(The Center Square) — Hurricane Idalia made landfall early Wednesday morning in Florida’s Big Bend area and state officials are assessing damage to the sparsely populated region’s infrastructure.
The Category 3 storm with 125 mph sustained winds made landfall at 7:45 a.m. near Keaton Beach in Taylor County.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said in a news conference in Tallahassee that there were no confirmed fatalities from the storm.
Regarding electrical service disruptions, the governor said 262,000 accounts lost power and have since been restored. Another 250,000 customers await the restoration of their electrical service.
“We are still assessing what is all going on the ground in the places where it made initial impact,” DeSantis said. “I’m going to try to get down to some of those counties today, but we’ve got a lot of people going in offering assistance from the state perspective, helping these counties stabilize the situation.”
He also said urban search and rescue teams and Florida National Guard troops were deployed in the areas affected by the storm. He also said U.S. Coast Guard and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission were engaged in search and rescue operations.
The second-term Republican governor also said Florida Department of Transportation workers were engaged in “cut and toss” operations to clear debris from state highways and would work their way up from the Tampa Bay area to Taylor County.
DeSantis also said the Tampa airport would reopen to incoming flights at 4 p.m. and be completely open by 3 a.m. Tallahassee and Gainesville’s airports would reopen on Thursday.
Florida Division of Emergency Management Director Kevin Guthrie said the town of Perry had a few businesses that had caught fire and others that had collapsed. He said Madison County had 99% power outages and lots of debris.
He also said the Big Bend’s sparse population – when compared to densely populated Fort Meyers during last year’s Hurricane Ian – made searching for those in distress a challenge since “you might have two houses on a five-mile stretch of road.” He also said that search and rescue operations might take longer to complete.
Florida National Guard Maj. Gen. John D. Haas said there were 5,500 guardsmen and airmen supporting emergency response operations with 2,400 vehicles for high-water rescues, 14 helicopters and 23 boats for riverine operations. Haas said units from South Carolina, Tennessee and three Kentucky UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters are en route. Maryland, Tennessee and Colorado are on tap to possibly send helicopters as well.
