Difficult road to recovery in the aftermath of Hurricane Milton

AccuWeather

Storm chaser Connor McCrorey reports from Siesta Key, Florida, where Hurricane Milton made landfall on the night of Oct. 9. The region has a long and difficult road to recovery after the storm.

Transcript

00:00I'm storm chaser Connor McCrory reporting from Siesta Key, Florida, where Hurricane

00:05Milton made landfall Wednesday night.

00:07After a slow build-up over a few days, Milton roared ashore as a Category 3 storm, bringing

00:13several feet of storm surge and wind gusts around 110 mph to nearby Sarasota, where I

00:20rode out the storm.

00:23The front half of the eyewall gave me a false sense of security, as it seemed the hurricane

00:27was a bit weaker than predicted.

00:29When the backside of the eyewall came through, though, it brought with it storm surge and

00:34flooding that inundated parts of the city, along with the high winds that brought down

00:39trees, power lines, awnings, and other structures.

00:43Elsewhere in Florida, storms associated with Hurricane Milton produced deadly tornadoes

00:48and torrential rains, causing flash flooding across much of the state.

00:53Floodwaters sparked fires, like this one, that burned these condominiums to the ground.

00:59The day after Milton hit, life in this area was difficult, to say the least.

01:04Even for those who didn't receive any damage themselves, power and communication outages

01:09were widespread, and gas remained hard to find.

01:14Milton was the third hurricane to affect western Florida in a span of just over two months.

01:19With many in Tampa Bay and the surrounding areas still clearing piles of debris from

01:23around their homes, Milton only added to their recent ordeals.

01:28Hurricane season is not over yet, but most of the residents that I've spoken to in Florida

01:33while covering this storm have said they hope this will be the last one that they have to

01:37deal with for a long time.

01:39Reporting from Siesta Key, Florida, I'm storm chaser Connor McCorry.

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