Hurricane Helene Leaves Trail of Destruction Across South

Hurricane Helene struck Florida as a Category 4 storm on Thursday night, resulting in at least 21 deaths across four states. The storm has caused widespread damage in Florida, with power outages and flooding affecting multiple southern states.

Helene initially formed as a tropical storm earlier this week but intensified to a Category 4 hurricane before making landfall in the U.S. The storm first hit Florida’s sparsely populated Big Bend region before moving along the Gulf Coast. It brought maximum sustained winds of 140 mph and record-breaking storm surges to the state.

As the storm made landfall in Perry, Florida, on Thursday, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis warned residents to brace for the worst: “When Floridians wake up tomorrow morning, we’re going to be waking up to a state where very likely there’s been additional loss of life and certainly there’s going to be loss of property,” he said during a press conference late Thursday.

On Friday morning, DeSantis reported two storm-related deaths in the state and added that 1.24 million customers were without power across the state. A spokesperson for Georgia Governor Brian Kemp told that 11 people have died in the state, and dozens more are trapped in their homes. Millions in Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and Florida are due to the storm. As the system moved up the coast of Florida and into Georgia and the Carolinas on Friday morning, it had been downgraded to a tropical storm.

The National Hurricane Center warned of catastrophic and life-threatening flash and urban flooding, including numerous significant landslides, in the southern Appalachian region on Friday. Flooding is also expected in Northwestern, northern, and southeast Florida on Friday.