Hurricane Milton made landfall as a Category 3 hurricane near Siesta Key, Florida, on Wednesday evening around 8:30 p.m. For about eight hours, the storm brought heavy rainfall, flooding, tornadoes, storm surges and high winds before moving over the ocean just north of Cape Canaveral as a Category 1 hurricane.

Among the hardest-hit areas were Sarasota, Fort Myers, St. Petersburg, St. Lucie and other Gulf Coast cities. Storm surge warnings were in effect along the east coast of Florida all the way to Georgia’s Altamaha Sound.

Hurricane Milton caused destruction in cities in areas of the west coast, central and east coast of Florida.

Officials reported downed trees, storm surges, flooding, destroyed homes, damaged roads, downed power lines and damage to infrastructure, electrical and water systems and more.

By 11am on Thursday, nine deaths had been reported, although search and rescue operations had barely begun.

Officials have warned that about 11 million people are at risk of flash floods and river flooding after some parts of the state received historic amounts of rain. St. Petersburg received about 18 inches, as well as localized flooding. St. John’s County also experienced “widespread flooding” that made some roads impassable, officials said.

As search and rescue efforts continued Thursday morning, early reports indicated that approximately 125 homes had been destroyed, mostly mobile homes in senior communities.

More than 3.3 million Florida residents were without power on Thursday afternoon.

Tornadoes

Milton also produced “a lot of tornadoes” in affected areas, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said Thursday. “We expect there will be confirmed casualties from the tornadoes, and that happened all the way up the east coast of Florida,” he added.

Four fatalities were reported in St. Lucie County on Florida’s Atlantic coast as a result of several tornadoes that touched down there Wednesday, officials said.

Several hours before Milton made landfall, the National Weather Service in Miami reported that there were at least seven tornadoes and that 53 tornado warnings had been issued, 41 of which were issued by the weather service in Miami.

Videos and photos posted online Wednesday show several spotted tornadoes increasing in size as they move through South Florida.

Storm surge

While the strong storm surge authorities had forecast prior to Milton’s arrival may not have been as severe as expected, some areas, such as parts of Sarasota County, recorded a storm surge of 8 to 12 feet.

On Thursday, DeSantis also said that while the “storm was significant … this was fortunately not the worst-case scenario,” adding that “the storm weakened before landfall and that the storm surge, as initially reported, was overall not as significant as what was observed before Hurricane Helene.”

Storm surge, the rise in sea water levels caused by a storm, can often pose the greatest threat to life and property during a hurricane and lead to significant flooding.

The wave is mainly caused by the winds of a storm pushing water onto land. As a hurricane approaches the coast, the winds force ocean water onto land, and the storm’s atmospheric pressure also helps push the water onto land. The shallower the continental shelf, the greater the threat of a dangerous wave, and waves become even more dangerous as they coincide with high tides.

Water is heavy – about 770 kg to a cubic meter (0.76 cubic meters) – and it can move quickly in a wave, tossing people to their deaths, overturning boats and vehicles and crushing structures. The currents created by the tides can also mix with the waves and seriously erode beaches and coastal roads.

Eight inches of fast-moving water is enough to knock over an adult, the National Hurricane Center says. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina caused storm surges of more than 25 feet on the Mississippi coast, killing as many as 1,500 people directly or indirectly.

Climate connection

Hurricane Milton was the second deadly hurricane in two weeks to hit the state of Florida as hurricanes become more intense and dangerous due to the climate crisis, caused mainly by the burning of fossil fuels, experts say.

According to the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, sea levels are expected to rise between 29 and 82 cm by the end of the century as the sea continues to warm.

The research states that sea level rise will make storm surges during hurricanes more devastating.

Because greenhouse gases help trap heat in the atmosphere, they also help charge the oceans with record temperatures.

In addition, hurricanes are becoming more intense and intense because the heat in the Gulf of Mexico, where many of these storms develop, has been abnormally high. The extra heat acts as a kind of jet fuel for hurricanes, quickly turning them into major storms.

Researchers have found that since the 1970s, the number of storms escalating to Category 4 or 5 hurricanes, with winds of at least 130 mph, has roughly doubled in the North Atlantic.

“If you look back in time, storms have historically increased more slowly than they do today,” said Phil Klotzbach, a researcher at Colorado State University who specializes in hurricane forecasts.