Array
Hurricane Helene could cause a “nightmare” scenario of catastrophic storm surge in northwestern Florida, officials warned Thursday as they urged residents to heed evacuation orders ahead of the enormous storm, which is expected to cause significant damage hundreds of miles inland across much of the southeastern U.S.
Helene was upgraded to a major Category 3 storm Thursday afternoon ahead of its expected evening landfall on Florida’s northwestern coast. Hurricane and flash flood warnings extend far beyond the coast up into south-central Georgia.
It was already starting to be felt Thursday afternoon, with tropical storm force winds hitting the state and water lapping over a road on the northern tip of Siesta Key near Sarasota. And rain has started battering places like Asheville, North Carolina, where a 7-inch (18-centimeter) deluge has raised flooding concerns.
With forecasters also warning of tornadoes, damaging winds and mudslides, the governors of Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia have all declared emergencies, as did President Joe Biden for several of the states. He is sending the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency to Florida on Friday to view the damage.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said Thursday morning that models suggest Helene will make landfall further east, lessening the chances for a direct hit on the capital city of Tallahassee, whose metro area has a population of around 395,000.
The shift has the storm aimed squarely at the sparsely-populated Big Bend area, home to fishing villages and vacation hideaways where Florida’s Panhandle and peninsula meet. Shuttered gas stations dotted the two-lane highway, their windows boarded up with plywood.
Philip Tooke, a commercial fisherman who took over the business his father founded near the region’s Apalachee Bay, plans to ride out this storm like he did during Hurricane Michael and the others – on his boat. “This is what pays my bills,” Tooke said of his boats. “If I lose that, I don’t have anything.”
Many, though, were heeding the mandatory evacuation orders that stretched from the Panhandle south along the Gulf Coast in low-lying areas around Tallahassee, Gainesville, Cedar Key, Lake City, Tampa and Sarasota.
Among them was Sharonda Davis, one of several gathered at a Tallahassee shelter worried their mobile homes wouldn’t withstand the winds.
