Hurricane Debby makes landfall in Florida, threatens catastrophic flooding

Hurricane Debby reached the Big Bend coast of Florida early on Monday, bringing with it the potential for record-setting rains, catastrophic flooding and life-threatening storm surge as it moves slowly across the northern part of the state before stalling over the coastal regions of Georgia and South Carolina.

The storm made landfall as a Category 1 storm near Steinhatchee, a tiny community in northern Florida of less than 1,000 residents on Florida’s Gulf coast. It had maximum sustained winds of 80mph (129kph) and was moving northeast at 10mph (17kph), the National Hurricane Center in Miami said.

The storm made landfall in one of the least populated areas of Florida, but forecasters warned heavy rain could spawn catastrophic flooding in Florida, South Carolina and Georgia. Nearly 214,000 customers were without power in Florida on Monday morning, according to PowerOutage.com.

A tornado watch also was in effect for parts of Florida and Georgia on Monday.

“Right now, we are to trying to secure everything from floating away,” said Sheryl Horne, whose family owns the Shell Island Fish Camp along the Wakulla River in St. Marks, Florida, where some customers moved their boats inland.

The sparsely populated Big Bend region in the Florida Panhandle also was hit last year by Hurricane Idalia, which made landfall as a Category 3 hurricane.