What to know as Florida residents begin cleaning up after Hurricane Milton
Cleanup from Hurricane Milton was underway on Friday as residents returned home after the storm barreled across Florida, spawning tornadoes, knocking out power to millions, damaging homes and leading to hundreds of rescues.
At least eight people died in the storm, and there was significant damage in areas, but Milton wasn't as bad as had been feared. However, flooding from Milton’s heavy rains was still causing problems.
Gov. Ron DeSantis on Friday warned people to not let down their guard and to be aware of hazards.
The storm roared into Florida mid-week as some communities were still dealing with damage from devastating Hurricane Helene two weeks ago.
Follow The Associated Press’ coverage of tropical weather at https://apnews.com/hub/hurricanes.
Milton came ashore Wednesday evening as a Category 3 storm near Siesta Key, a barrier island of white sand beaches on the Gulf Coast.
The storm made landfall about 70 miles (110 kilometers) south of the Tampa Bay area, sparing the densely populated area a direct hit.
As the storm made its way across Florida to the Atlantic Ocean it downed power lines and trees and flooded some neighborhoods. Before Milton even made landfall, it spawned deadly tornadoes.
In St. Petersburg, Milton toppled a crane working on a 46-story building and destroyed the roof of Tropicana Field, home to the Tampa Bay Rays baseball team.
On Friday morning, over 2 million customers in Florida were still without power, according to poweroutage.us.
Officials were reporting at least eight deaths as of Friday.
Five people were killed when a tornado hit the Spanish Lakes Country Club near Fort Pierce, on the Atlantic Coast, authorities said.
In Volusia County, a 79-year-old woman in Ormond Beach and a 54-year-old woman in Port Orange died after trees crashed into their homes, the sheriff's office said.
And in Tampa, police said the body of a woman in her 70s was found Thursday morning under a large tree branch.
Human-caused climate change gave a significant boost to Milton, intensifying the storm’s rainfall by 20% to 30% and strengthening its winds by about 10%, scientists said in a new flash study.
World Weather Attribution researchers said Friday that without climate change, a hurricane like Milton would make landfall as a weaker Category 2, which is not considered a “major” storm, instead of a Category 3.
Climate change also boosted Helene’s wind and rain. The two storms made an otherwise unusually quiet hurricane season roar to life.
Three major theme parks in the Orlando area — Walt Disney World, Universal Orlando and SeaWorld — all closed Wednesday as Milton approached but were reopening Friday.
Airports that had ceased operations as the storm approached were reopening as well. Orlando International Airport — the nation’s seventh busiest and Florida’s most trafficked — had resumed full operations by Friday, as had Tampa International Airport and Southwest Florida International Airport in Fort Myers.
The back-to-back hurricanes of Helene and then Milton have reshaped the U.S. presidential campaign, just weeks before the Nov. 5 election.
Both Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump have been devoting part of their recent days to tackling questions about the storm recovery effort, and have seen their schedules jumbled.
After Helene, Trump and Harris have separately gone to Georgia and North Carolina, requiring campaign events elsewhere to be canceled. The hurricanes are also forcing basic questions about who as president would best respond to deadly natural disasters, a once-overlooked issue that has become an increasingly routine part of the job.
© Copyright The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in this news report may not be published, broadcast or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.
