One man in SC was killed by a falling tree limb and another died in a traffic accident, officials said. Charleston Mayor John Tecklenburg said of the storm surge that flooded the city, “It sounds kind of counterintuitive that we’d have that, because the center of the storm is over 200 miles away in western Georgia, and here we are over on the coast of SC”. Florida Power & Light Co. said it now has 16,000 fix staff in the state, triple the normal amount.
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Forecasters warn wind gusts around 60 miles per hour and storm surge of up to 6 feet are possible later today. The National Hurricane Center predicted the storm would cross Monday into southwest Georgia, where a hurricane warning was in effect for a large rural area including the cities of Albany and Valdosta.
Rain and winds have subsided in Florida, but the state is still reeling from the storm’s destruction.
Storm surge impacts were less than expected but areas like Lehigh, downtown Fort Myers and Cape Coral are dealing with flooding because of heavy rain and storm surge from the Caloosahatchee River. Officials closed major bridges.
What was left of Barbuda was spared from the worst of Hurricane Jose, as the Category 4 storm skirted just north of the island on Saturday. Its center hit portions of the Keys on Sunday but missed Miami and Naples, then skirted Tampa as the storm slowed.
Panama said it was distributing at least 90 tonnes of humanitarian aid to Saint Martin and Cuba, while Venezuela – itself beset by shortages amid a crippling economic crisis – sent 30 tonnes of food, drinking water and supplies to Cuba and other Caribbean islands.
Bryan Koon, Florida’s emergency management director, said late Sunday that authorities had only scattered information about damage, but feared worse reports could come in Monday. “The first blush is that not only did we dodge a bullet, but we survived pretty well. I don’t have any numbers on fatalities at this point”.
The full breadth of the damage statewide remained unclear, though, with communications and travel cut off by high winds and flooding. Nursing homes, shelters, major thoroughfares are priorities.
An electrical worker repairs traffic lights in Naples, Florida.
On Sunday, parts of the central business district of Brickell were swamped when the storm surge overwhelmed the sea front and flooded several blocks of high-end hotels, businesses and condo buildings. We’ve got downed power lines all across the state, we’ve got debris all across the state.
Florida Gov. Rick Scott says he also spoke with Trump on Sunday. In a parting blow to the state before pushing on to Georgia and beyond, the storm caused record flooding in and around Jacksonville, causing untold damage and prompting dozens of rescues.
Charles Saxon, 57, became South Carolina’s first recorded death when he was struck by a tree limb while clearing debris outside his home in Calhoun Falls amid wind gusts of about 40 miles per hour, according to a statement from Abbeville County Coroner Ronnie Ashley.
The storm engulfed almost all of Florida, from the state’s southernmost point up to the Georgia line, from the Atlantic coast to the Gulf side.
As Irma continues to move inland it’s getting farther from the warm ocean water, its fuel source, and weakening.
Miami-Dade’s mayor, Carlos Gimenez, imposed a county-wide curfew from 1900 to 0700 until further notice, noting that 80 percent of the population had no electricity.
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Irma, which had rampaged through the Caribbean as one of the most powerful Atlantic hurricanes on record, was downgraded to a tropical depression on Monday.
