Hurricane Milton Update: Major hurricane for Florida

Milton is a Category 4, 155-mph monster Wednesday morning. Weather is quickly deteriorating across Florida, and it is time to be in your safe place as soon as possible.

Milton, now moving into the eastern Gulf of Mexico will continue to move to the northeast today and current forecasts and the WeatherRadar are honing in on a landfall early Thursday somewhere between the Tampa Bay area and the Sarasota area as a major hurricane.

However, Milton is a growing storm and hurricane force winds extend more than 30 miles from the center of the system. Tropical storm force winds (39 mph) extend more than 125 miles out. In fact, the arrival of tropical storm force winds early this afternoon will close most of the large bridges in the Tampa area, so if you need to still evacuate, do it before these major travel corridors are closed.

The hurricane expanding size and the abundant energy stored in the very hot water of the Gulf of Mexico will keep the hurricane powerful at landfall. In fact, an expanding Milton will increase the amount of coast that will be exposed to hurricane force winds and a likely destructive storm surge.

Landfall as a Category 3 or Category 4 hurricane Wednesday night near Tampa or Sarasota will bring widespread damage, coastal flooding from storm surge, inland flooding and widespread power outages.

Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center are reminding everyone that “Milton has the potential to be one of the most destructive hurricanes on record for west-central Florida.” The Weather & Radar Task Force has been activated and our team of meteorologists will be providing up-to-date information and our reporter Jonathan Petramala will be sharing video reports from the scene.