"If you choose to stay, you're gonna die": officials urge people to leave Hurricane 'Milton' evacuation zones

Florida turned on all the alarms ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Milton, which will make landfall in the Sunshine State Wednesday night. Although it lost strength Monday, dropping from Category 5 to 4, the National Hurricane Center warns that beyond fluctuations in intensity, it will be "extremely dangerous hurricane through landfall in Florida."

In recent hours, state and local authorities redoubled attempts to communicate this urgency: "If you choose to stay in one of those evacuation areas, you're gonna die," said the mayor of Tampa, Jane Castor, in conversation with CNN. Forecasts indicate the coastal city will be one of the first to be impacted.

In Pinellas County, and in Tampa Bay, where the hurricane will hit first, Sheriff Bob Gualtieri was just as adamant: "Everyone just needs to get out." He further predicted that they will take a "different approach" to evacuations, that they will be "more assertive." "We can't have a tragedy like we had a week and a half ago," he said, referring to the material damage and 12 deaths in the county.

Castor, in Tampa, also compared the Helene to the impending arrival of Milton: "Hurricane Helene was a “wake-up call,” but Milton could be “literally catastrophic."

State authorities are offering free transportation services for those unable to flee on their own. For those evacuating on their own, tolls have been suspended and roads have been opened. As a result of the mass evacuation, major roads are experiencing traffic jams and delays.

Milton's path worries the whole peninsula

From the NHC warned that the dangerous storm that has the west coast of the country on alert should also worry in the rest of the state: "Milton is forecast to remain a hurricane as it crosses the Florida Peninsula and life-threatening hurricane-force winds, especially in gusts, are expected to spread inland across a portion of the entire Florida Peninsula."

"Preparations to protect life and property in the warning areas should be complete by Tuesday night since tropical storm conditions are expected to begin within this area early Wednesday," the NHC warned.

The NHC also warned that the arrival of Milton would be preceded by heavy rainfall, especially between Tuesday night and Thursday morning. "This rainfall brings the risk of considerable flash, urban, and areal flooding, along with moderate to major river flooding," they maintained, as well as noting that the hardest-hit areas will be where both coastal and inland flooding occurs.

Hurricane Recovery Concerns

Post-impact recovery remains one of the big questions. It will be the second blow for some of the communities hardest hit by Helene just days ago, which had to trade repair work for preparedness tasks when this week's cyclone was reported.

"Hundreds of first responders will be embedded in potential impact sites along Florida’s west coast to begin search and rescue operations as soon as the storm passes," Gov. Ron DeSantis said. "Power restoration resources are being marshaled in advance of this storm, including 30,000 linemen who are coming to Florida from all over the country."

President Joe Biden, after filming an emergency declaration for the state Monday, assured that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has sufficient resources to deal with the new natural disaster. His remarks come days after Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas announced that the agency lacked sufficient funds to cope with the hurricane season.

The Biden-Harris administration has come under fire in recent days for announcing that will send $157 million to Lebanon, forgetting the victims of the two powerful hurricanes, and for directing money away from FEMA for illegal immigrants.