Tropical Storm Nicole Issues Hurricane Warning for Parts of Florida – National

Nicole developed into a tropical storm on Tuesday as it intensified toward the northwestern Bahamas and the Atlantic coast of Florida, forecasters said.

Various warnings and monitoring will continue. Many areas are still reeling from the damage caused by Hurricane Ian, which hit Florida’s southwestern Gulf Coast as a Category 4 storm in late September. Forecasters said heavy rain could hit areas still recovering from Ian’s floods.

Hurricane warnings have been issued for Abacos, Berry Islands, Bimini and Grand Bahama, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center said in an advisory. Other parts of the Bahamas, including Andros, New Province and Eleuthera, were under tropical storm warnings.

Elian Hall, who works at a hotel on Great Abaco Island, said people were lining up at petrol stations and grocery stores in preparation for the storm.

“We just boarded,” she said of the hotel, adding that the effects of Hurricane Dorian, a Category 5 storm that struck in 2019, are still in the memory of many. “We are still affected.”

Authorities say people currently living in about 100 campers in Grand Bahama and 50 to 200 acres (81 ha) since Dorian destroyed their homes. Former communities of Haitian immigrants were hit hardest by the 2019 storm, given the large number of fragile structures in which they lived.

The Hurricane Center said the storm’s path moved slightly northward overnight, but its exact path remains unknown as it approaches Florida and is expected to make landfall as a Category 1 hurricane late Wednesday or early Thursday. It has been.

A hurricane warning was issued Tuesday morning for much of Florida’s Atlantic coast, from Boca Raton to north of Daytona Beach. A tropical storm warning has been issued for the rest of Florida’s coast, as far as Altamaha Sound, Georgia. The warning area extends inland, covering Lake Okeechobee in Florida, and tropical storm warnings are in effect for the state’s Gulf Coast, from Bonita Beach in southwestern Florida to the Ocroconee River in the Panhandle.

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Bevin said the storm has a “very large cyclonic envelope.” So even if it landed along the central Florida coastline, its effects would extend north into Georgia.

But Bevin said the storm was not expected to affect Tuesday’s vote in Florida.

Bahamian officials Tuesday opened more than 20 shelters across the archipelago to close schools and government offices in Abaco, Bimini, Berry Islands and Grand Bahamas.

Officials have warned that airports and seaports will be closed as the storm approaches and will not reopen until Thursday, urging people in the slums to seek safe haven.

The Abaco community is expected to take a direct hit from Nicole as they are still struggling to recover from Dorian.

Captain Stephen Russell, Director of Emergency Management Authority, said:

At 10 a.m., the storm was approximately 350 miles (560 km) east-northeast of the northwestern Bahamas, traveling at 9 miles per hour (15 km/h), with maximum sustained winds of 50 miles (80 km/h).

The Atlantic hurricane season runs from June 1st to November 30th. The last storm to hit Florida in November was Tropical Storm Ita, which made landfall at Cedar He Key on the state’s Gulf Coast on November 12, 2020.

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