When did blogging first hit MY radar?

I was just thinking about my first encounter with blogging. I'm going to forget the details, but bear with me. My brother-in-law, Dave Fewer, became the key contact in Canada when his parents and some family members were struck by a massive category 5 hurricane while attending a family wedding in Mexico. It was Hurricane Wilma and it was devastating.

Dave was getting sporadic communications with his parents and other members of the family were also receiving some information from other marooned travellers. All Dave's family members, and friends, back in Canada were contacting him constantly for information and updates. Email was not working to keep everyone informed and to keep all the gathered information in one place. Dave was trying to work with the Canadian government to get the stranded travelers out of Mexico, and needed to put a cohesive story together. And he needed to keep his phone line open, to receive any calls from Mexico and the government. So, Dave started a blog... a place where he pointed everyone to so they could read all the information gathered so far. Anyone reading the blog could comment with updates and things THEY were hearing. And we could all follow along (rather than calling Dave) as Dave and his family worked feverishly to get their loved ones back to Canada. It was a very efficient way to manage this crisis. This story had a happy ending - all the family members eventually got out of Mexico safely, with some pretty incredible stories of survival and human compassion to share with us.

At the time, the blog seemed like magic to me. Like an instant website. How did Dave figure out how to "start" it? How did he know to use it for this purpose? I pay close attention to Dave whenever he has an idea now...