Idalia weakened to a tropical storm on Wednesday evening as it trekked across the Southeast, threatening parts of Georgia and the Carolinas with strong winds and flooding after pummeling parts of Florida, CNN reported.
In Florida’s Crystal River, water levels appeared to be receding but a high tide was still expected, city council member Ken Frink told CNN.
“Right now, it’s still a catastrophic event,” Frink said. “All the homes around us, they’re all underwater.”
In nearby coastal Pasco County, just north of Tampa, roughly 6,000 homes were “inundated with water,” according to one official.
Hurricane Idalia made landfall in Florida at approximately 7:45 a.m. EDT on Wednesday.
On Wednesday afternoon, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis announced that so far, no deaths have been confirmed as a direct result of the storm.
The governor stated that 262,000 people who lost power due to the hurricane have had their electricity restored, but "more than 250,000 accounts that are currently out of power and in need of restoration."
At around 5:00 p.m. local time, the storm was whipping 70 mph winds and was roughly 40 miles west of Savannah, Georgia.
Georgia Governor Brian Kemp said multiple counties in the southern portion of the state have been seeing powerful winds Wednesday, and are expecting heavy rain.
Up to 10 inches of rain could drop over parts of east-central Georgia to central and eastern South Carolina and through eastern North Carolina into Thursday, the National Hurricane Center said.
Tornadoes are also possible through Wednesday evening across coastal South Carolina and coastal North Carolina Wednesday night.