American authorities are increasing calls to evacuate before the arrival of Milton, a hurricane”extremely dangerous“which is due to make landfall during the night from Wednesday to Thursday, and which could be”the worst storm“to strike this peninsula”in a century“, according to Joe Biden.
“The entire Florida peninsula is under some form of either monitoring or alert“, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said Tuesday. The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) warned that Milton was “an extremely dangerous hurricane“, category 4 on the Saffir-Simpson scale – after having been classified for a time in category 5, the highest.
Milton could be “Florida’s worst storm in a century” Joe Biden said on Tuesday, on the sidelines of a meeting with his advisers at the White House to take stock of the preparations. “You must evacuate now, it’s a matter of life and death“, also launched the American president for the inhabitants of the third most populous state in the United States.
His vice-president Kamala Harris followed suit by asking residents to “take local officials seriously“. “Floridians, you are tenacious people who have suffered a lot, but this is going to be different“, alerted the Democratic candidate in the November 5 presidential election on the ABC channel.
A sign of the seriousness of the situation, the White House announced that Joe Biden had decided not to go as planned at the end of the week to Germany and then to Angola.
“Mortal danger”
The hurricane, which is moving from southwest to northeast in the Gulf of Mexico, is expected to make landfall in Florida overnight from Wednesday to Thursday. Before that, “devastating waves“and one”deadly storm” are expected Tuesday along the northern coast of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, the NHC warned.
Climate change makes rapid intensification of storms more likely and increases the risk of more powerful hurricanes by warming sea and ocean waters, scientists say. Temperatures in the North Atlantic have been continuously evolving for more than a year at record levels of heat, according to data from the American Meteorological Observatory (NOAA).
“I can say this without any dramatization: if you choose to stay in one of the evacuation zones, you will die” Jane Castor, the mayor of the large city of Tampa, Florida, said on CNN on Monday.
According to weather expert Michael Lowry, “If the worst forecasts materialize for the Tampa Bay region, coastal flooding caused by Milton could be double that observed two weeks ago during Helene“. “Milton strengthened on Monday at a breakneck pace“, one of “fastest ever observed in the Atlantic basin“, he added.
Generators, food, water and tarps are being distributed across Florida and many residents plan to leave.
“Irresponsibility”
In Tampa, dozens of cars line up to collect sandbags to try to protect their homes from expected flooding. Chicago resident John Gomez decided to come to Tampa to watch over his vacation home during the hurricane. “If I’m in Chicago and something happens, there’s nothing I can do“, declared this septuagenarian who came to collect sand.
In line, Luis Santiago says he fears that “everything will be flooded“. His house is located near the coast, in an evacuation zone decreed by the authorities, and this 43-year-old man wants to protect it before heading inland to flee the danger.
The southeastern United States is still recovering from Helen, a devastating hurricane that caused widespread flooding and damage in half a dozen states, killing at least 234 people.
In the middle of the presidential campaign, Republican candidate Donald Trump was quick to accuse the federal state, led by Democrats, of having done too little, too late, to provide assistance to the victims of Hélène. The Republican had notably accused the Democrats of having “stole the money“from the federal natural disaster response agency (Fema), “so they can give it to their illegal immigrants“.
Her rival in the November 5 election, Kamala Harris, castigated these statements on Tuesday. “This is the height of irresponsibility and frankly insensitivity“, declared the vice-president on ABC. She had already accused the ex-president of “play political games” around Hurricane Helene.
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