'Stay inside and stay off the roads': Hurricane Milton approaching landfall in Sarasota County

Hurricane Milton is in the process of making landfall as a Category 3 storm in Sarasota County, Gov. Ron DeSantis announced Wednesday evening in Tallahassee.

Milton's rapidly approaching landfall, coming in at maximum sustained winds of 120 mph, may be hours ahead of forecasts that had landfall between 11 p.m and early Thursday morning.

"Stay inside and stay off the roads," Gov. DeSantis cautioned at a 7:30 p.m. press conference, warning Floridians that landfall hasn't happened, and the storm is far from being past. "Flood waters and rushing storm surge are very dangerous."

The worst storm surge so far, he continued, is between the Charlotte/Lee Counties area through Manatee County and Anna Maria Island, which is still picking up the pieces from Hurricane Helene less than two weeks ago. Storm surge is expected to range between 5 feet and 13 feet in the more vulnerable areas of St. Pete, Tampa Bay, and Bradenton, though the storm's track shifting away from Tampa and toward Sarasota may save Hillsborough County from what would have been the worst hurricane to hit the area in 100 years.

Aside from the hurricane itself, DeSantis announced that Florida has issued a record 116 tornado warnings statewide with 19 confirmed touchdowns, some of which decimated parts of Fort Myers and St. Lucie.

"We've seen more tornado watches than I've ever seen...that is a hazard for sure," DeSantis said. "I think we're likely to see that throughout the night."

Kevin Guthrie, the Director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management, estimated that as of 5:15 p.m., around 100,000 Floridians were hunkering down in statewide shelters, pointing out that while some shelters in Pinellas and Hillsborough Counties reported being maxxed out, there's still plenty of room for others. This is crucial considering 35 of the 51 counties under a declared state of emergency have some sort of evacuation order in place.

Earlier in the week, Milton surprisingly strengthened to a powerful Category 5 storm with max sustained winds of 185 mph before weakening to a Category 4. Over the past two days, it see-sawed between the two categorizations before finally decreasing to a Category 3 Wednesday evening.

As of 7:50 p.m., over 390,000 Floridians are without power—a marked increase from 2:00 p.m, which saw 44,000 without electricity—though that number is expected to spike as Milton draws nearer. To prepare for this, 20 states plus Nova Scotia have sent linemen, National Guard, and equipment to help shore up the state.

Florida now has 50,000 linemen and 8,000 National Guard at the ready.