Emergency crews rescued Florida residents yesterday from the debris left by the hurricane Milton after the storm hit coastal communitieswhere it destroyed homes, filled the streets with mud and gave rise to a large number of tornadoes.
Just two weeks after the devastation caused by Hurricane Helene, the storm also left more than three million customers without powerflooded barrier islands, ripped the roof off a baseball stadium and launched a construction crane into a building.
In one of the most spectacular rescues, Hillsborough County deputies put a 14-year-old boy on a raft who they found clinging to a piece of fence floating in the torrent.
A Coast Guard helicopter crew rescued a man holding onto a cooler in the waters off the State’s Western coast after his fishing boat was destroyed off Medeira Beach hours before the hurricane made landfall. . The agency estimates that the man survived winds of between 121 and 145 km/h and waves of up to 7.6 meters for an entire night.
Despite the destruction, many people expressed relief that the storm’s passage was not much worse.
The city of Tampa It was not hit directly, and the potentially lethal storm surge that many scientists feared never materialized. The storm veered south in recent hours and made landfall Wednesday afternoon as a Category 3 hurricane on Siesta Key, about 70 miles south of Tampa.
Damage was widespread and water levels could continue to rise for several days, but Gov. Ron DeSantis said it was not a “worst-case scenario.”
“You get two hurricanes in a couple of weeks, it’s not an easy thing to go through, but I’ve seen a lot of resilience across this state,” the governor said in Sarasota. He indicated that he was confident that this area “will recover very, very quickly.”
Five people were killed by tornadoes in Spanish Lakes Country Club, near Fort Pierceon the Atlantic Coast.
At the White House, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said there were reports of up to 10 deaths due to the tornadoes, but warned that this is a tentative number. At least 340 people and 49 pets have been rescued during current operationssaid DeSantis, who also reported that the worst storm surge was recorded in Sarasota County.
CT