The National Hurricane Center warned of a "life-threatening situation" Sunday evening as Hurricane Debby gained strength over the Gulf of Mexico on a path toward Florida's coast.
The center of the storm was about 100 miles west of Tampa, Florida with maximum sustained winds of 75 mph, the hurricane center said in an update issued at 11 p.m. ET.
Debby was forecast to barrel into the Big Bend coast from mainland Florida to the state's panhandle early Monday morning.
Storm surges and high tides were predicted to cause up to 10 feet of flooding, and rainfall totals could reach 18 inches across parts of northern Florida by Friday.
"This is a life-threatening situation," the hurricane center said. "Persons located within these areas should take all necessary actions to protect life and property from rising water and the potential for other dangerous conditions."
Gov. Ron DeSantis urged "all Floridians to be cognizant of the fact that we are going to have a hurricane hit the state, probably a Category 1, but it could be a little bit more powerful than that," the Associated Press reported.
"But we are absolutely going to see a lot of rainfall. We are going to see a lot of saturation. We are going to see flooding events. That is going to happen. There is also going to be power outages," DeSantis said during a Sunday morning briefing.
Debby is the fourth named storm of the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season after Tropical Storm Alberto, Hurricane Beryl and Tropical Storm Chris, all of which formed in June.
Beryl, the earliest Category 5 hurricane on record, killed 36 people around Houston, with nine deaths added to the toll last week, according to the Houston Chronicle.
The storm also reportedly killed at least 11 others in the Caribbean before it crossed the Gulf of Mexico into Mexico and Texas.
