Hurricane Milton Hits Florida as Category 3 Storm, Still Dangerous as it Sweeps Across State

October 10

Hurricane Milton landed as a Category 3 storm Wednesday in Siesta Key, about 60 miles south of Tampa Bay on Florida’s Gulf Coast, spawning tornadoes, and creating a large storm surge with heavy rains. Downgraded to a still-dangerous Category 2 hurricane, the storm swept across Florida, threatening central Florida and the Atlantic Coast population centers.

More than 2 million Floridians lost power in the storm, and flooding is a major concern after a deluge of rainfall Wednesday soaked the Tampa-St. Petersburg area.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said Milton created 19 tornadoes upon making landfall, destroying 125 homes, many of them mobile homes.

“At this point, it’s too dangerous to evacuate safely, so you have to shelter in place and just hunker down,” DeSantis cautioned as the storm came ashore.

High winds shredded the roof of Tropicana Field, home of Major League Baseball’s Tampa Bay Rays. According to The Tampa Bay Times, the stadium was not being used as a shelter but was being employed as “a staging site for workers” who had arrived to help clean up the storm’s aftermath.

St. Lucie County Sheriff’s office reported “loss of life” there as a tornado struck a retirement center.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami reported, “A flash flood emergency continues over portions of west-central Florida and damaging winds reaching the Florida east coast.”

A forecast from The Weather Channel read, “Milton will now cross Central Florida with tropical storm-force winds and extremely heavy rainfall before getting into the Atlantic early Thursday. Conditions will rapidly improve for the remainder of the week.”

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