At least 13 people were killed in the hurricane, which made landfall south of Sarasota at 8:30 p.m. Wednesday, officials said. Six of them were killed when two tornadoes touched down ahead of the storm in St. Lucie County on Florida's central Atlantic coast.
The hurricane tore the fiberglass roof off a baseball stadium and sent a construction crane crashing into a high-rise building in St. Petersburg. It destroyed homes and inundated roads across a wide swath of Florida.
Milton weakened slightly before coming ashore as a still-powerful Category 3 hurricane. It also turned slightly south of Tampa Bay rather than hitting it head on, sparing the heavily populated area a potentially devastating storm surge.
Thankfully this was not the worst-case scenario, said Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. The largest storm surge - the increase in water over dry land - of eight to 10 feet came in Sarasota County where Milton made landfall.
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