The director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) said Florida appeared to have dodged a “worst-case scenario” during Hurricane Milton, which made landfall on Wednesday night as a Category 3 storm before passing over the state.
Milton, which formed in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico, strengthened to a Category 5 hurricane with 185 mph winds several days before it slammed into Florida’s Gulf Coast about 50 miles south of Tampa. But as the storm neared Florida, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) downgraded the system to a Category 3.
“What we know for sure is we avoided that worst-case scenario that we were planning for,” FEMA Director Deanne Criswell told CNN on Thursday morning. “But the fact that they prepared for the worst really made sure that they were able to respond to the impacts that they have experienced, and the biggest ones right now are the tornadoes that have been reported across the state.”
Her sentiment was echoed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who told a news conference around the same time that a “worst-case scenario” appeared to have been avoided.
“We will better understand the extent of the damage as the day progresses,” DeSantis said at a Thursday briefing. “The storm was significant but thankfully, this was not the worst-case scenario.”
Criswell told CNN that Florida will still need federal aid from FEMA, which has been responding to destructive impacts from Hurricane Helene. But Florida will not need the same level of federal aid that it “could have needed,” she said.
Tampa Mayor Jane Castor told reporters that Port Tampa Bay, a critical piece of Florida’s infrastructure, did not suffer major damage during the storm, while DeSantis said Port Tampa Bay “will likely be able to resume operations very quickly.”
“The port looks good, so we should be able to get fuel in and out of there,” Castor told reporters on Thursday after viewing the Tampa port from a helicopter. “There was one of the fuel containers at the port that had a roof peeled back,” she said.
“If Milton had hit on the north side, we would have been in dire circumstances.”
Hurricane Milton’s storm surge peaked at 8 to 10 feet in Sarasota County on the west side of Florida, DeSantis said in the press conference at the state Emergency Operations Center in Tallahassee.
But the fabric that serves as the roof of Tropicana Field—home of the Tampa Bay Rays baseball team in St. Petersburg—was ripped to shreds by the fierce winds from Milton. It wasn’t immediately clear if there was damage inside. Before the storm hit, first responders were moved from a staging area there, officials said.
Aerial photos taken after Milton made landfall show that a large portion of the roof was torn off, with the baseball field and diamond visible.
The White House said in a statement that DeSantis told President Joe Biden that officials are still evaluating the damage to his state. The White House added that Criswell would join DeSantis in surveying the damage on Thursday morning before briefing Biden on the results.
