A path of destroyed and precariously perched beachside homes, damaged hotels and condos along Florida’s Atlantic coast, and four injuries or deaths were left behind by Storm Nicole as it made its way north on Friday, drenching parts of Georgia and the Carolinas with heavy rains.
Late Thursday, hours after the storm made landfall along Florida’s Atlantic Coast as a Category 1 hurricane, local authorities in Volusia County ordered the evacuation of 24 beachfront hotels and condos because the buildings were deemed unsafe.
In Wilbur-by-the-Sea, a posh beachfront neighborhood just south of Daytona Beach, 25 single-family homes were deemed structurally unsafe and evacuated, according to reports posted online. Six houses or so completely fell into the water.
In a statement, Volusia County Manager George Recktenwald said. “Our coastline has sustained unprecedented structural damage,”
He mentioned. “This is something we’ve never seen before…. It will take a while to fully recover from this.
The 30,000-person community’s beaches were covered in heaps of concrete, wood, and rebar where once stood sizable homes with lovely ocean views. The locals looked in shock at the
Two more people died in a car accident on the Florida Turnpike during the storm, according to the Orlando Sentinel, citing the state Highway Patrol, in addition to the two who died from electrocution in Orange County, home to Orlando and Disney World, after the storm.
Over 300,000 homes and businesses lost service on Thursday as a result of the storm’s sustained winds of 75 miles per hour (120 km per hour), which tore down power lines. According to Power Outages. About 44,500 homes and businesses were still without power on Friday morning.
According to sheriff’s officials, Nicole’s storm surge also contributed to the collapse of a portion of the picturesque A1A highway that runs along the Atlantic coast in Volusia County.
Nicole was downgraded to a tropical depression on Friday and began to move north, passing through central and northern Georgia as cleanup operations began in Florida. With wind gusts of more than 35 mph, it was still dumping a lot of rain (56 kph). It was anticipated that as it approached the western Carolinas later in the day, it would weaken into a post-tropical cyclone.
According to the National Hurricane Center, the storm will continue to weaken on Saturday as it pours rain on New England and the Middle Atlantic states.
Up to 8 inches (20 cm) of rain may fall in some areas of the Southeast, the Appalachians, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Ohio; this amount of precipitation has the potential to cause sporadic flooding. According to forecasters, 3 inches (8 cm) of rain may fall in the northern Mid-Atlantic and up into New England.
Six weeks ago, Hurricane Ian, a devastating Category 4 storm that first pounded Florida’s Gulf Coast before sweeping across the state and into the Atlantic, severely damaged Volusia County along with several other East Coast areas. Ian’s damage totaled $60 billion, and it claimed the lives of over 140 people.
After November 4, Nicole was just the second hurricane in history to make landfall in the continental United States. On November 21, 1985, Hurricane Kate made landfall close to Mexico Beach, Florida, according to Philip Klotz Bach, a hurricane specialist.
