Hurricane Helene makes landfall in northwestern Florida as Category-4 storm

Hurricane Helene hits Florida as Category-4 storm, causing widespread damage and prompting evacuations across southeastern U.S.

Hurricane Helene made landfall on Thursday night (September 27, 2024) in northwestern Florida as Category-4 storm as forecasters warned that the enormous system could create a “nightmare” storm surge and bring dangerous winds and rain across much of the southeastern U.S.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami said Helene roared ashore at around 11:10 p.m. EDT near the mouth of the Aucilla River in the Big Bend area of Florida’s Gulf Coast. It had maximum sustained winds estimated at 225 kph (140 mph). That location was only about 32 km (20 miles) northwest of where Hurricane Idalia came ashore last year at nearly the same ferocity and caused widespread damage.

Helene prompted hurricane and flash flood warnings extending far beyond the coast up into northern Georgia and western North Carolina. More than a million homes and businesses were without power in Florida and more than 50,000 in Georgia, according to the tracking site poweroutage.us. The Governors of Florida, Georgia, Alabama, the Carolinas and Virginia all declared emergencies in their states.

One person was killed in Florida when a sign fell on their car and two people were reported killed in a possible tornado in south Georgia as the storm approached.

“When Floridians wake up tomorrow morning, we’re going to be waking up to a state where very likely there’s been additional loss of life and certainly there’s going to be loss of property," Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said at a news conference on Thursday night (September 26, 2024.)

The National Weather Service in Tallahassee had issued an “extreme wind warning” for the Big Bend as the eyewall approached: “Treat this warning like a tornado warning,” it said in a post on X. “Take shelter in the most interior room and hunker down!”

Even before landfall, the storm's wrath was felt widely, with sustained tropical storm-force winds and hurricane-force gusts along Florida's west coast. Water lapped over a road in Siesta Key near Sarasota and covered some intersections in St. Pete Beach. Lumber and other debris from a fire in Cedar Key a week ago crashed ashore in the rising water.