Hurricane Milton is heading towards the coast of the US state of Florida overlooking the Gulf of Mexico, causing traffic jams and fuel shortages as a result of the displacement of thousands of residents, while officials ordered more than a million people to evacuate before the hurricane hits the Tampa Bay area.
A Category 5 hurricane, the highest on the hurricane intensity scale, is expected to make landfall late Wednesday or early Thursday, threatening part of Florida’s densely populated West Coast, which is still reeling from the effects of devastating Hurricane Helen. It hit the area less than two weeks ago.
More than three million people live in the sprawling Tampa Bay area.
The US National Hurricane Center said that the maximum wind speed associated with Hurricane Milton was 270 kilometers per hour.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said that five thousand National Guard members had been deployed, with another three thousand on standby to deal with the consequences of the storm.
President Joe Biden, who postponed a visit abroad to oversee the response to the storm, urged those under evacuation orders to leave immediately and said it was a matter of life and death.
Heavy traffic clogged the roads leading out of Tampa.
About 17 percent of Florida’s 8,000 gas stations were out of fuel late Tuesday.
Milton weakened to a Category 4 hurricane yesterday, Tuesday, but regained strength. The hurricane is expected to remain extremely dangerous after making landfall in Florida, potentially causing catastrophic damage and power outages for days.
The storm has already caused some chaos in Mexico, but Yucatan Governor Joaquín Díaz Mina said most of the damage reported so far has been minor. Electricity was cut off for thousands of people.
Relief efforts are still underway across much of the southeastern United States in the wake of Hurricane Helen, which killed more than 200 people in six states and caused billions of dollars in damage.
