Hurricane Milton's Seawater Surge Threatens to Swamp Florida Gulf Coast

Cars drive during heavy rainfall as Hurricane Milton approaches Orlando, Florida, U.S., October 9, 2024. (REUTERS/Jose Luis Gonzalez)

TAMPA, Florida (Reuters) -Hurricane Milton closed in on Florida's Gulf Coast on Wednesday, leaving residents only a few hours to evacuate or hunker down before the storm brings a life-threatening surge of seawater, shredding winds and a deluge of rain to a region already battered by Hurricane Helene two weeks ago.

Millions of people along a stretch of more than 300 miles (483 km) of coastline were under evacuation orders, and authorities issued increasingly dire warnings on Wednesday morning as the storm approached.

Michael Tylenda, who was visiting his son in Tampa, said he was heeding the advice from officials to evacuate.

"If anybody knows anything about Florida, when you don't evacuate when you're ordered to, you can pretty much die," Tylenda said. "The house can be replaced. The stuff can be replaced. It's just better to get out of town."

Sarasota County Emergency Management Chief Sandra Tapfumaneyi told CNN that people who remain on the barrier islands in her county just south of Tampa likely would not survive the projected 10- to 15-foot storm surge.

"If you choose to stay, make sure you have a life preserver handy," she said.

The storm was on a collision course for the Tampa Bay metropolitan area, home to more than 3 million people, though forecasters said the path could vary before the storm makes landfall late Wednesday.

At 8 a.m. CDT (1300 GMT), the eye of the storm was 250 miles (405 km) southwest of Tampa. The storm slightly weakened on Wednesday morning to a Category 4, the second-highest level, but remained "an extremely dangerous major hurricane" with maximum sustained winds of 155 mph (249 kph), the National Hurricane Center said.

Milton was expected to maintain hurricane strength as it crossed the Florida peninsula, posing storm-surge danger on the state's Atlantic Coast as well.

While wind speeds may drop further, the size of the storm was growing, endangering more coastal areas.

U.S. President Joe Biden spoke with leaders in Clearwater and Pinellas County Tuesday night, the White House said on Wednesday. The White House said Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris would be briefed on the storm at noon ET and Biden would make remarks later in the afternoon.

Officials including Biden and Tampa Mayor Jane Castor warned people in evacuation zones to get out or risk death.

"There is high confidence that this hurricane is going to pack a major, major punch and do an awful lot of damage," Governor Ron DeSantis said at a morning briefing.

Trucks have been running 24 hours a day to clear mounds of debris left behind by Helene before Milton potentially turns them into dangerous projectiles, DeSantis said.

Deanne Criswell, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said she would travel to Florida on Wednesday and remain there after the storm to help coordinate recovery efforts.

FEMA has moved millions of liters of water, millions of meals and other supplies and personnel into the area. None of the additional aid will detract from recovery efforts for Hurricane Helene, she said.

"I want people to hear from me directly, FEMA is ready," she said.

About 2.8% of U.S. gross domestic product is in the direct path of Milton, said Ryan Sweet, chief U.S. economist at Oxford Economics. Airlines and energy firms were among the companies beginning to halt their Florida operations as they braced for disruptions.

Major Florida theme parks shuttered ahead of the storm, with Disney World, Universal Studios and SeaWorld all planning to close their doors later on Wednesday.

Mobile homes, nursing homes and assisted-living facilities faced mandatory evacuation.

In Fort Myers, mobile-home resident Jamie Watts and his wife took refuge from Milton in a hotel after losing their previous trailer to Hurricane Ian in 2022.

"My wife's happy. We're not in that tin can," Watts said.

"We stayed during Ian and literally watched my roof tear off my house," he added. "So this time I'm going to be a little safer."

Bumper-to-bumper traffic choked roads leading out of Tampa on Tuesday, when about 17% of Florida's nearly 8,000 gas stations had run out of fuel, according to fuel-markets tracker GasBuddy.

Milton became the third-fastest intensifying storm on record in the Atlantic, growing from a Category 1 to a Category 5 in less than 24 hours.

"These extremely warm sea surface temperatures provide the fuel necessary for the rapid intensification that we saw taking place to occur," said climate scientist Daniel Gilford of Climate Central, a nonprofit research group. "We know that as human beings increase the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, largely by burning fossil fuels, we are increasing that temperature all around the planet."

(Reporting by Julio-Cesar Chavez and Octavio Jones in Tampa; Additional reporting by Evan Garcia, Rich McKay, Brendan O'Brien, Susan Heavey and Daksh Grover; Writing by Joseph Ax; Editing by Frank McGurty and Rod Nickel)