It has been suggested that individuals who are able should use these last hours to leave the area, and for those who are unable to, they should “seek safe places immediately.” It is expected that tonight, Hurricane Milton will make landfall on Florida’s west coast. On Wednesday, the US Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) sent a warning.
The upgraded Category 4 hurricane Milton is expected to make landfall in western Florida tonight or early tomorrow morning, according to FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell, who also indicated that the storm will have a “significant impact” on certain areas during a press conference.
“There is still time to evacuate. Seek shelter inland. In my experience, most deaths occur due to rising water levels on the coast, so now is the time to seek safe areas immediately, away from flood warning areas,” Criswell said.
The administrator also stressed the importance of informing the population in Spanish in the affected area, which includes thirty counties with mandatory evacuation orders in densely populated areas of Tampa, Sarasota, Fort Myers and Orlando, totaling more than 5 million people.
Criswell also spoke of the difficulties in obtaining funds in a year with a number of natural disasters that, he confessed, he has not seen since he has worked at the emergency management agency.
The official said that the succession of Hurricane Helene (the deadliest since Katrina in 2005) and Milton, with winds of around 250 kilometers per hour, in a matter of two weeks, “will cost a lot of money” and the agency will have to ask Congress for more resources to continue operating during this intense hurricane season.
Criswell said they have enough funds to respond to Helene, which affected Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Milton, but “the season is not over.”
FEMA has deployed more than a thousand personnel in anticipation of Milton’s arrival, as well as rescue and search equipment.
Criswell will travel today from North Carolina, where he was leading recovery efforts following the impact of Helene, which left at least 230 dead, to Florida to coordinate more closely with Florida state authorities and Governor Ron DeSantis.