Helene nears Florida’s Gulf Coast as it becomes Category 4 hurricane

SEVERE WEATHER

Bobby Joe Edwards Sr., and his wife, Lillie Edwards, of Walkalla, Fla., and their grandson Tavarrious Dixon, right, rest inside a hurricane evacuation shelter at Fairview Middle School in Leon County, Fla., Thursday ahead of Hurricane Helene’s landfall. GERALD HERBERT — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

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By Kate Payne and Heather Hollingsworth

The Associated Press

CRAWFORDVILLE, Fla. >> Hurricane Helene strengthened into a Category 4 storm hours ahead of its expected landfall on Florida’s northwest coast Thursday night as forecasters warned that the enormous system could create a “nightmare” storm surge and bring dangerous winds and rain across much of the southeastern U.S.

Helene, which had strengthened into a Category 3 storm earlier Thursday, prompted hurricane and flash flood warnings extending far beyond the coast up into northern Georgia and western North Carolina. Strong winds already cut power to over 320,000 homes and businesses in Florida, according to the tracking site poweroutage.us. The governors of Florida, Georgia, Alabama, the Carolinas and Virginia all declared emergencies in their states.

The hurricane was about 110 miles west of Tampa and had sustained winds of 130 mph, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center. Accelerating through the Gulf of Mexico, it was moving north-northeast at 23 mph, and life-threatening storm surges of up to 20 feet were expected in the Big Bend area of Florida.

Hurricane warnings and flash flood warnings extended far beyond the coast up into northern Georgia and western North Carolina, with heavy rains and strong winds reported in much of Florida and Georgia Thursday evening.

Helene arrives barely a year since Hurricane Idalia slammed into Florida’s Big Bend and caused widespread damage. Idalia became a Category 4 in the Gulf of Mexico but made landfall as a Category 3 near Keaton Beach, with maximum sustained winds near 125 mph.

The storm’s wrath was felt Thursday afternoon, with water lapping over a road on the northern tip of Siesta Key near Sarasota and covering some intersections in St. Pete Beach along Florida’s Gulf Coast. Lumber and other debris from a fire in Cedar Key a week ago was crashing ashore in the rising water.

Beyond Florida, up to 10 inches of rain had fallen in the North Carolina mountains, with up to 14 inches more possible before the deluge ends, setting the stage for flooding that forecasters warned could be worse than anything seen in the past century.

Heavy rains began falling and winds were picking up in Valdosta, Georgia, near the Florida state line. The National Weather Service said more than a dozen Georgia counties could see hurricane-force winds exceeding 110 mph.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said that models suggest Helene will make landfall further east than earlier forecast, lessening the chances for a direct hit on the capital city of Tallahassee, whose metro area has a population of around 395,000.

The shift has the storm aimed squarely at the sparsely-populated Big Bend area, home to fishing villages and vacation hideaways where Florida’s Panhandle and peninsula meet.

“Please write your name, birthday, and important information on your arm or leg in a PERMANENT MARKER so that you can be identified and family notified,” the sheriff’s office in mostly rural Taylor County warned those who chose not to evacuate in a Facebook post, the dire advice similar to what other officials have dolled out during past hurricanes.

Still, Philip Tooke, a commercial fisherman who took over the business his father founded near the region’s Apalachee Bay, planned to ride out this storm like he did during Hurricane Michael and the others — on his boat. “If I lose that, I don’t have anything,” Tooke said. Michael, a Category 5 storm, all but destroyed one town, fractured thousands of homes and businesses and caused some $25 billion in damage when it struck the Florida Panhandle in 2018.

Many, though, were heeding the mandatory evacuation orders that stretched from the Panhandle south along the Gulf Coast in low-lying areas around Tallahassee, Gainesville, Cedar Key, Lake City, Tampa and Sarasota.

Among them was Sharonda Davis, one of several gathered at a Tallahassee shelter worried their mobile homes wouldn’t withstand the winds. She said the hurricane’s size is “scarier than anything because it’s the aftermath that we’re going to have to face.”