Monday Evening Update: Monster Milton Has Floridians Fleeing Grave Danger

Satellite view of Hurricane Milton late this afternoon.
If you click on the image to make it bigger and
easier to see, you'll notice a tiny eye, which is
often what you see in extremely strong hurricanes.
The clouds around the eye are arranged like a 
stadium would look like, another sign of a powerful storm

Hurricane Milton spent the day making history and also making Floridians, emergency managers and meteorologists quake in their boots.  

By late this afternoon, Hurricane Milton has strengthened to a monster Category 5 storm with top winds of 180 mph. (A hurricane needs to be at least at 157 mph to reach Category 5, so Milton is there by a long shot.

Only five Atlantic Ocean hurricanes on record have had stronger winds than Milton and three others were as strong. And Milton could get stronger yet before factors come together to cause a gradual weakening.

Again, I hate to use the word "weakening" because this is an enormous threat to Florida's Gulf coast. Just ask the experts: 

"If the storm stays on the current track, it will be the worst storm to impact the Tampa area in over 100 years," the National Weather Service office in Tampa, Florida warned.

"Unless we get extremely lucky, Milton will be one of the biggest hurricane disasters in history," said Bryan Norcross, one of the nation's leading hurricane experts. 

Meteorologist John Morales, with decades of hurricane forecasting under his belt, became emotional when explaining the hurricane to viewers today. It's that bad.

The overall forecast for Hurricane Milton hasn't really changed since this morning, despite it being even stronger than almost any forecast had anticipated.

It's going to scrape by the northern Yucatan peninsula tonight, raking that coastline with hurricane force winds.

Milton is just about making its turn toward the northeast for its eventual destination in Florida. At the strength it's at now, we can expect some variations in its strength before a weakening trend begins Wednesday.

The storm does have an opportunity tomorrow to get even more intense than it is now.

Hurricane Milton as powerful as it is, is relatively small in size. Hurricane force winds late this afternoon only extended out 30 miles from its tiny intense eye.

After Hurricane Milton peaks in intensity and begins to weaken a bit, the storm will also grow much larger. That's bad, because it will be able to push more Gulf of Mexico water into the Florida as a giant storm surge ahead of and during its expected landfall Wednesday night. 

If Milton goes over or a wee bit north of Tampa, the storm surge could be up to 15 feet tall. That's double what Helene managed less than two weeks ago, causing over a $1 billion in damage in Florida and causing 12 deaths. 

If Milton goes a little south of Tampa, the storm surge there will be still be catastrophic, and those potentially 15 foot storm surges could instead hit places like Sarasota or Fort Myers. 

One small piece of news about Hurricane Milton that's at least vaguely gratifying. News footage today has been showing a mass exodus out of the Tampa metro and nearby areas under the greatest threat from the storm.

Almost all those outbound vehicles represent potential lives saved because their occupants are driving away from the unsurvivable storm surge zone.

MILTON STATS

Some stats I've come across that explain why meteorologist were agog at how fast Hurricane Milton strengthened and how strong it got.

Milton's top wind speed increased by 90 mph within 24 hours. Only Felix in 2007 (100 mph in 24 hours) and Wilma in 2005 (105 mph in 24 hours, were faster, said hurricane and storm surge expert Michael Lowry. 

Milton is the second Category 5 hurricane this year (Beryl was the first one). It's only the 8th hurricane season to have two such strong storms. The others were 1932, 1933, 1961, 2005, 2007, 2017 and 2019, reported hurricane researcher Michael Ferragamo

Notice how four of those years were pretty recent. Makes you think those increasing water temperatures out there due to climate change might be one reason (but probably not the only reason)why we have such strong storms.

Another oddity about Milton is its the only known Category 5 hurricane since at least 1851 that moved toward the southeast. noted atmospheric scientist Tomer Burg. All the others headed in other directions, mostly toward the west or northwest.  

This is already a historic storm, and will very likely be one of the worst on record for the United States. It's a scary thought that perhaps by Wednesday or Thursday, we will have had two of the worst hurricanes hitting the U.S. within two weeks of each other.