Hurricane Nicole tore through Florida on Thursday with high-speed winds and rain. Nicole, now considered a tropical depression, is making its way north to southeast and mid-Atlantic states, leaving floods in its wake.
How much damage has Hurricane Nicole caused?
Nicole left Florida cleaning up its mess before the state could even make a full recovery from Hurricane Ian, which made landfall in late September.
At least five people were killed in the unusual November storm. The hurricane is the first to make landfall during November in the United States in almost 40 years, reports CNN.
Two people were killed after getting “electrocuted by a downed power line,” the Orange County Sheriff’s Office said, per CBS News.
Dozens of power lines crashed into flooded streets during the storm. Crews are actively working to remove the hazardous power lines and other debris and damage left in Nicole’s wake.
The storm also left thousands of people without power. According to CBS News, more than 300,000 people went without power after the storm passed.
“The structural damage along our coastline is unprecedented,” said George Recktenwald, the Volusia County manager, in a news conference, per CBS.
Homes and buildings crashed into the ocean as Nicole’s high waves eroded the coastline. In Voulsia County, at least 49 beachfront properties, including hotels and condos, were deemed “unsafe,” forcing roughly 500 people to evacuate their homes, according to The New York Times.
“The devastation is almost impossible to comprehend — Imagine watching your home collapse into the ocean,” Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood tweeted.
Where will Hurricane Nicole strike next?
Hurricane Nicole threatens Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia with flooding and tornadoes as it travels north.
In Georgia and the Carolinas, more than 20 million people are under wind alerts, CNN reported. The Storm Prediction Center reports that a few tornadoes are expected to hit northern Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and eventually North Carolina over the next two days.
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp alerted Georgians of the potential danger in a tweet on Thursday: “We are urging Georgians throughout the state and especially on the coast to remain weather aware today and tomorrow.”
Excessive rainfall will likely cause flash flooding as the storm accelerates through the southeast Appalachians and into western New York.
“‘The worry is that there could be some hourly rain totals of an inch, inch and a half, which over a few hours could overwhelm urban areas or places with high elevations,” reports David Roth, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service Weather Prediction Center, per The New York Times.
According to CNN, Nicole is also expected to dump 4 inches of rain in cities such as Pittsburgh, Jacksonville, Florida, and Syracuse, New York.