'It's eerie to see its power' - Florida woman documents 20 hours in hurricane’s path in messages to BBC

BBC ^

[nickcarraway]

For days, residents of Florida's Gulf Coast were warned to evacuate as Hurricane Milton approached - less than two weeks after the south-eastern US was thrashed by Hurricane Helene.

But from her home in Tampa, squarely in the path of the coming storm, Chynna Perkins decided to stay.

By Thursday morning, she said she, her husband Sterling and their pets had weathered the storm but lost power.

As the storm came and went, Perkins talked the BBC through her situation with a series of voice notes and calls, describing how Milton barrelled through her neighbourhood of West Tampa.

Her decision to stay was a matter of gut instinct, she said, after years living through Florida’s storms. Twenty-five miles (40km) east of the sea, and half a mile west of Tampa’s Hillsborough River, she felt protected from any storm surge.

“And then, as far as evacuation zones, we're in one of the last ones. So, you know, I'm not concerned,” she said.