Hurricane weakens, 1 dead in US

Panama City (US) Oct. 11: Hurricane Michael claimed its first life after roaring ashore in Florida, flooding homes and streets and toppling trees and power lines in the Gulf of Mexico beachfront area where it made landfall as a raging Category 4 storm.

Florida officials said Michael, packing winds of 250 km per hour, was the most powerful storm to hit the state’s northern Panhandle area in more than a century. Michael had weakened to a Category 1, with maximum winds of 90 mph as of 8 pm Eastern time (local time), but that still left it an extremely dangerous storm.

Pictures and video from Mexico Beach — a community of about 1,000 people where Michael made landfall around 1:00 pm Eastern time (1700 GMT) -showed scenes of devastation, with houses floating in flooded streets, some ripped from their foundations and missing roofs.

Roads were filled with piles of floating debris.

After being battered for nearly three hours by strong winds and heavy rains, roads in Panama City were virtually impassable and trees, satellite dishes and traffic lights lay in the streets.

Briefing President Donald Trump, Federal Emergency Management Agency chief Brock Long said Michael was the most intense hurricane to strike the Florida Panhandle since 1851.

“Along our coast, communities are going to see unimaginable devastation,” Scott said, with storm surge posing the greatest danger.

“Water will come miles in shore and could easily rise over the roofs of houses,” he said. “Those who stick around to experience storm surge don’t typically live to tell about it,” said FEMA’s Long.