Florida Gulf Coast Faces Catastrophic Threat
Hurricane Ian has strengthened into an “extremely hazardous” Category 4 hurricane, with maximum sustained winds of 140 mph and is expected to cause high tides, catastrophic winds and flooding in Peninsular Florida. , the National Hurricane Center said Wednesday.
Tornadoes are also a risk and several warnings and watches were issued around the state Wednesday morning as rain bands moved across Florida.
Ian crashed into Cuba on Tuesday, a level 3 monster smashing the island with winds of 125 mph. State Emergency Management Director Kevin Guthrie said high winds and high tides are still forecast to travel further north in the Tampa Bay area.
Hundreds of thousands of Floridians face mandatory evacuation orders as the National Hurricane Center extends storm warnings along more than 150 miles of the state’s Gulf coast. Florida Power & Light warns of possible statewide blackouts.
As of Tuesday night, power outages have occurred in the Florida Keys and South Florida, according to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
On the forecast path, Ian’s center is expected to approach the west coast of Florida in the hurricane warning area Wednesday morning, and make landfall afterward.
At 5 a.m., the center of Hurricane Ian was located 75 miles southwest of Naples.
Ian’s hub is forecast to move over central Florida Wednesday night and Thursday morning and emerge into the western Atlantic late Thursday.
Along with howling winds, parts of Central Florida could see 12 to 16 inches of rain and possibly 2 feet of rain in isolated areas, the storm center said. DeSantis said there was a chance of “historic” high tides and flooding.
“In some areas, there will be catastrophic flooding and life-threatening high tides,” DeSantis said Tuesday. “Because of the size of the storm, it’s generating a lot of surge. The Bay Area will be furious when this happens.”
The Florida Keys saw strong winds and heavy rain late Tuesday as Ian headed toward the state, DeSantis said at a news conference Tuesday night.
High tide warnings remain in effect along the west coast of the state with the highest risk from Naples to Sarasota.
DeSantis warned that flooding is possible across much of western Florida. He also raised the possibility that after landing, a weakening Ian would continue to march through Central Florida before leaving the state on Friday near Volusia County on the Atlantic coast.
“This is very nasty weather that we have to stock up on for the next few days,” DeSantis said.
WHAT IS SURGE SURGE? Explain the most dangerous and dangerous threat of hurricanes
Other developments:
►8,000 customers without power in southeast Florida and 30,000 utility workers on standby to help respond to the outage, DeSantis said.
►To prepare for flooding and damage, 176 disaster shelters have been opened and more are expected to open, according to DeSantis.
►DeSantis’ authorized, a total of 5,000 Florida Guards are being activated for State Operations Mission and pre-positioned at armed units across the state for Ian response operations. 2,000 guards from Tennessee, Georgia and North Carolina are also being activated to assist.
► Lando International Airport will be shut down at 10:30 a.m. Wednesday, More than 1,200 flights scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday have been canceled due to the forecast storm, according to flight tracking website Flightaware. com.
►The storm center has expanded its storm warning to include Bonita Beach north across Tampa Bay to the Anclote River. Fort Myers is in a hurricane zone, and Tampa and St.Petersburg could still be directly impacted by a major hurricane for the first time in a century.
Tampa may not make landfall, but is likely to be greatly affected
Tampa is no longer the most likely place to make landfall, but local forecasts still expect heavy rainfall. AccuWeather senior meteorologist Dan Kottlowski said Tampa will still experience a storm surge, but not as predicted in previous forecasts. And it’s “most likely this thing could wobble” further north than computer models are suggesting.
Meteorologist Christianne Pearce said the Tampa area, located at sea level, is particularly vulnerable to storm surge.
“Any storm surge could be significant in those areas, especially as it is more accreted, and storm surge and any kind of inland flooding would be significant,” Pearce said. could be significant,” Pearce said.
Hurricanes will slow down, linger over Florida ‘for a long time’
FEMA administrator Deanne Criswell, speaking at a press conference at the White House, said the storm would make landfall somewhere between Tampa and Fort Myers. The entire state will be affected, and “everyone needs to be focused,” she said. By the time Ian arrives in Florida, the storm will have slowed to about 5 mph, meaning storm surge is the biggest concern, she said.
“This is significant because it means Floridians will have to experience the effects of this storm for a very long time,” she said.
Florida theme parks prepare to close
Florida’s theme parks are hastily prepared for its arrival. Busch Gardens Tampa Bay, just a few miles from where the previous storm was expected to make landfall, was the first park to close before the storm. Walt Disney World, Universal Orlando, SeaWorld Orlando and LEGOLAND Florida will follow on Wednesday.
“Everything revolves around the safety of our guests and team members,” Universal Orlando Resort said in a statement to USA TODAY.
Evacuees don’t have to go too far
Guthrie said those looking to get out of the storm’s path may not have to travel far.
“Many people in the Southwest Florida area, your best bet is to be evacuated across the state,” Guthrie said. “Just go straight across the state to Broward, Miami-Dade, Palm Beach.”
DeSantis says that for some evacuees, moving to a nearby building on higher ground may be enough.
“This doesn’t necessarily mean you have to evacuate to another state,” DeSantis said. “When we say evacuate, we don’t mean keep traveling until you have no chance of getting rain.”
Waiting for the storm in Sarasota County’s Siesta Key
Andrew and Pam Trapani weathered Hurricane Ian at their home in Siesta Key on Tuesday. They thought of leaving when the forecast deteriorated, but by the time the Trapanis considered evacuating, they could not find the hotel. They decided their home – built in 2017 at 17 feet with storm windows and a whole-house generator – was safe enough. It sits on 55 pilots pushed 35 feet into the ground and has a bottom deck designed to let flood water flow through.
Andrew Trapani said it always felt like the area was protected from major storms. But he’s not too confident.
“I’m not a heavy drinker, but I’ll probably have a couple of Scotch drinks in the next few days,” he said.
Sanibel business up; shop prepared for Ian
Nick Ticich and his family have owned the T-Shirt Hut in Sanibel, about 50 miles south of Venice, since the 1950s. Over the past 50 years, the family has battled numerous hurricanes and mostly win every time. However, after his family nearly lost their shop when Hurricane Charley swept through the small town in 2004, he said he still feels the need to be prepared for each upcoming disaster.
“It can come to us,” Ticich said as he boarded his store. “We could lose the building. We could lose everything.”
Cuba has no electricity after Ian’s power grid failure
Ian landed on the western tip of Cuba, where officials set up shelters, housed emergency personnel and worked to protect crops in Cuba’s tobacco-growing region.
“Remarkable wind and the impact of high tides (is) happening in Cuba,” said Daniel Brown, senior hurricane expert and warning coordinator at the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
Cuba’s Electricity Union said in a statement that work was underway to gradually restore service to the country’s 11 million people overnight. Electricity was initially knocked out for about 1 million people in Cuba’s western provinces, but then the entire grid went down.
The storm is forecast to make landfall over Cuba and strengthens into a Category 4 hurricane over the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico. The storm’s winds could reach 140 mph before hitting Florida as early as Wednesday.
Hurricane Ian . Tracker
The storm center said Ian will slow down over the Gulf, growing wider and stronger, “will likely cause significant wind and storm surge impacts along Florida’s west coast,” the center said. said the center of the storm.
Ian is forecast to emerge in the southeastern Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday and approach the west coast of Florida on Wednesday and Wednesday nights. The storm is forecast to slow down during this time, the National Hurricane Center warned in a statement.
“This will likely prolong storm surge, wind and rain effects along affected areas of Florida’s west coast,” the advisory said.
RAPID INTENSIFICATION:What does it mean?
LANDFALL AT CUBA:Hurricane Ian strengthens
Heavy rain and floods forecast for the Southeast
Heavy rainfall is expected to affect the Southeast on Friday and Saturday, the weather service said. Urban flash floods and “significant, widespread” flash floods are expected mid-to-late weekend across central and northern Florida, southern Georgia and coastal South Carolina. Significant, prolonged flooding on the river is expected from central to northern Florida.
Flash flooding and limited river flooding are forecast over parts of the Southeast into the mid-Atlantic mid-to-late weekend.
WHAT IS THE SURGE STORM?:It is often the most deadly and destructive threat of hurricanes
Florida National Guard called to duty
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who declared a statewide state of emergency, said 5,000 members of the Florida National Guard have been called to duty, and another 2,000 are being sent to Florida from neighboring states. . The state is working to load 360 trailers with more than 2 million meals and more than 1 million gallons of water in preparation for distribution. DeSantis said Urban Search and Rescue Teams are ready to mobilize where needed.
“There will be a power disruption, so plan for that,” DeSantis said. “The impacts will be far and wide.
RESOURCES LIST EXPLAINED:Breaking the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind speed scale
What is ‘rapid boost’?
“Rapid intensity” is a process in which a hurricane experiences a faster rate of development: The phenomenon is generally defined as a tropical cyclone (whether tropical storm or hurricane) that is at least 35 mph within 24 hours. Ian is expected to fit this definition. The storm’s winds are forecast to reach 140 mph late Tuesday.
That typically includes very warm water, low vertical wind shear and high average humidity levels, said Colorado State University hurricane researcher Phil Klotzbach. Of the nine hurricanes with winds of 150 mph or more that have hit the U.S. mainland over 103 years, all have seen explosive bursts of force and strength known as rapid intensity.
Category 4 hurricanes could cause ‘catastrophic’ damage
If the storm that strikes is a Category 4 hurricane, it could cause “catastrophic” damage and power outages that could last for weeks or months, according to the National Weather Service’s description of strong storms. The weather service said areas could be uninhabitable for weeks or months.
“Even if you don’t necessarily have to be right in the path of the storm, there will be fairly wide state-wide effects,” warns DeSantis.
Contributing: Ashley Williams; Celina Tebor, Doyle Rice, Eve Chen and Jane Onyanga-Omara, USA TODAY; Zac Anderson and Steven Walker, Sarasota Herald-Tribune; Samantha Neely, Cheryl McCloud and Diane Pantaleo of Fort Myers News-Press; John Kennedy, Hannah Morse, and Sergio Bustos, USA TODAY Network; Related press