Helene's winds batter Florida as Category 3 storm races toward the coast

Estimated read time: 4-5 minutes

CRAWFORDVILLE, Fla. — Tropical storm force winds began battering Florida on Thursday as Hurricane Helene prepared to make landfall, with forecasters warning that the enormous storm could create a "nightmare" surge along the coast and churn up damaging winds hundreds of miles inland across much of the southeastern U.S.

Helene was upgraded to a major Category 3 storm Thursday afternoon ahead of its expected evening landfall on Florida's northwestern coast. Hurricane and flash flood warnings extend far beyond the coast up into south-central Georgia.

It was starting to be 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. The winds have left around 100,000 homes and businesses without power already in the state. And rain has started battering places like Asheville, North Carolina, where a 7-inch deluge has raised flooding concerns.

With forecasters also warning of tornadoes and mudslides, the governors of Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia have all declared emergencies, as did President Joe Biden for several of the states. He is sending the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency to Florida on Friday to view the damage.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said Thursday morning that models suggest Helene will make landfall further east, 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. Shuttered gas stations dotted the two-lane highway, their windows boarded up with plywood.

Philip Tooke, a commercial fisherman who took over the business his father founded near the region's Apalachee Bay, plans to ride out this storm like he did during Hurricane Michael and the others — on his boat. "This is what pays my bills," Tooke said of his boats. "If I lose that, I don't have anything."

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."

Federal authorities were staging search-and-rescue teams as the National Weather Service office in Tallahassee forecast storm surges of up to 20 feet and warned they could be particularly "catastrophic and unsurvivable" in Apalachee Bay. It added that high winds and heavy rains also posed risks.

"Please, please, please take any evacuation orders seriously!" the office said, describing the surge scenario as "a nightmare."

This stretch of Florida known as the Forgotten Coast has been largely spared by the widespread condo development and commercialization that dominates so many of Florida's beach communities. The region is loved for its natural wonders — the vast stretches of salt marshes, tidal pools and barrier islands; the dwarf cypress trees of Tate's Hell State Forest; and Wakulla Springs, considered one of the world's largest and deepest freshwater springs.

Anthony Godwin, 20, found one gas station outside Crawfordville where the tanks were still running Thursday morning to fill up before heading west toward his sister's house in Pensacola.

"It's a part of life. You live down here, you run the risk of losing everything to a bad storm," said Godwin, who lives about a half-mile from the water in the coastal town of Panacea.

Along Florida's Gulf Coast, school districts and multiple universities have canceled classes. Airports in Tampa, Tallahassee and Clearwater were closed Thursday, while cancellations were widespread elsewhere in the state and beyond.

Helene was about 195 miles southwest of Tampa on Thursday afternoon and moving north-northeast at 16 mph with top sustained winds of at least 111 mph.

Helene is forecast to be one of the largest storms in breadth in years to hit the region, said Colorado State University hurricane researcher Phil Klotzbach. He said since 1988, only three Gulf hurricanes were bigger than Helene's predicted size: 2017's Irma, 2005's Wilma and 1995's Opal.

Areas 100 miles north of the Georgia-Florida line can expect hurricane conditions. More than half of Georgia's public school districts and several universities canceled classes. The state has opened its parks to evacuees, and their pets, including horses

For Atlanta, Helene could be the worst strike on a major Southern inland city in 35 years, said University of Georgia meteorology professor Marshall Shepherd.

More than 200 miles to the south, some businesses in the inland city of Valdosta, Georgia, closed because of the hurricane warning, including the local Walmart.

"We know the Lord's in control," said 67-year-old Margaret Freenman, when she found pallets stacked high blocking the store's entrances after showing up to buy snacks with her two grandchildren. "He's got the last say."

Helene is the eighth named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, which began June 1. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has predicted an above-average Atlantic hurricane season this year because of record-warm ocean temperatures.

Contributing: Seth Borenstein, Jeff Amy, Danica Coto, Andrea Rodríguez, Mark Stevenson, María Verza, Claire Rush, Kate Payne

Photos

Related topics

U.S.
Heather Hollingsworth and Stephen Smith