While numerous tornadoes and heavy rains have already begun to impact the Florida coast, Hurricane Milton is expected to make landfall in Florida in a few hours. Downgraded at the end of the day to category 3 (out of 5) but still considered “major” by the American Hurricane Center (NHC), Milton is expected to be “one of the most destructive hurricanes in more than a century in Florida”. warned Joe Biden on Wednesday evening.
Florida, the third most populous state in the United States and which attracts many tourists, is used to hurricanes. But climate change, by warming the seas, makes their rapid intensification more likely and increases the risk of more powerful phenomena, according to scientists.
Residents worried after the passage of Hélène
From Tampa to Fort Myers, in the area where Milton is due to make landfall, the time is now no longer for evacuation but for confinement on site, at home or in centers provided for this purpose. Sarasota, also on the West Coast, took on the appearance of a ghost town as the rain intensified.
Brad Reeves, a resident who returned to confine himself at home, predicted that “it will be quite a storm”, confiding his fear of seeing this “beautiful city where (he) has loved to live for 15 years be destroyed”. A little further north, in Tampa, Randy Prior, 36, says he is “nervous”. “We are barely recovering” from Hurricane Helene, which left “the soils saturated” with water, he observes.
Dozens of tornadoes
At 9:00 p.m. (3 a.m. in Paris), the hurricane was escorted by winds of nearly 200 km/h and located 100 kilometers southwest of Sarasota, according to the NHC. Milton is expected to cross Florida from west to east, according to the NHC, passing in particular near Orlando, where Disney World theme parks were closed at midday. Tampa and Sarasota airports are at a standstill.
The hurricane could especially cause coastal flooding of up to 4.5 meters and heavy rains which pose the “risk of catastrophic and potentially fatal urban flash flooding”, according to the NHC. In addition to the rising waters, authorities fear the additional danger posed by the numerous debris left by Hélène, which killed at least 236 people across the southeast of the United States, including at least 15 in Florida. For several days, authorities have been urging residents of areas affected by evacuation orders to leave, assuring that it is a “matter of life and death”.
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