TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Two people died in Florida as Hurricane Helene made landfall as a powerful Category 4 storm in the Big Bend region late Thursday night, Gov. Ron DeSantis said Friday.
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The deaths included a traffic fatality and a death that happened when a tree fell on a house in Dixie County.
Helene made landfall at Deckle Beach in Taylor County with maximum sustained winds of 140 miles per hour.
Storm surges were “historic” according to DeSantis, exceeding those seen during Hurricane Idalia, particularly in Tampa Bay and the Big Bend region.
DeSantis said the state will now begin to assess the damage and check on residents in the hardest hit areas. The hope is the death toll will not rise, officials said.
Residents were urged not to visit impacted areas and to stay off the roads to allow search and rescue personnel to do their jobs.
Florida Fish and Wildlife and other agencies were actively conducting search and rescue efforts Friday morning, and the Hope Florida line is available for non-emergency assistance.
DeSantis said there were thousands of successful rescue missions after people called 911 through the night.
As of 6 a.m., 1.24 million accounts in Florida were without power, but 1.16 million accounts had already been restored as of 9 a.m., DeSantis said.
Counties with over 30% power outages included Alachua, Baker, Bradford, Citrus, Clay, Columbia, Dixie, Gilchrist, Hamilton, Jefferson, Lafayette, Leon, Levy, Liberty, Madison, Nassau, Pinellas, Polk, Suwannee, Taylor, Union, Wakulla, and many others.
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Restoration efforts are ongoing and significant progress is expected throughout the day.
The Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) began cut-and-toss operations at 3 a.m. and cleared over 2,000 miles of roadway.
Interstate 10 and Interstate 75 north to Georgia were open and passable Friday morning, but other bridges, including the Sunshine Skyway, Gandy, Courtney, Campbell, and Howard Franklin in the Tampa Bay region, were closed. Inspectors were assessing damage before reopening.