The storm sent Florida homes overturning into the Atlantic Ocean earlier Thursday and threatened a string of apartment buildings in places where Hurricane Ian washed ashore and damaged seawalls just weeks ago. At 10 p.m., an advisory from the National Hurricane Center said the storm’s center was about 20 miles (35 kilometers) north of Tallahassee with maximum sustained winds of 35 mph (55 kmh). It was moving northwest at 15 mph (24 kmh). The storm, which caused at least two deaths, was the first November hurricane to make landfall in Florida in 37 years and only the third on record. It dealt another devastating blow just weeks after Ian made landfall on the Gulf Coast, killing more than 130 people and destroying thousands of homes. Although Nicole’s winds died down after it made landfall as a Category 1 hurricane around 3 a.m. Thursday near Vero Beach, its storm surge pounded shorelines in the neighboring island communities of Wilbur-by-the-Sea and Daytona Beach Shores. sending some houses falling into the ocean. Officials in Volusia County, which is northeast of Orlando, said Thursday afternoon that building inspectors declared 24 hotels and condos in Daytona Beach Shores and New Smyrna Beach unsafe and ordered them evacuated. At least 25 single-family homes in Wilbur-by-the-Sea had been declared structurally unsafe by building inspectors and were also evacuated, county officials said. “The structural damage along our coastline is unprecedented. We’ve never experienced anything like this before,” County Manager George Recktenwald said during a press conference earlier, noting that it’s unknown when it will be safe for evacuated residents to return to their homes. County Sheriff Mike Chitwood said in a social media post that several coastal homes in Wilbur-by-the-Sea had collapsed and that several other properties were in “imminent danger.” He said most bridges to waterfront properties were closed to all but essential personnel and a curfew was in place. Krista Dowling Goodrich, who manages 130 vacation homes in Wilbur-By-The-Sea and Daytona Beach Shores as director of sales and marketing at Salty Dog Vacations, saw yards collapse into the ocean just before the storm. Then the backs of about seven colorful houses along Highway A1A were gone. A modern home was missing two bedrooms and much of its living room as water seeped under its foundation. On a partially damaged wall, decorations read “blessed” and “grateful.” Goodrich burst into tears when she saw it. “Half the house is gone, but we were able to get family pictures yesterday,” Goodrich said. “It’s overwhelming when you see that. These are hard-working people who got to this point in their lives and now they’re losing everything.” In Daytona Beach Shores, where beachside bathrooms attached to the city’s Beach Safety Ocean Rescue building collapsed, officials deemed several high-rise buildings unsafe and went door-to-door telling people to grab their belongings and leave. “These were the tall apartment buildings. So the people who weren’t leaving, they were physically forced to leave because it’s not safe,” Goodrich said. The homeowners association at the Marbella condominiums in Daytona Beach Shores had just spent $240,000 to temporarily rebuild the seawall that Ian destroyed in September, said Connie Hale Gellner, whose family owns a unit there. Live video from the building’s cameras showed Nicole’s storm surge washing over the seawall. “We knew it wasn’t meant to stop a hurricane, it was only meant to stop erosion,” Gellner said. But after Nicole, the building’s pool deck “is basically in the ocean,” Gellner said. “The problem is that we don’t have another beach. So even if we wanted to rebuild, they would probably condemn the building because the water is just splashing on the building.” Nicole was widespread, covering almost the entire weather-weary state of Florida, while also reaching Georgia and the Carolinas before dawn Thursday. Tropical-storm-force winds extended up to 450 miles (720 kilometers) from the center in some directions as Nicole turned north over central Florida. Although Nicole’s winds caused little damage, its storm surge was more destructive than it might have been in the past because seas are rising as the planet’s ice melts due to climate change, climate scientist Michael Oppenheimer said. from Princeton University. Add in higher coastal flooding, which flows deeper inland, and what used to be once-in-a-century events will happen almost every year in some places, he said. “It’s definitely part of a picture that’s happening,” Oppenheimer said. “It will happen elsewhere. It will happen all over the world.” A man and a woman were electrocuted when they touched downed power lines in the Orlando area, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office said. Nicole also caused flooding inland, as parts of the St. Johns was at or above flood stage, and some rivers in the Tampa Bay area were also nearing flood levels, according to the National Weather Service. Although Nicole made landfall near Vero Beach, it did not cause significant damage there, officials said. Part of a fishing pier was washed away in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, but the brunt of the storm hit north of its center. By 1 p.m., Nicole’s maximum sustained winds had decreased to 45 mph (70 km/h) as it moved toward Tallahassee. The rare November hurricane could dump up to 6 inches (15 cm) of rain over the Blue Ridge Mountains by Friday, the hurricane center said. Urban flooding and flooding will be possible as rain spreads across the eastern Ohio Valley, mid-Atlantic and New England through Saturday. Nicole was the first hurricane to hit the Bahamas since Hurricane Dorian, a Category 5 storm that devastated the archipelago in 2019. For storm-weary Florida residents, it’s only the first November hurricane to hit their shores since 1985 and only the third since record keeping began in 1853. All 67 Florida counties were under a state of emergency. President Joe Biden also approved a declaration of emergency for the Seminole Tribe of Florida, ordering federal aid for the tribal nation. Many Seminoles live on six reservations throughout the state. The skeletal remains of six people believed to be from a Native American burial site were discovered by Nicole’s wind and waves on a beach on Hutchinson Island, according to the sheriff’s office in Martin County, which is about 160 miles (257 km) south of Volusia County. . “Detectives are working diligently to preserve and carefully remove the remains on display with the utmost care and respect,” the sheriff’s office said in a news release. The remains will be taken to a medical examiner and then to the State Office of Archaeological Research. Gov. Ron DeSantis said at a news conference Thursday in Tallahassee that about 333,000 customers were without power by mid-morning, about 2.9 percent of the state’s total. He said there were 17,000 electricians ready to begin restoring power and that many other assets, including rescue boats and vehicles, would be deployed as needed. Disney World and Universal Orlando Resort announced they likely will not open as planned on Thursday. Nearly two dozen school districts closed schools and 15 shelters were opened along Florida’s east coast, the governor said. Parts of Florida were devastated by Hurricane Ian, which made landfall as a Category 4 storm. Ian destroyed homes and damaged crops, including orange groves, across the state — damage that many are still dealing with — and sent a storm surge up to 13 feet ( 4 meters) on land, causing widespread destruction.
Frisaro reported from Fort Lauderdale. Associated Press contributors include Terry Spencer in Vero Beach, Curt Anderson in St. Petersburg, David Fischer in Miami and Seth Borenstein in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.
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