More than 2.6 million without power as Hurricane Milton slams Florida

By AP 10 October 2024, 9:33 am

1 Edit

Max Watts, of Buford, Ga., walks in the parking lot to check on a trailer parked outside the hotel where he is riding out Hurricane Milton with coworkers, Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in Tampa, Fla. Watts, who works for a towing company, was deployed with colleagues to Florida to aid in the aftermath of the storm. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)

Hurricane Milton has plowed into Florida as a Category 3 storm, bringing misery to a coast still ravaged by Helene, pounding cities with winds of over 100 mph (160 kph) after producing a barrage of tornadoes, but sparing Tampa a direct hit.

The storm tracked to the south in the final hours and made landfall Wednesday night in Siesta Key near Sarasota, about 70 miles (112 kilometers) south of Tampa. The situation in the Tampa area is still a major emergency as St. Petersburg recorded over 16 inches (41 centimeters) of rain, prompting the National Weather Service to warn of flash flooding there as well as other parts of western and central Florida.

St. Petersburg residents can no longer get water from their household taps because a water main break led the city to shut down service.

The storm knocked out power across a large section of Florida, with more than 2.6 million homes and businesses without power as of early Thursday, according to poweroutage.us, which tracks utility reports.

Before Milton even made landfall, tornadoes were touching down across the state. The Spanish Lakes Country Club near Fort Pierce, on Florida’s Atlantic Coast, was hit particularly hard, with homes destroyed and some residents killed.

“We have lost some life,” St. Lucie County Sheriff Keith Pearson told WPBF News, though he wouldn’t say how many people were killed.