Strengthening Elsa takes aim at Florida
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — The storm that has been lashing Florida over the past day has intensified into a hurricane, the National Weather Service said Tuesday evening.
Hurricane Elsa was packing winds as high as 75 mph as it hurtled toward Florida’s northern Gulf Coast. The Category 1 storm, which has killed at least three people in the Caribbean, is expected to make landfall between 8 and 9 a.m. Wednesday between the Tampa Bay area and Florida’s Big Bend region.
Besides damaging winds and heavy rains, the Miamibased U.S. National Hurricane Center warned of life-threatening storm surges, flooding and isolated tornadoes. A hurricane warning has been issued for a long stretch of coastline, from Egmont Key at the mouth of Tampa Bay to the Steinhatchee River in the Big Bend.
The Tampa area is highly vulnerable to storm surge because the offshore waters and Tampa Bay are quite shallow, experts say. Gov. Ron Desantis said the area would take a hard hit from the storm overnight.
Now is “not a time to joyride,” because “we do have hazardous conditions out there,” Desantis said at a news conference Tuesday.
Still, on the barrier island beach towns along the Gulf Coast, it was largely business as usual with few shutters or plywood boards going up
Tuesday. Free sandbags were being handed out at several locations, and a limited number of storm shelters opened Tuesday morning in at least four counties around the Tampa Bay area, although no evacuations have been ordered.
Nancy Brindley, 85, who lives in a seaside house built in 1923, said she has experienced 34 previous tropical cyclones and isn’t having shutters put on her windows. Her main concern is what will happen to sand on the adjacent beach and the dunes that protect her house and others.
She’s staying through the storm.
“The main concern here is, if it doesn’t speed up and decides to stall, there will be enormous erosion,” she said.
Friends Chris Wirtz, 47, and Brendan Peregrine, 44, were staying put at a beachfront inn with their families. Both are from Tampa, about 25 miles across the bay and have been through storms many times.
“Before we left, we knew it was coming,” Wirtz said.
Others were taking no chances. Annie Jones, 51, has lived along the Gulf Coast her entire life. She was buying ice and food at a local grocery store in advance of the storm.
“I’ve seen this happen over the years and I decided to load up,” Jones said.
Across the Tampa Bay region that’s home to about 3.5 million people, events, government offices and schools were closing down early Tuesday in advance of the
storm. Tampa International Airport shut down at 5 p.m.
Duke Energy, the main electric utility in the Tampa Bay area, said in a statement it has about 3,000 employees, contractors, tree specialists and support personnel ready to respond to power outages in the storm’s aftermath. Additional crews are being brought in from other states served by Duke Energy.
“We’re trained and prepared, and we want to ensure our customers are safe and prepared for any impacts from the storm,” said Todd Fountain, the utility’s Florida storm director.
Elsa is the earliest fifthnamed storm on record, said Brian Mcnoldy, a hurricane researcher at the University of Miami.