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That is the view of Hurricane Milton from area on Monday morning, October 7, 2024. Milton underwent fast intensification and is poised to hit Florida’s west coast late Wednesday or early Thursday. Picture by way of NOAA.

Hurricane Milton threatens Florida’s west coast

Hurricane Milton, which sprang to life within the western nook of the Gulf of Mexico, has quickly intensified because it barrels towards the west coast of Florida. As of Monday morning, its most sustained winds had been 155 miles per hour, a powerful Class 4. The precise observe of the hurricane remains to be unsure, however it’s going to brush previous the Yucatan earlier than coming onshore late Wednesday or early Thursday across the Tampa Bay space.

The Nationwide Climate Service mentioned that areas the place Milton comes ashore ought to anticipate rainfall quantities of 5 to 10 inches, with localized totals as much as 15 inches.

As Jeff Masters wrote in Yale’s Local weather Connections weblog:

Essentially the most weak metropolitan space within the U.S. to storm surge injury is Tampa/St. Petersburg. That’s in accordance with a 2015 report by Karen Clark & Firm, Most Susceptible US Cities to Storm Surge Flooding. Their 1-in-100-year storm (with a 1% likelihood of occurring in any given 12 months) was a powerful Class 4 hurricane with 150 mph (240 km/h) winds. Such a storm putting simply north of Tampa Bay could possibly be anticipated to trigger $230 billion in injury (2024 USD) – simply from the storm surge.

There are some 3.5 million residents within the four-county area surrounding Tampa Bay.

Speedy intensification of Hurricane Milton

Meteorologists outline fast intensification as when a hurricane undergoes a rise in wind speeds of 35 mph in 24 hours. From Sunday to Monday, Hurricane Milton elevated its wind speeds by 85 mph in 24 hours. Hurricane Milton may change into a Class 5 hurricane, but it surely ought to weaken earlier than it comes onshore on Florida’s west coast Wednesday or Thursday. Sadly, the storm surge is already constructed up. Consider it compared to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. It was a Class 5 within the Gulf however weakened to Class 3 went it got here onshore. Nevertheless, it nonetheless introduced with it the storm surge of a Class 5 storm within the New Orleans space.

Map showing Gulf of Mexico and path of hurricane to Florida's west coast.
This was the possible path of Hurricane Milton as of Monday morning, October 7, 2024. Picture by way of NHC/ NOAA.

Put together now!

Delaying Europa Clipper

The mission to Jupiter’s moon Europa – often known as Europa Clipper – was presupposed to launch from Cape Canaveral on October 10. Because of Milton, that launch is postponed, with no rescheduled date but. Nevertheless, resulting from planetary alignments that the mission should make use of, the launch window solely extends to the tip of October.

In the meantime, one other mission – Hera, the “crime scene investigator” for the Dart mission to Dimorphos – managed to launch forward of the storm on Monday.

Hurricane Helene

Hurricane Helene just lately got here ashore on September 26, 2024, in Florida’s Large Bend area, north of Tampa. However that storm additionally impacted the Tampa space. Most of the surrounding communities had report storm surges in that storm. Milton is poised to strike the realm extra immediately.

However precisely the place Milton comes onshore will make a giant distinction. The farther south the storm hits Florida, the higher will probably be for the Tampa space. That’s as a result of the northern winds carry much less storm surge than winds on the south facet of the hurricane. After all, the farther south it hits, the more serious will probably be for areas round Fort Myers, which had been badly broken in Hurricane Ian in 2022.

Backside line: Hurricane Milton underwent fast intensification from Sunday to Monday. It was a powerful Class 4 storm Monday morning, brushing previous the Yucatan on its strategy to Florida.

Kelly Kizer Whitt

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Concerning the Writer:

Kelly Kizer Whitt – EarthSky’s roving nature reporter on YouTube – writes and edits among the most fascinating tales at EarthSky.org. She’s been writing about science, with a give attention to astronomy, for many years. She started her profession at Astronomy Journal and made common contributions to different retailers, together with AstronomyToday and the Sierra Membership. She has 9 revealed books, together with a kids’s image e book, Photo voltaic System Forecast, and a younger grownup dystopian novel, A Totally different Sky.



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