Hurricane Milton’s Landfall Could Be a First for Florida in 100 Years

If Hurricane Milton continues its current track, it will be the first hurricane in more than 100 years to make a direct hit on Florida’s Tampa area.

On Monday afternoon, Milton—which exhibited rapid intensification overnight—was classified as a Category 5 hurricane, with maximum sustained winds of 180 miles per hour, the most recent National Hurricane Center (NHC) update said. Forecasts show Milton making landfall in Tampa on Wednesday, but the expected wind speeds at landfall are still uncertain.

Milton’s path will likely take the storm across Florida, with widespread impacts affecting coastal regions of Georgia and South Carolina.

The last time a storm made direct landfall in Tampa was 1921, when a Category 3 hurricane elicited 11 feet of storm surge and brought devastating winds to the area.

“Since 1921, there’s been a lot of changes to the Tampa Bay area, including a lot more people, a lot more infrastructure that can be impacted compared to what was around back then, so there’s that impact,” NWS meteorologist Keily Delerme told Newsweek. “In addition to that, most people haven’t experienced that kind of impact, so that is the other concern.”

Delerme added that Tampa did sustain some impacts related to Hurricane Helene, even though the region didn’t suffer a direct hit.

“This is just going to exacerbate that as well,” Delerme said, adding that officials are expecting “lots of widespread power outages” and that many areas will become “impassable.”

“Most of us haven’t seen that in this area,” she said.

Officials are urging people in Milton’s path to take the storm seriously, including Florida Senator Marco Rubio.

“Several years ago I asked @NHC_Atlantic to show me what the worst case storm hitting Florida would look like,” Rubio posted on X (formerly Twitter). “What they showed me back then is almost identical to the #Milton forecast now.”

The NHC is forecasting storm surge of up to 15 feet for the Tampa Bay area, with 1 to 10 feet of storm surge forecast for the entire rest of Florida’s western coast. Officials also are concerned about heavy rain, with much of the Florida Peninsula expecting widespread amounts of at least 6 inches. Much of Florida, from Jacksonville south past Tampa Bay, as well as the state’s southern tip, is at a risk for flash flooding, according to the NHC.

Milton comes only two weeks after Helene made landfall as a Category 4 storm in Florida’s Big Bend region before cutting inland. Helene has killed hundreds of people, and hundreds of thousands remain without power.