Search and rescue teams have yet to find anyone dead in their homes, and there are no outstanding missing persons reports, according to Florida Division of Emergency Management Director Kevin Guthrie.

In Tampa Bay, thousands lost power, but far fewer than in counties that experienced a direct hit. Nearby Suwannee, Madison and Jefferson counties also had outage rates around 100%, according to data from the site,. Counties to the north and in the state’s Big Bend have the highest rates of outages, a Tampa Bay Times analysis shows.Īs of 6:30 p.m., 97% of customers in Taylor County, where the storm made landfall, had reported power outages. Hundreds of thousands of Florida residents are without power after Hurricane Idalia. Their reasons for not going to county shelters varied, but many said they didn’t know shelter was available. The group had ridden out Hurricane Idalia under the shelters near the corner of E Tyler and N Marion streets, some using the cardboard to unsuccessfully block the rain that poured down and into the exposed sides of the shelters from Tuesday night into Wednesday. Pasco County Fire Rescue carried out 85 rescue missions to save at least 150 people from flooding, “ages ranging from 9 days to 90 years old,” according to a county news release Wednesday evening. Flood damage should be reported to apply for potential state and federal assistance. Pinellas County residents in need of assistance with damage to their homes or cleanup can call the county’s Crisis Cleanup Home Cleanup Hotline at (800) 451-1954. Only residents in elevated vehicles with proof of address are being allowed into those areas. Sections of 62nd Avenue N and 22nd Avenue N used to drive into those neighborhoods remained underwater and about 60% of streets in Shore Acres and Snell Isle remained flooded, police said. Petersburg, police said flood waters have receded and most city streets were fully open to traffic Wednesday evening, except the Shore Acres and Snell Isle neighborhoods. Petersburg, and Palm Harbor CSA, 1500 16th St.

The county still has two open shelters, Lealman Exchange, at 5175 45th St. “Never drive through standing water,” the release stated. Residents who evacuated from Hurricane Idalia should be careful returning home, due to ongoing street flooding, Pinellas County said in a news release Wednesday night. In Cedar Key, raging surge took over tiny townĨ:27 p.m. The governor and other officials credited people’s willingness to evacuate to keeping the death toll lower, so far, compared to deadly Hurricane Ian last year. DeSantis noted that there had been no reported deaths related to flooding, and no one had been reported missing due to the storm. That one happened in Alachua County where a man died after driving his truck into a ditch during heavy rain. Ron DeSantis at a news conference Wednesday night said there was possibly one hurricane-related death in Florida, a different fatal traffic accident. First responders were able to get to him immediately, so we’re not going to classify it as a storm fatality, but as a traffic fatality.”Ī falling tree killed a Georgia man clearing a blocked roadway Wednesday as tropical storm Idalida tore through the Valdosta, Georgia, area, according to Lowndes County Sheriff Ashley Paulk. Unfortunately he hit a tree and lost his life. “He was driving on an incredibly curvy road, the road was slick. “The weather was not that bad when the gentleman was driving,” Fossa said. “In general for the bay, everything that was forecast - those numbers looks like it panned out pretty well.” “Tampa Bay is such a wide and varied bay and it has these little nuances,” he said. One area may be flooding while another is much drier. “It’s actually a lot better and higher resolution than it had been 20 or 30 years ago.”ĭavis said surge is hard to predict in Tampa Bay. “A lot of science has gone into the hurricane center’s forecasting,” Davis said. In June, the National Hurricane Center began using its new Hurricane Analysis and Forecast System to predict storm activity. Rick Davis, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s Tampa Bay office, said that is thanks to much better hurricane technology. Tampa Bay’s impact from Hurricane Idalia was very close to what forecasters predicted. Instead, their bungalow succumbed to flames after flood waters prevented firefighters from getting there in time. Like most Floridians, Dave and Heather Durst figured flooding was the biggest threat to their Hudson dream home as Hurricane Idalia bore down on Wednesday. Dave Durst, right, and his wife, Heather, survey what remains of their Hudson bungalow.

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