(SARASOTA, Fla.) — While it’s still hours away from making landfall and has yet to cause any damage, Hurricane Milton is already rewriting the record books, officials said.
“I think for the west-central coast of Florida, this has the potential to be the most impactful hurricane we’ve seen in living memory, given the scope of the impacts from the storm surge,” Mike Brennan, director of the National Hurricane Center, told ABC News.
Milton is forecast to make landfall between 9 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET Wednesday near Sarasota as a Category 3 hurricane with wind gusts of over 100 mph. On Wednesday afternoon, Milton was a Category 4 hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico about 150 miles southwest of Tampa, and moving toward Florida’s west coast at 16 mph.
Once it makes landfall, the hurricane is expected to create a 10-to-15-foot storm surge in Sarasota and a storm surge of 8-to-12 feet from Tampa down to Fort Myers.
But the storm, the ninth hurricane of the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season, has already made an impact on the record books.
Milton is the strongest hurricane in the Atlantic Basin in terms of pressure since Hurricane Wilma, which hit Florida in 2005. The storm is also the strongest hurricane in the Atlantic Basin in terms of windspeed since Hurricane Dorian in 2019.
On Monday, Milton was producing maximum winds of 180 mph, making it the third strongest hurricane in the Atlantic Basin on record in terms of wind.
According to the National Hurricane Center records, Milton is one of the top rapidly intensifying hurricanes after increasing 95 mph in 24 hours this week. Only hurricanes Wilma and 2007’s Felix had a greater intensification, according to the records.
Milton is also the fifth strongest hurricane in the Atlantic Basin on record by pressure.
Brennan said Milton is a different beast from other hurricanes due to its “unusual” track.
“Often we see hurricanes approach Florida from the east or the southeast,” Brennan said. “But this track is somewhat unusual and is really a worst-case scenario for these very storm-sensitive areas along the west coast of Florida because the circulation of Milton is going to be pushing that Gulf of Mexico water right up onto dry land here in these vulnerable places.”
Thomas Simonetti for The Washington Post via Getty Images
(TALLAHASSEE, FL.) — Storm surge is a major threat from Hurricane Milton, which is set to make landfall on Florida’s west coast as a Category 4 hurricane Wednesday night.
A dangerous, record-breaking storm surge of up to 12 feet is expected for Tampa Bay and Fort Myers. Storm surge could reach a life-threatening 15 feet near Sarasota.
Here is how storm surge works and why it’s so dangerous:
When pressure falls in the center of the hurricane, water levels rise, and the water amasses while the storm is still over the open ocean.
As the hurricane nears the shore, strong winds push that amassed water toward the coast and onto land.
This can build walls of water — potentially as tall as 20 feet or more — which can quickly overpower walls and flood homes.
In 2005, during Hurricane Katrina, at least 1,500 people died “directly, or indirectly, as a result of storm surge,” according to the National Hurricane Center.
The risks can be even greater if storm surge combines with high tide, which could quickly create a catastrophic rise in water levels.
Miguel J. Rodriguez Carrillo / AFP via Getty Images
Hurricane Milton is already causing travel disruptions as the storm takes aim at Florida’s west coast.
The hurricane is expected to make landfall as a Category 3 hurricane Wednesday night or early Thursday morning. Possible record storm surge is anticipated in the Tampa area. Flooding is also a risk throughout much of the state.
Mandatory evacuation orders have been issued for at least parts of 14 counties along Florida’s west coast, including in Charlotte, Citrus, Collier, Hernando, Hillsborough, Lee, Levy, Manatee, Pasco, Pinellas and Volusia.
Several airports have announced temporary closures ahead of landfall.
Airport closures
Tampa International Airport suspended operations beginning at 9 a.m. on Tuesday and will remain closed to the public “until it can assess any damage after the storm,” airport officials said.
The St. Pete-Clearwater International Airport, just outside of Tampa, closed at 12:30 p.m. on Tuesday, and will remain closed on Wednesday and Thursday.
“The airport is in a mandatory evacuation zone and is not a public shelter,” airport officials tweeted. “Prepare and stay safe.”
The Sarasota Bradenton International Airport in Sarasota closed at 4 p.m. Tuesday and will reopen “once safe to do so,” airport officials tweeted.
Commercial operations stopped at the Orlando Executive Airport at 10 p.m. Tuesday and at the Orlando International Airport at 8 a.m. Wednesday, airport officials said. Both will reopen as soon as it’s safe.
“While these airports will cease commercial operations, they are not closed to emergency/aid and relief flights and will remain open as necessary,” airport officials said. “Commercial operations will resume as soon as possible based on damage assessment.”
Orlando Sanford International Airport in Sanford also suspended operations at 8 a.m. Wednesday, airport officials said, while advising passengers to “stay tuned for updates.”
Miami International Airport and Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport will remain open and operational, with airport officials saying they are closely monitoring the storm.
Flight cancellations More than 1,700 flights have been canceled throughout the U.S. as of Wednesday morning, according to FlightAware. Orlando International Airport has the most, followed by Tampa.
Airlines were operating larger aircraft and adding more flights to their schedules ahead of the hurricane and airport closures.
The Department of Transportation is monitoring flights in and out of areas affected by Milton to “make sure airlines are not charging excessively increasing fares,” Secretary Pete Buttigieg said on X.
Rail service changes
Amtrak announced it will operate a modified schedule due to Milton.
Among the changes, trains on its Silver Service route will terminate at Jacksonville through Thursday, not continuing on south to stops including Orlando, Tampa and Miami. Select trains on its Silver Service route will also originate at Jacksonville through Friday.
The company’s Auto Train Service, which runs between the Washington, D.C., and Orlando areas, is canceled through Thursday.
Brightline, Florida’s high-speed rail, is also adjusting some of its scheduled trips due to Milton, including ceasing operations on Wednesday and Thursday between West Palm Beach and Orlando.
“We will resume full operations after an assessment of track conditions once the storm has passed,” the rail service said in an update on X while advising passengers with reservations to refer to their email for updates.
Other travel updates
Florida’s Department of Transportation began locking down drawbridges Tuesday afternoon in coordination with the United States Coast Guard.
The department has suspended lane closures and active construction work on interstates within the storm’s path. Tolls have also been suspended across central and west Florida, it said.
The Florida Division of Emergency Services announced Monday it has partnered with Uber to provide free rides to and from shelters. Free shuttles to shelters were also operating Tuesday in counties with an evacuation order in place, it said.
ABC News’ Clara McMichael and Ayesha Ali contributed to this report.
(TAMPA, Fla.) — As Danny Pownall looked through the piles of debris on the street in front of one of his rental properties in Redington Shores, Florida, he pointed out suitcases, beds and even a workout ball.
“Their lives just got flipped upside down, literally, and dumped on the street,” he said of residents still recovering from Hurricane Helene, which made landfall in Florida on Sept. 30 and then cut a path of destruction and death up through Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Tennessee.
Pownall told ABC News that Helene destroyed his home as well as some of his rental properties. As a line of dump trucks waited to pick up the piles of debris left by Helene, Pownall and other residents in the Tampa metropolitan area are bracing for Hurricane Milton, which the police chief of Tampa described as “the storm of the century.”
“We don’t know what this storm is going to do,” said Pownall, surveying the sagging second-floor terrace of one of his properties still standing. “That could be a one-two punch to take out this property.”
As of Tuesday, Milton was a Category 4 hurricane swirling in the Gulf of Mexico about 500 miles south-by-southwest of Tampa. It is expected to make landfall around 11 p.m. Wednesday between St. Petersburg and Sarasota, possibly as a Category 3 hurricane, officials said.
From Treasure Island near St. Petersburg to Sanibel Island near Fort Miles, officials are preparing for an emergency on top of the emergency left by Helene and issuing mandatory evacuations.
Florida officials warn that Milton is stacking up to be a monster, forecasting a 10-to-15-foot storm surge, nearly twice as high as what transpired in the area during Helene.
“I know that our residents, our staff, everyone is absolutely, purely exhausted from the recovery effort for Hurricane Helene, but we do need to start preparing for another potential serious hit from another hurricane,” Treasure Island Mayor Tyler Payne said in a video message to his community on Monday. “And you’re still trying to recover from that, and now we have to go through it all over again. But it is absolutely critical that you obey the evacuation orders when they are issued and really protect yourself at this point.”
Sarah Steslicki told ABC News on Tuesday that she has endured more than two decades of hurricanes since building her house in Belleair Beach near Tampa, but said she will decide at the last minute whether to evacuate to higher ground.
“We are still staying put. The storm has been delayed. It’s slowed down a bit. We want to make sure we know the path of the storm. Is it safer to stay at home or are we going to leave?” said Steslicki, adding that she lives on high ground and that her garage got about 2 inches of water during the 8-foot storm surge caused by Helene.
The last time multiple hurricanes hit Florida in such a short period was in 2004, when hurricanes Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne pummeled the state in just six weeks.
“It was chaotic. They were spread out like a week apart,” Steslicki said of surviving the quadruple hit in 2004. “As soon as we’d put our patio furniture out, we’d have to bring it all back in.”
Milton is lining up for a direct hit on the Tampa metro area, which would be the first since 1921. In the time that has passed, the population of Hillsborough and Pinellas counties has grown 20 times over, now home to 2.5 million people.
“We built our house new about 20 years ago. So we know the construction. It’s concrete block,” Steslicki said. “We’d rather be in a safe environment and maybe be out of power and water than to be in jeopardy in a structure that’s not sound.”
Making matters worse, Steslicki said she and her family plan to travel to California on Saturday for her daughter’s wedding.
“It’s especially stressful for us. If there’s any kind of damage, we’re not going to cancel our daughter’s wedding,” Steslicki said.
Kevin Doyle, the co-owner of the Celtic Public House in Punta Gorda, near Fort Myers, said he was taking no chances after staying put during Hurricane Helene. He told ABC News on Tuesday and that he is evacuating south to Coral Gables on the east coast of southern Florida near Miami.
Doyle also survived the 2004 barrage of hurricanes. He said his pub and much of his town were destroyed by Hurricane Charley, which caused $16 billion in damage and, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, killed 18 people. Doyle spent seven years rebuilding his business only to see it damaged again by Hurricane Helene.
“It was treacherous; the worst thing to happen,” Doyle said of riding out Helene at home.
Doyle said Helene flooded his pub with up to 42 inches of water and damaged the inside of the business. He said his two cars were also destroyed by the flooding.
Doyle said he finished installing new drywall in his business “in record time” as officials began issuing warnings of Milton. He said he’s erected a 4-foot-high wall of sandbags around his pub hoping it will protect it.
“I’m just hoping it’s not as high as Helene,” he said.
(WASHINGTON) — A first-of-its-kind survey has found that 3.3% of U.S. high school students identified as transgender in 2023, with another 2.2% identified as questioning.
The first nationally representative survey from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also highlights the multiple health disparities faced by transgender students who may experience gender dysphoria, stigma, discrimination, social marginalization or violence because they do not conform to social expectations of gender, the CDC reports.
These stressors increase the likelihood transgender youth and those who are questioning may experience mental health challenges, leading to disparities in health and well-being, according to the health agency.
Here are some of the findings:
More than a quarter (26%) of transgender and questioning students attempted suicide in the past year, compared to 5% of cisgender male and 11% of cisgender female students. The CDC urged schools to “create safer and more supportive environments for transgender and questioning students” to address these disparities, including inclusive activities, mental health and other health service referrals, and implementing policies that are LGBTQ-inclusive.
About 7 in 10 questioning students (69%) and transgender students (72%) experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness, which the CDC states is a marker of depressive symptoms.
The CDC estimates 40% of transgender and questioning students have experienced bullying at school. About a quarter of transgender students (25.3%) and more than a quarter of questioning students (26.4%) skipped school because they felt unsafe, compared with 8.5% of cisgender male students.
Trans students were more likely to experience unstable housing in the last month than cisgender students. The CDC found 10.7% of trans students and 10% of questioning students said they experienced unstable housing, compared to 2.1% of cisgender males and 1.8% of cisgender females.
The CDC noted this disparity is likely caused of discrimination, such as family rejection.
Additionally, “transgender students might experience discrimination, harassment, and assault among foster, shelter, and other social service providers that make this population less likely to be sheltered when experiencing unstable housing, compounding their vulnerability to experiences of violence, poor mental health, and suicidal thoughts and behaviors,” the report states.
The Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System regularly surveys more than 20,000 high school students in both public and private schools nationwide to monitor adolescent behavior over time to identify key issues and health needs.
If you are struggling with thoughts of suicide or worried about a friend or loved one, call or text the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 for free, confidential emotional support 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
(TAMPA, Fla.) — It has been more than 100 years since Florida’s Tampa Bay area – a region especially vulnerable to storm surge and flooding – faced a direct hit by a hurricane.
But Hurricane Milton is now heading straight for Florida’s Gulf Coast, with landfall and a 15-foot storm surge possible in Tampa by late Wednesday night, meaning residents are racing to evacuate ahead of the storm even as they continue to clean up the damage from Hurricane Helene.
Here’s why Hurricane Milton is posing such a threat to the Tampa Bay region:
Why is Tampa susceptible to flooding and storm surge?
The two major surrounding bodies of water – the Gulf of Mexico and surrounding bays – as well as the low-lying coastline make the Tampa Bay area especially susceptible to storm surge, according to experts.
The continental shelf in the Gulf of Mexico extends far offshore, up to 150 miles in some spots, according to the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration. When water gets “shoved” onto the coast from tropical systems, it has nowhere to go but onto the land, Marshall Shepherd, director of the Atmospheric Sciences Program at the University of Georgia and former president of the American Meteorological Society, told ABC News.
Additionally, when it comes to storm surge, it isn’t the strength of the storm that matters, but rather the size, Shepherd noted. That’s because the larger is the storm system, the longer water gets pushed onto shore, according to Josh Dozor, general manager of medical and security assistance at International SOS, a risk mitigation company, and former deputy assistant administrator of FEMA.
“When you have a large storm, it enables the gradual, continuous buildup of storm surge as it approaches,” Dozor told ABC News. ” … That 10 to 15 feet of storm surge could result in 10 to 15 feet over what is normally dry land.”
It isn’t uncommon for rising waters from Hillsborough Bay, which comprises the northeast arm of Tampa Bay, to spill onto Bayshore Boulevard, a scenic waterfront roadway in South Tampa that serves as recreation for residents, as well as a common route for drivers. Bayshore Boulevard flooded ahead of and during Hurricane Helene, when the storm surge was less than is currently forecast for Hurricane Milton.
Hurricane Helene’s impact is still fresh
The Tampa Bay region is nowhere near done with recovery and cleanup from Hurricane Helene, which made landfall Sept. 30 and brought six feet of storm surge to the Tampa area’s coastlines. The storm’s size allowed for that surge to infiltrate homes and businesses along the Gulf Coast from Cedar Key to Fort Meyers – each of which is about two hours north and south of Tampa, respectively – residents told ABC News.
In Dunedin, Florida, located on the Gulf Coast at the northernmost tip of Tampa Bay, mountains of debris still litter the streets and people were still airing out their belongings when evacuation orders for Hurricane Milton were issued, Dunedin resident Candace Allaire, 39, COO of the Crown & Bull restaurant, told ABC News.
While the restaurant’s newly renovated kitchen weathered the brunt of Helene’s damage, the rest of the neighborhood was destroyed, Allaire said. Many homes for Allaire’s family and employees, as well as neighboring restaurants, had four feet of standing water in them for hours as Helene barreled through, she said.
The emotional toll of Helene less than two weeks ago, and Hurricane Ian two years ago, is still pervasive in the community. Rebecca Kuppler, mother to a 4-year-old son and 2-year-old daughter, lost everything in Hurricane Helene. The family had evacuated to Orlando ahead of the storm and heard from neighbors that the water line was rising higher and higher, she told ABC News.
“It’s not stuff,” Kuppler said of the loss. “It’s our home, it’s the memories, it’s the love, the time you put into that, and that’s what’s been really hard.”
The pile of debris outside of Kuppler’s home was still there as the forecasts for Hurricane Milton began, prompting the family to evacuate yet again.
The back-to-back storms are reminiscent of the 2004 hurricane season, when Hurricanes Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne all struck Florida within a six-week period.
“It’s an extreme amount of stress, and if it happens once in a while, I think people can weather it,” Dozor told ABC News. “But when it happens a couple times a year or a couple times every few years, it takes a great toll on people.”
How climate change is increasing the storm risk in the Tampa Bay region
The extreme threat from hurricanes that the Tampa Bay region faces is also likely being influenced by our changing climate.
Human-amplified climate change is the primary cause for present-day rising sea levels, according to a consensus of climate scientists. It’s also triggering more frequent and more intense extreme rainfall events, experts say.
While many factors contribute to the magnitude and impact of storm surge and coastal flooding, average sea levels for many Gulf Coast communities are more than six inches higher today than they were just a few decades ago, data shows.
Human-amplified climate change also likely affected how fast Hurricane Milton intensified as it tracked over the warmer than average waters of the southern Gulf of Mexico, according to researchers. The record-high sea surface temperatures observed in this region over the past two weeks were made up to 400 to 800 times more likely by climate change, according to a rapid attribution analysis by Climate Central.
Warm ocean waters provide the energy hurricanes need to form and intensify. The warmer the water, the more powerful the storms typically are.
While a link has been established between the unusually warm sea surface temperatures and human-caused climate change, it is not yet known to what degree that climate change may have influenced Hurricane Milton’s development.
How Tampa Bay is preparing for the storm
Mandatory evacuations are in place for six counties in Florida, with Tampa at the center of the threat. Airports, businesses and schools from Tampa to Naples, some 170 miles south, are closing in preparation for Milton.
The Tampa area is one of the top five places for evacuations due to potential storm surge, Dozor said. Tampa Mayor Jane Castor issued a dire warning, urging those in the evacuation zones to heed evacuation mandates.
“If you choose to stay in one of the evacuation areas, you are going to die,” Castor said in an interview with CNN Monday night.
While FEMA and emergency management at the state and local levels report that they are adequately prepared for Hurricane Milton, it is incumbent upon residents to follow instructions and get themselves out of harm’s way in a timely manner, Dozor said. In highly populated cities along the Tampa peninsula, like Tampa, St. Petersburg and Clearwater, it is important for people to leave early because of the limited roadways.
“There are a lot of bottlenecks that hinder quick and efficient movement of populations to be able to leave the peninsula of Tampa,” he said.
It appears that residents are heeding the warnings, Dozor noted. Beginning on Monday, standstill traffic could be seen for miles on I-75 and the Sunshine Skyway, the bridge that spans the Tampa Bay, as residents embarked on a mass exodus to safety.
At 4 a.m. on Tuesday, Candace Allaire and her fiancé evacuated north to Destin, in Florida’s panhandle, to ride out the storm. Fuel was hard to come by in preparation of their road trip, she said.
In addition, hotel availability is most major Florida cities to which residents might evacuate – such as Fort Lauderdale, Gainesville and Jacksonville – is already extremely low, Dozor said.
“All the hotels are reserved for people who’ve obviously been evacuated,” he said.
(KANSAS CITY, Mo.) — Andrew Lester, the man charged in the April 2023 shooting of Ralph Yarl after the teenager mistakenly went to the wrong house, got a new trial date on Tuesday, pending the outcome of a mental health evaluation, ABC’s Kansas City affiliate KMBC reported.
A Clay County judge rescheduled Lester’s trial, which was initially set for Oct. 7, to begin on Feb. 18, 2025, according to KMBC.
Prior to Tuesday’s hearing, Lester’s trial had been delayed indefinitely after the judge ordered on Sept. 9 that Lester undergo a mental health check to determine if he is fit to stand trial in response to a motion filed by Lester’s attorney Steven Salmon.
Salmon filed a motion in the Clay County Circuit Court on Aug. 27, requesting a mental evaluation to determine if Lester is fit to stand trial, according to court documents obtained by ABC News, where he claimed that Lester is facing health conditions that could impair his ability to understand legal proceedings or assist in his defense at trial.
The judge said on Tuesday that Lester’s mental evaluation must be complete by Nov. 9 and his next hearing was set for Nov. 26, according to KMBC.
ABC News reached out to Lester’s attorney but a request for comment was not immediately returned.
Lester, a white man, was charged with one count of felony assault in the first-degree and one count of armed criminal action, also a felony, in the shooting of Yarl, a Black teenager who mistakenly went to Lester’s Kansas City home after arriving at the wrong address to pick up his twin brothers from a play date. Lester pleaded not guilty in April 2023 and was released on a $200,000 bond.
Yarl was shot in the head and in the right arm on the evening of April 13, 2023, by Lester, according to police. The 18-year-old suffered a traumatic brain injury, his family previously told ABC News.
Exclusive: Ralph Yarl, teen shot after mistakenly going to the wrong house, seeks ‘justice’ in civil lawsuit
According to court documents, Salmon said in the motion that Lester has lost more than 50 pounds, experienced issues with his memory and has exhibited confusion surrounding the details of the case.
“Over the course of this case, Counsel has noticed a significant decline in Defendant’s overall physical health, as well as his mental acuity,” Salmon said in the motion. “The frailty of Defendant’s physical health has, in part, been because of a broken hip, heart issues and hospitalization he has suffered during the pendency of this matter.”
Salmon also noted that Lester has faced “stress” due to “overwhelming media attention, as well as death threats and other unwanted attention, making it difficult for him to interact socially with anyone.”
“The goal of the judicial system is never to hold white offenders accountable for the crimes committed against people of color,” Yarl’s mother, Cleo Nagbe, told ABC News in a statement on Sept. 9 after the trial was delayed indefinitely. “So, we wait to be proven wrong this time around, especially with a victim like Ralph.”
Andrew Lester, suspect in Ralph Yarl shooting, to undergo mental health check, judge rules
The trial was initially set after a Clay County judge ruled during an August 2023 preliminary hearing that there was enough probable cause that a felony has been committed.
“The binding over of a defendant from a preliminary hearing is fairly normal. The prosecutor simply needs to provide probable cause to bind the case over,” Salmon told ABC News after the August 2023 ruling.
Mohamed Bahi, who resigned Monday from his job in the Adams administration, was arrested Tuesday for obstructing the investigation into the mayor and his campaign.
Bahi is charged with witness tampering and destroying evidence.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Morton Plant North Bay Hospital/Google Maps Street View
(NEW YORK) — Dozens of health care facilities in Florida are suspending services and/or preparing to evacuate as Hurricane Milton approaches.
On Sunday, Pinellas County – located on the west central Florida coast and including Clearwater and St. Petersburg – issued mandatory evacuation orders for long-term care facilities, assisted living facilities and hospitals in three evacuation zones.
The order affects six hospitals, 25 nursing homes and 44 assisted living facilities, totaling about 6,600 patients, according to the order.
“Pinellas County is in the potential path of the storm and could experience life-threatening storm surge, localized flooding and hurricane force winds, [depending] on where the storm makes landfall on Wednesday,” the order read. “Many coastal areas have barely begun to recover from Hurricane Helene.”
Just north of Pinellas County, Morton Plant North Bay Hospital in New Port Richey initiated evacuation procedures Monday morning and is not accepting new patients, according to a statement from BayCare, the hospital’s parent network.
BayCare said that while all of its other hospitals are open as of Monday afternoon, elective procedures for non-urgent procedures have been canceled for Wednesday, Oct. 9, with a decision for procedures on Thursday, Oct. 11, to come shortly.
All BayCare ambulatory surgery centers, imaging centers, laboratories, urgent care facilities and behavioral health outpatient sites will also be closed Wednesday and Thursday, according to the BayCare statement.
Additionally, the James A. Haley Veterans’ Hospital, located in Tampa and affiliated with the University of South Florida Morsani College of Medicine, announced the hospital and its outpatient clinics would be closed for in-person appointments and elective surgeries from Tuesday, Oct. 9, to Thursday, Oct. 11, due to “predicted impacts from Hurricane Milton.”
University of Florida Health (UF Health) issued a tropical weather alert Monday afternoon, announcing that most UF Health hospitals, outpatient clinical facilities and physician practices remain open, with some exceptions. Facilities in Archer, Gainesville, Jacksonville, Leesburg, Naples, St. Augustine, St. Petersburg, and The Villages announced closures or modified hours ahead of Milton’s landfall.
HCA Florida Healthcare told ABC News on Monday it was working to transfer patients from hospitals most directly in the Milton’s expected path to sister facilities throughout the state. Hospitals that are transferring patients include HCA Florida Englewood Hospital in Englewood, HCA Florida Fawcett Hospital in Port Charlotte, HCA Florida Largo West Hospital in Largo, HCA Florida Pasadena Hospital in St. Petersburg, and HCA Florida West Tampa Hospital in Tampa.
However, not all health care facilities currently have plans to suspend service. A spokesperson for Tampa General Health (TGH) said no closures have been announced yet and directed ABC News to an update on the hospital’s website, which as of Monday afternoon stated that all of TGH’s “hospitals, medical offices and other facilities are continuing normal operations.”
TGH also said it activated its emergency response plan “and opened its incident command center to enable and support continued operations.”
Another network, Florida AdventHealth, issued a notice that its hospitals and emergency rooms remain open but warned that some of its operations may change “for the safety of our patients, their loved ones and our team members.”
The National Hurricane Center announced Monday that Milton had intensified to a Category 5 hurricane, with maximum sustained winds of 175 mph, and with flooding and storm surges posing a major risk for many communities on Florida’s west central coast.
(TALLAHASSEE, FL) — Florida officials are urging residents to evacuate now as Hurricane Milton intensifies and sets its sights on the state’s west coast.
Hours before the storm strengthened to a Category 5 hurricane on Monday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis warned residents to take evacuation orders seriously.
“Time is going to start running out very, very soon,” he said at a news conference.
“Please, if you’re in the Tampa Bay area, you need to evacuate,” Kevin Guthrie, executive director of Florida Emergency Management, urged at the news conference. “Drowning deaths due to storm surge are 100% preventable if you leave.”
More than 50 counties along Florida’s west coast are now under state of emergency orders and several are under evacuation orders, including Charlotte, Hillsborough, Manatee, Pasco, Pinellas and Sarasota. All evacuation orders are listed on Florida’s Division of Emergency Management website.
The storm is is expected to weaken, but will still be a major Category 3 hurricane by the time it makes landfall in Florida late Wednesday night or early Thursday morning.
“If you live in a storm surge evacuation zone and you’re asked to leave by your local officials, please do that,” Michael Brennan, the director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Hurricane Center, told ABC News Live on Sunday. “You don’t have to drive hundreds of miles to get to a safe place, often just tens of miles to get inland, out of that evacuation zone, to a shelter, a friend or loved one’s home.”
Brennan also urged Floridians to prepare a disaster kit with several days’ worth of nonperishable food, water, medicine and batteries.
Ahead of landfall on Monday, President Joe Biden approved an emergency declaration for the state to allow federal assistance to begin supplementing local efforts.
Flooding is expected, and storm surge is a significant threat.
A record-breaking storm surge of 8 to 12 feet is expected in the Tampa Bay area, as Floridians continue cleaning up from the 6 to 8 feet of storm surge that was just brought on by Hurricane Helene.
As Milton churns closer, Tampa International Airport said it would suspend operations Tuesday at 9 a.m. and remain closed “until it can assess any damage after the storm,” airport officials said. St. Pete-Clearwater International Airport also said it would close Tuesday, and remain shuttered on Wednesday and Thursday.
The University of Florida said it would be canceling classes Wednesday and Thursday, but plan to reopen Friday morning.
