Heartbreaking images show homeless people in Florida desperately battling to survive Hurricane Milton as winds exceeded 100mph.
Hurricane Milton barreled into the Atlantic Ocean on Thursday after plowing across Florida as a Category 3 storm, pounding cities with ferocious winds and rain, whipping up a barrage of tornadoes and causing an unknown numbers of deaths
The storm tracked to the south in the final hours and made landfall Wednesday night in Siesta Key, about 70 miles south of Tampa. The situation in the Tampa area was still a major emergency as St Petersburg recorded over 16 inches of rain, prompting the National Weather Service to warn of flash flooding there as well as other parts of western and central Florida.
As the storm increased, heartbreaking images of homeless people trying to shield from the hurricane were captured including Melvin Lee Hicks, who was lying under a sheet donated by a nearby hotel. He sheltered alongside a parking garage in downtown Tampa, during the approach of Hurricane Milton. Another homeless person was seen sleeping under a wheelchair alongside a parking garage in deserted Tampa.
Melvin Lee Hicks, who is homeless, lies under a sheet donated by a nearby hotel (
AP)
The harrowing images come as the hurricane knocked out power across a large section of Florida, with more than 3.2 million homes and businesses without electricity, according to poweroutage.us. St Petersburg residents also could no longer get water from their household taps because a water main break led the city to shut down service.
The fabric that serves as the roof of Tropicana Field, home of the Tampa Bay Rays baseball team in St. Petersburg, was ripped to shreds by the fierce winds. It was not immediately clear if there was damage inside. Multiple cranes were also toppled in the storm, the weather service said.
The devastating pictures show the homeless trying to seek cover (
AP)
“We have lost some life,” St. Lucie County Sheriff Keith Pearson told WPBF News, though he wouldn’t say how many people were killed.
About 125 homes were destroyed before the hurricane came ashore, many of them mobile homes in communities for senior citizens, said Kevin Guthrie, the director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management. About 90 minutes after making landfall, Milton was downgraded to a Category 2 storm. By early Thursday, the hurricane was a Category 1 storm with maximum sustained winds of about 85 mph and leaving the state near Cape Canaveral.
Joseph, who is homeless, sits with his dogs Rodney and Baby (
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The storm surge remained a concern in many parts of Florida and tropical storm warnings were in place for much of the east-central coast. Officials in hard-hit Pinellas and Sarasota counties urged people to stay off the roads, warning of downed power lines, trees in roadways and blocked bridges.
“The storm may have passed, but it is still dangerous to be traveling this morning,” the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office said in a social media post.