, living [in a condo overlooking] the ocean. It's a Zone A with mandatory evacuation," she continued. On Twitter, she wrote: "I have no intention of evacuating. For more tips, buy my second book! It should be out soon, if I survive." In an interview on Thursday, October 10, Caroline Calloway was asked if the authorities had contacted her to check on her status: she replied no but said she had received a message from Emma Roberts, adding, "I much prefer that."

Caroline Calloway isn't the only influencer to think of it: it’s the law of engagement

Apparently, Calloway isn't the only one who found the idea of profiting off her own survival to be genius: like many others, she realized she could seize the opportunity of a lifetime to gain views and sell copies of her new book. Even on TikTok, my algorithm was hit by the hurricane: suddenly, it started showing me livestreams where various creators recorded the weather conditions, their survival kits, and the approaching storm. In an article published by the Washington Post, Jamie Cohen—a media studies professor at CUNY—explained how disaster livestreams have become more common in recent years, as platforms started paying users based on their engagement. The higher the engagement, the higher the pay.

@allieraeofficial Its time…. #hurricanemilton #hurricane #milton #florida original sound - Freedom_Lover

The case of Allie Rae on TikTok

Allie Rae, a 40-year-old woman, chose to document the arrival of the hurricane to offer her TikTok followers a first-person view. A few hours later, she, her husband, and their three children found themselves trapped at home with no way out. Seeking safety, she asked ChatGPT for the safest place during a storm. After posting video after video, Rae declared herself happy to have had such an experience: her followers gave her advice, updated her on the hurricane's progress when the radar went down, but most importantly, knowing that millions of people were watching comforted her. "We never felt alone," she stated.