Milton becomes a Category 5 hurricane as it approaches Mexico

Monday 07th October 2024 11:48 PM

“If the storm stays on its current path, it will be the worst to hit the Tampa area in more than 100 years,” the weather services of this large Florida city warned on Monday.

In Progreso, in the state of Yucatan, the windows and doors of a building are reinforced and protected Monday before the arrival of the hurricane. — © Martin Zetina / keystone-sda.ch

Milton, is expected to make landfall in this southeastern American state, the third most populous in the United States, during the night from Wednesday to Thursday, after having skirted the northern coast of the Mexican province of Yucatan on Monday and Tuesday. Gulf of Mexico.

With “destructive winds” of up to 285 km/h, according to the American Hurricane Center (NHC), the hurricane is expected to bring “destructive waves” to the Yucatan. The new Mexican president Claudia Sheinbaum also alerted the population to the possibility of “torrential rains”, in a message on X.

Earlier Monday, workers in Yucatan barricaded doors and windows as fishermen returned their boats to port.

In Cancun, the population stocked up on Monday, before Milton’s arrival. — © ELIZABETH RUIZ / AFP

Florida braces for second devastating hurricane

Less than two weeks after the passage of Helene, the inhabitants of Florida were also preparing with concern for the arrival of this new hurricane. “Last time, people’s cars were underwater, here in the street,” David Levitsky, a resident of Treasure Island, a small Florida island of 6,500 inhabitants, told AFP. “But obviously this time the biggest problem for us will be the wind.”

Americans collect sand to protect their property from Milton’s arrival in St. Petersburg, Florida, on Monday. — © SPENCER PLATT / Getty Images via AFP

Milton is a “ferocious” hurricane, Republican Governor Ron DeSantis warned Monday. “You have time to leave. So, please do it,” he urged residents of at-risk areas. To facilitate these evacuations, the Florida authorities have announced that they will make tolls free.

In Orlando, a city with many amusement parks in the center of the state, hundreds of cars waited under a gray sky on Monday for a distribution of sandbags. Dominick Tucciarone, 29, told AFP that he had not planned to evacuate but admitted to being worried. “It’s been a long time since the eye of a hurricane passed over Orlando,” he said, pointing to the fact that Milton continues to expand into the Gulf of Mexico.

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Milton intervenes even as emergency services are still hard at work to help the many victims of Hurricane Helene, the deadliest to hit the continental United States since Katrina in 2005.