ST. PETERSBURG, Florida. Hurricane Milton left a trail of destruction across Florida on Thursday, killing at least four people, spawning multiple tornadoes, and destroying homes. Despite the damage, the state narrowly avoided the catastrophic storm surge that had been feared.
Governor Ron DeSantis confirmed the deaths in a morning briefing, stating that while the worst-case scenario was avoided, the damage remains significant. “One of the blessings for us is that we did not see that predicted storm surge. That saved a lot,” Tampa Mayor Jane Castor noted during a press conference.
The four fatalities occurred in St. Lucie County, located on Florida’s east coast. Two of those deaths were in the Spanish Lakes Communities, a senior living area, where multiple tornadoes touched down on Wednesday afternoon, according to county spokesperson Erick Gill. The identities of the other two victims have yet to be confirmed.
By 8 p.m. Wednesday, there were 19 confirmed tornadoes in Florida as Hurricane Milton made landfall. More than 3 million homes and businesses remained without power on Thursday morning, as reported by PowerOutage.us. Many residents were still recovering from the devastation of Hurricane Helene, which struck nearly two weeks earlier.
Among the damage, the storm tore through Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, home to the Tampa Bay Rays baseball team, leaving a gaping hole in its fabric roof. While the stadium had been turned into a response staging area, no injuries were reported.
In the Tampa area, Hurricane Milton caused extensive damage, felling trees and scattering debris across roadways, while local news footage showed downed power lines and some flooded neighborhoods. Emergency crews were dispatched overnight to respond to numerous calls for help, including an incident where a tree collapsed onto a home with 15 occupants inside, including children. All were safely transported to a shelter, according to Tampa Police Chief Lee Bercaw.
Despite Milton’s devastating effects, officials remain cautious. Heavy rainfall, reaching up to 18 inches (457 mm) in some areas, could still lead to river flooding. Authorities are closely monitoring water levels, which are currently stable but could rise in the coming days.
DeSantis acknowledged the challenge of cleaning up the aftermath. “Our state is a peninsula in the middle of a tropical environment. We are just built to be able to respond to hurricanes,” he said in an interview with CNBC. He praised the Biden administration for swiftly granting all emergency assistance requests, stating, “We’ll survey the damage and get people on their feet. We’ll get through this.”
In Fort Myers, resident Connor Ferin described the terrifying moment when a tornado struck his home. “All this happened instantaneous, like these windows blew out,” he said. “I grabbed the two dogs and run under my bed and that was it. Probably one minute total.” His home was left without a roof and littered with debris.
Hurricane Milton, a Category 3 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson scale when it made landfall, packed sustained winds of 120 mph (205 kph). It weakened as it moved inland, downgrading to a Category 1 hurricane with winds of 85 mph (145 kph) by the time it crossed the Florida peninsula’s east coast.
The eye of the storm first struck Siesta Key, a barrier island near Sarasota, approximately 60 miles south of Tampa Bay. As the storm moved eastward, it left damage in its wake but spared some of the more densely populated areas from the catastrophic surge that had been feared.
Throughout the state, response crews worked through the night, clearing debris and restoring services. Tornadoes caused widespread destruction, particularly in St. Lucie County, where 17 twisters touched down and destroyed roughly 100 homes, many of them mobile units, according to St. Lucie County Sheriff Keith Pearson.
As many as 2 million residents were ordered to evacuate before Milton’s landfall, while millions more remained in the storm’s path. Flights across Florida were disrupted, with more than 2,200 cancellations reported by Thursday morning, particularly in major airports like Orlando, Tampa, and Palm Beach.
With Florida still reeling from the impacts of Hurricane Helene, both storms are expected to cause billions of dollars in damage across the southern U.S. Emergency services continue to assess the full extent of Milton’s devastation as recovery efforts unfold.
Gary P Hernal started college at UP Diliman and received his BA in Economics from San Sebastian College, Manila, and Masters in Information Systems Management from Keller Graduate School of Management of DeVry University in Oak Brook, IL. He has 25 years of copy editing and management experience at Thomson West, a subsidiary of Thomson Reuters.
