Hurricane Helene kills over 30 people, causes catastrophic flooding in Southeast after Florida landfall
The remnants of Hurricane Helene wreaked havoc across the Southeast on Friday after crashing ashore in Florida's Big Bend area the night before as a dangerous Category 4 storm. Helene, which was downgraded to a tropical depression Friday afternoon, was blamed for dozens of deaths in several states after inundating areas with what the National Hurricane Center described as historic and catastrophic flooding.
In Tennessee, floodwaters forced dozens of people at a hospital to head to the roof Friday. Ballad Health said on social media that 54 people at Unicoi County Hospital were relocated to the roof and needed to be rescued because the facility was "engulfed by extremely dangerous and rapidly moving water."
At least 35 deaths have been attributed to Helene. A spokesperson for Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp said 15 people were killed in the state. A first responder was among the dead, Kemp said earlier Friday.
In Florida, the Pinellas County administrator confirmed five fatalities to CBS News. Gov. Ron DeSantis also told reporters that at least one person was killed in the Tampa area when a traffic sign fell on a vehicle, and Tampa police confirmed a woman in her late 70s was found dead in her home after water made it into the residence. Another person died in Dixie County when a tree fell on a home, DeSantis told reporters.
In North Carolina, Gov. Roy Cooper said two people died in his state. One person died in a collision on a flooded road, Cooper said. Another person was killed when a tree fell on a house, according to the Mecklenburg Emergency Medical Services Agency. Another person in that incident was taken to a hospital with life-threatening injuries.
In South Carolina, the Aiken County Sheriff's Office confirmed to CBS News four people died because of the storm. Officials said two firefighters were killed in Saluda County. Two people were killed in Newberry County, according to its sheriff's office, and two others were killed when trees fell on two separate residences, the Anderson County coroner's office said.
As of 2 p.m. EDT, Helene was approximately 125 miles south-southeast of Louisville, Kentucky, and was racing north-northwest at 28 mph, the Miami-based hurricane center said. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 35 mph.
Helene made landfall about 10 miles west of Perry, Florida, at 11:10 p.m. EDT, according to the hurricane center, with maximum sustained winds of 140 mph.
Meteorologist Stephanie Abrams of The Weather Channel said on "CBS Mornings" Friday that Helene is the fourth hurricane to make landfall on the Gulf Coast this year, which has happened only five other times in history.
Helene is the third hurricane to hit the Big Bend region in the last 13 months. In 2023, Hurricane Idalia, a Category 4 storm with maximum sustained winds of 130 mph, generated a record-breaking storm surge from Tampa to the Big Bend. Last August, Hurricane Debby also hit the area.
"The early reports we've received is that the damage in those counties that were really in the eye of the storm has exceeded the damage of Idalia and Debby combined," DeSantis told reporters Friday.
Daylight revealed scenes of utter destruction along Florida's Gulf Coast: a giant tree into an apartment building in Tallahassee and boats in the front yards in Treasure Island.
Over 4 million customers in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia were without power Friday afternoon, according to utility tracker PowerOutage.us.
DeSantis said emergency crews conducted thousands of rescue missions overnight.
In Atlanta, crews helped bring a couple, their baby and two dogs to safety.
"The vehicle was traveling in through the water, and the vehicle started to float, and it floated off the roadway," Atlanta Fire Rescue Capt. Scott Seely said. "They were able to get out of the vehicle and get on top of the vehicle."
Several airports closed because of the storm, and airlines canceled nearly 1,300 flights Thursday, according to FlightAware. Nearly 800 U.S. flights were already canceled as of Friday morning.
More than 175 people sheltered in a school in Tallahassee.
Annie Sloan, who was one of them, told CBS News Miami: "I decided to come to the shelter because I live alone and basically my son came to take me to Georgia, but we discovered the hurricane was going to Georgia also, and I decided to just come here and shelter because my husband passed, and I don't want to be home alone."
Most gas stations in the Tallahassee area were shut down or out of gas.
School districts and numerous universities called off classes for Friday.
CBS News senior weather and climate producer David Parkinson described Helene as a "gargantuan" storm.
NASA shared video of the hurricane as seen from the International Space Station, showing the size of the storm as it churned through the Gulf of Mexico Thursday afternoon.
President Biden and DeSantis declared emergencies in the state earlier in the week, and evacuation orders were issued in several counties. At the University of Tampa, officials were trying to evacuate all residential students by Wednesday afternoon.
States of emergency were also declared in Georgia, North and South Carolina and as far north as Virginia.
Exceptionally warm Gulf water fuels hurricanes
Record-warm water in the Gulf almost certainly acted like jet fuel in intensifying the storm. Brian McNoldy, senior research associate at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science, recently noted that ocean heat content in the Gulf of Mexico is the highest on record. Warm water is a necessary ingredient to strengthen tropical systems.
Sea surface temperatures in the path of Helene were as warm as 89 degrees Fahrenheit — 2 to 4 degrees above normal.
These record water temperatures have been made significantly more likely by human-caused climate change, according to Climate Central. The North Atlantic Ocean as a whole has seen record warm temperatures in 2024, storing 90% of the excess heat from climate change produced by greenhouse gas pollution.
