Hurricane Nicole slammed into Florida Thursday, battering a large area of the state that’s still recovering from the historic devastation of Hurricane Ian just six weeks ago — despite being downgraded to a tropical storm after making landfall.
The rare November hurricane — which already led to a state of emergency being declared in Florida, with evacuations and 600 National Guards at the ready — made landfall just south of Vero Beach, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center said at 3 a.m.
It was downgraded an hour later, with the center warning that it was still wreaking havoc with “strong winds, dangerous storm surge and waves, and heavy rains” across a large area of the already battered state.
“A dangerous storm surge is expected” across much of the state as well as “portions of coastal Georgia,” the weather center warned in its latest update at 4 a.m.
“The storm surge will be accompanied by large and damaging waves along the Atlantic coast.”
Adding to the danger, Nicole “is a large storm with hazards extending well to the north of the center, outside of the forecast zone,” with flash flooding warnings across much of the southeast US.
Tropical storm force winds were recorded as extending as far as 450 miles from the center, which early Thursday was about 60 miles southeast of Orlando.
Nicole is expected to weaken into a tropical depression over Georgia on Thursday night or early Friday. However, the heavy rainfall is likely to remain even as Nicole is forecast to pass western New York late Friday and into Saturday, the center said.
The storm struck after the historic, wide-ranging devastation of Ian in late September, which killed more than 140 people. The latest storm is threatening to further damage hard-hit areas and further erode many beaches hit by Hurricane Ian.
Hurricane Nicole made landfall as a Category 1 storm. APFor storm-weary Floridians, it is only the third November hurricane to hit their shores since recordkeeping began in 1853. The previous ones were the 1935 Yankee Hurricane and Hurricane Kate in 1985.
A hurricane warning had been posted for a 240-mile coastal stretch that included the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, where NASA’s new moon rocket stood exposed to the elements and anchored to its launch pad to ride out the storm.
Officials had already shut down airports and theme parks and ordered extensive evacuations.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has warned that the wind is the most dangerous threat from Nicole. APThat included one in the area that is home to former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, which is about a quarter-mile inland from the ocean.
The main buildings sit on a small rise that is about 15 feet above sea level, and the property has survived numerous stronger hurricanes since it was built nearly a century ago.
There were no signs that it was being evacuated, which would not result in penalties. However, rescue crews will not respond in evacuation zones.
Gov. Ron DeSantis declared a state of emergency for 45 of Florida’s 67 counties, with “16,000 linemen staged, 600 guardsmen activated, and 7 Urban Search and Rescue teams on standby to deploy.”
He warned of potential significant power outages just weeks after millions were left in the dark by Ian, which caused an estimated $60 billion in damage.
Forty-Five Florida counties were under a state of emergency declaration as of Thursday morning. AP
“It will affect huge parts of the state of Florida all day,” DeSantis said.
Even before reaching hurricane strength, the storm unleashed “extensive flooding” across much of the Bahamas, including the islands of Grand Bahama, Eleuthera, Andros and the Abacos.
It was declared a hurricane on Wednesday evening as it made its first landfall on Grand Bahama island in the northwestern corner of the Atlantic West Indies archipelago nation.
With Post wires
