Hurricane Milton cuts a path of destruction as Florida braces for a grim aftermath

Hurricane Milton roared into Florida, leaving a path of destruction and fears of major damage and loss of life.

Milton hit the west Florida coast Wednesday night with 120-mph winds and strong storm surges, causing major flooding. Tornadoes caused their own devastation, including deaths.

Across the west coast, from Tampa Bay to Sarasota and beyond, streets were deluged with stormwater.

It will take hours, if not days, for the full scope of the damage to become clear.

The storm moved through the interior of the state Wednesday night and Thursday morning and was expected to hit Florida’s east coast Thursday morning before heading out into the Atlantic. Affected communities include Orlando, Lakeland and Cape Canaveral.

Reports of destruction continued to flow in overnight.

In St. Lucie County, on the state’s eastern coast, Sheriff Keith Pearson told local media that there were believed to be multiple fatalities. Deputies were conducting a search and rescue operation at the Spanish Lakes Country Club, a senior community. Many homes were destroyed by tornadoes that had touched down ahead of Milton’s arrival, he said.

Videos and photos on social media showed heavy rain and power lines swinging as stormwater pushed into homes. One video showed several feet of water slapping against the stairway of a home in Nokomis. At Venice Bay Park, a mobile home park in Venice, several homes were partially submerged in water.

A homeless person slept under a wheelchair alongside a parking garage in deserted downtown Tampa on Wednesday as the hurricane approached.

(Rebecca Blackwell / Associated Press)

Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, home of the Tampa Bay Rays, was missing part of its roof. Also in St. Petersburg, the Tampa Bay Rays’ Tropicana Field stadium was missing part of its roof, and a crane collapsed onto the McNulty Building downtown, which houses the offices of the Tampa Bay Times. The city had to shut off potable water to residents at midnight after a water main broke, officials said.

Officials have described Milton as potentially being the worst hurricane to hit Florida in a generation. It comes two weeks after another devastating storm, Helene.

Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Deanne Criswell at a briefing Wednesday placed a big share of the blame on climate change.

“As we continue to see the impacts of climate change cause more severe weather events across the U.S., we are going to see more communities impacted, and we are going to see them continue to need assistance,” Criswell said. She said that “storm after storm” had been more intense, with more water, more wind and more destruction.

Scientists for years have found that human-caused changes in climate, particularly warming ocean temperatures, supercharge tropical storms in the Atlantic, fueling more rain and stronger winds.

Already, a team of international scientists has determined that climate change made it up to 500 times more likely that Hurricane Helene would encounter such high surface temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico, driving the storm’s rapid intensification and unprecedented moisture.