Hurricane Milton in numbers: What made this hurricane so historic

Less than two weeks after Hurricane Helene hit Florida’s northern Gulf Coast, Hurricane Milton made landfall near Siesta Key on October 9. The storm brought dangerous Category 3 winds of 120 miles per hour, causing millions of people in Florida to lose power and at least two dozen people to die.

Milton is the third hurricane to hit Florida this year. In no other year have there been more than three hurricanes. After a lull from early to mid-season, the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season is now above normal in all respects.

Preliminary estimates of total damage and economic loss from historic Hurricane Milton range from $160 billion to $180 billion. Milton will go down as one of the most devastating and influential storms in Florida history. The total damage and economic loss from Hurricane Helene is estimated at approximately $225 billion to $250 billion.

Tornadoes:

On the day Milton made landfall, an incredible 126 tornado warnings were issued in Florida. A total of 45 tornado reports were received, but the NWS had only investigated 32 of the tornado reports as of Wednesday evening. As they continue to investigate, this number could increase if additional damage is found in new areas, or decrease if multiple areas of damage are determined to be from the same tornado.

Milton’s tornado outbreak ranks second among tornado warnings issued on a given day. Numbers 1 and 3 are from super tornado outbreaks in 2011. Number 5 is from the catastrophic Hurricane Rita.

Tornadoes often occur before and after hurricane landfall. Earlier this season, Hurricane Beryl spawned 68 tornadoes from Texas to Canada. However, that number is even surpassed by Hurricanes Beulah in 1967, Rita in 2005, Frances in 2004 and Ivan, which spawned 118 tornadoes across nine states in 2004 after making landfall near Gulf Shores, Alabama met.

Storm surge

The storm surge in Naples, Florida, reached a height of 5.78 feet above normal tide, nearly a foot higher than Hurricane Helene on September 26 and nearly 3 feet above Hurricane Debby on August 4.

In Fort Myers, the level rose to 5.26 feet, slightly above the peak reached during Hurricane Helene at 5.12, but below Hurricane Ian’s 50-year record of 7.26 feet on September 28, 2022.

Anti-surge

Instead of water rising in Tampa Bay, a “blowout tide,” or anti-storm surge, occurred at a downtown tide gauge north of the storm’s landfall. This happens when strong winds from a tropical storm or hurricane blow from land instead of the sea, temporarily pushing water in bays out to sea. Water levels fell to nearly 5 feet below normal as winds pushed water out of the bay and into the Gulf of Mexico.

Amount of precipitation:

One of the largest and most consequential impacts of Hurricane Milton will be its flooding rainfall. The total rainfall from Hurricane Milton is estimated to be over 3.4 trillion gallons of water in the Sunshine State. St. Petersburg Albert Whitted Airport received 18.87 inches of rain during Hurricane Milton. In just one hour, the rain gauge recorded 5.09 inches, an extremely rare amount of rainfall. As Milton moved through Florida, several ambient weather precipitation gauges in Lakeland, 32 miles northeast of Tampa, recorded 16.67 inches.

The torrential rains in Milton continue to cause significant river flooding problems more than a week after landfall. Several low-lying communities along rivers along the I-4 corridor have already begun preparing for more freshwater flooding over the next 10 days or so as floodwaters flow back into local rivers and overflow into flood-prone communities.

Power outages:

Hundreds of thousands of Florida residents lost power due to Hurricane Helene. After Hurricane Milton hit south-central Florida and bisected the state, the number of outages topped 3.5 million. Hardee and Highlands counties reported nearly 100% of customers were in the dark.

Peak wind gusts

The strongest wind gust reported during the storm was 105 mph at a WeatherFlow weather station in the Egmont Canal, southwest of St. Petersburg. Bradenton and St. Petersburg airports also reached gusts of 102 and 101 mph, respectively.

Other notable numbers

Hurricane Milton’s central pressure fell to 26.64 inches of mercury (902 mb) on October 8, making it the fifth strongest hurricane ever observed in the Atlantic basin and the second lowest at that end of the year. Milton’s sustained winds were estimated at 180 miles per hour, and only five Atlantic hurricanes had estimated wind speeds higher than Milton’s.

Hurricane season 2024

Hurricane Milton is the fifth hurricane to hit the Gulf Coast this season, joining Beryl, Debby, Francine and Helene. There were also five in the 2005 and 2020 hurricane seasons. Only 1886 saw more, with six hurricanes making landfall in the Gulf that season.

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