A tremendously powerful hurricane Milton collided with Florida’s west coast on Wednesday night as a category 3. It pushes ahead of it a massive and effective wall of water from the Gulf of Mexico. Catastrophic winds are likely to cause significant property damage.
The cyclone was described earlier in the day by Joe Biden as the “storm of the century”. It made landfall near Sarasota, Florida, just after 8:30 pm ET, according to the National Hurricane Centre, Miami.
Hurricane Milton was bringing deadly storm surges on various Florida’s Gulf coast. The area includes densely populated areas such as Sarasota, Tampa, St Petersburg, and Fort Myers.
As it is nearest the coastal area, it is losing some of its potency. Hurricane Milton is one of the strongest hurricanes to strike across the US mainland in recent memory.
It is the second direct hit on Florida within 12 days. Hurricane Helene strikes through the state’s panhandle toward Georgia and the Carolinas beginning on 27 September. Areas got devastated due to Helene receiving another pounding as Milton struck with winds above 120 mph.
On Wednesday night, a flash flood emergency was in effect for the Tampa Bay area. These include the cities of Tampa and St Petersburg. The Hurricane Centre said that St Petersburg already received 16.6 inches of rain on Wednesday.
The Hurricane expert, Alex DaSilva said that on Wednesday night hurricane Milton encountered some wind shear and another eyewall replacement cycle, that resulted in a permanent decline in peak wind intensity.
DaSilva said that since this occurred, the hurricane grew in size. DaSilva added that Hurricane Milton has made landfall as a formidable category 3 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson scale Wednesday evening.
The Hurricane experts try to control that Milton will strike with the impact of a 5 on “AccuWeather’s RealImpact” Scale for Hurricanes. This takes into account flooding rainfall, storm surge, population affected, and economic impacts beyond the Saffir-Simpson scale.
With the storm coming beached before high tide, Florida Governor, Ron DeSantis said that he hoped the west coast of the state could avoid the worst predicted storm rush. According to the Forecasters, the seawater could rise as high as 13 feet.
DeSantis said that the tornadoes caused damage to numerous counties and destroyed about 125 homes, and most of them are mobile homes. More than 1.3, homes and businesses are without power.
Upon landfall, DeSantis announces that at this point, it is too dangerous to evacuate safely. That is why, people have to shelter in place and just hunker down.
Hurricane Milton makes Landfall in Florida as a category 3 storm
