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WILBUR-BY-THE-Tropical Depression Nicole was moving through Georgia Friday morning after a day of causing havoc as it churned through Florida as a hurricane and then tropical storm.
The rare November hurricane could dump as much as 6 inches (15 centimeters) of rain over the Blue Ridge Mountains by Friday, the National Hurricane Center said. Flash and urban flooding will be possible as the rain spreads into the eastern Ohio Valley, Mid-Atlantic and New England through Saturday.
Nicole had spent Thursday cutting across central Florida after making landfall as a hurricane early that morning near Vero Beach. The brunt of the damage was along the East Coast well north of there, in the Daytona Beach area. The storm made it to the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday evening before turning north.
The storm caused at least two deaths and sent homes along Florida’s coast toppling into the Atlantic Ocean and damaged many others, including hotels and a row of high-rise condominiums. It was another devastating blow just weeks after Hurricane Ian came ashore on the Gulf Coast, killing more than 130 people and destroying thousands of homes.
Nicole was the first hurricane to hit the Bahamas since Hurricane Dorian, a Category 5 storm that devastated the archipelago in 2019. For storm-weary Floridians, it was only the first November hurricane to hit their shores since 1985 and only the third since recordkeeping began in 1853.
