Florida Braces for Impact as Idalia Made Landfall as Powerful Cat. 3 Hurricane Wednesday

Hurricane Idalia is intensifying over the Gulf, made landfall Wednesday AM…

• Idalia made landfall on Florida’s western coast as a powerful Category 3 storm. 
• Earlier Wednesday morning, it briefly intensified into an extremely dangerous Category 4 hurricane with winds of 130 mph before weakening slightly. 
• Gov. DeSantis warned Floridians to heed evacuation warnings. The storm is causing flooding in coastal areas and has left over 115,000 Floridians without power.
• Idalia’s landfall strength and storm surge could reach once-in-a-lifetime levelsin the region, which could be swamped by a surge of up to 16 feet, according to the National Hurricane Center.

Dangerous storm surge from Hurricane Idalia could reach 16 feet. Graphic, CNN

Storm surge damage may stretch about 200 miles along Florida’s west coast, past the Tampa Bay area, and the state’s Big Bend area could get 12 to 16 feet of storm surge.

Outer bands of rain containing gusty winds continue to swing into much of Florida, and parts of south Georgia.

Idalia is the strongest storm to make landfall in the Big Bend region in more than 125 years. 

This is frightening sight of Hurricane Idalia from Space which has been just upgraded to Category 4 storm!

Brace yourself florida, Cat 4 incoming!#HurricaneIdalia #Florida pic.twitter.com/Vfyr79dlG5

— Vishal Verma (@VishalVerma_9) August 30, 2023

For up to date info follow Interactive Storm Tracker on the Weather Channel. More coverage here on CNN.