Hurricane kills seven and turns Florida into ‘ground zero’

FLORIDA suffered “unimaginable destruction” as it was hit by one of the strongest hurricanes ever to have made landfall in the US, the state’s governor said.

Hurricane Michael flattened rows of houses, ripped apart shopping centres and petrol stations, hurled boats into buildings, and toppled trees and trucks as it smashed into the Florida Panhandle, a 200-mile stretch in the northwest of the state.

At least seven people were killed by the storm in Florida, Georgia and North Carolina from falling trees and other hurricane-related incidents, according to state officials. In Georgia an 11-yearold girl, named as Sarah Radney, died when the wind picked up a canopy and dropped it on her home.

The hurricane came ashore on Wednesday with winds of 155mph at Mexico Beach, a small town with a population of 1,200, which suffered the brunt of the devastation.

Aerial footage from a CNN helicopter showed houses closest to the beach had been washed away leaving only their foundations.

Nearly 300 people were known to have ignored a mandatory evacuation order to leave Mexico Beach before the storm. One resident who stayed told CNN he saw “cars floating by” his house. He added: “The next thing, houses started floating in front of our home. Then everything went black.

“We had furniture in our house that wasn’t even our furniture, the surge had brought stuff in.”

Brock Long, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, called the town “ground zero”.

At the Oval Office, President Donald Trump said the agency was getting “rave reviews” for its response. He said the storm was “unbelievably destructive and powerful” and he plans to visit the area next week.

Measured by wind speed, Hurricane Michael was the fourth strongest to make landfall in the US, and the strongest since 1992.