By Delayna Earley
The Island News
The Lowcountry is under a Tropical Storm Watch and Storm Surge Watch as Hurricane Milton, a Category 5 hurricane as of Tuesday afternoon, makes it’s way to the Florida coast and beyond.
It has been nearly two weeks since Hurricane Helene made landfall in Florida and made its way northward leaving behind massive destruction, flooding and widespread power outages across the states of Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia and Tennessee.
Thankfully, according to the National Weather Service in Charleston, Milton will likely not have the impact on the Lowcountry that Helene did.
Currently, Hurricane Milton is on track to hit the western coast of Florida, which has prompted mandatory evacuations in communities all along the coast.
It was expected to make landfall sometime on Wednesday, Oct. 9, and continue east across the peninsula until it enters the Atlantic Ocean on Thursday, Oct. 10.
Unless Milton changes its trajectory and veers more north, the main concerns for the Lowcountry are high winds along the coast, storm surge and dangerous marine conditions.
According to the NWS in Charleston, Hurricane Milton will likely generate large waves off the Georgia and South Carolina coast.
“Breaking waves of 5 feet or greater are possible at all beaches Wednesday into Thursday night, peaking around 5-8 feet Thursday afternoon,” their Tuesday afternoon post on Facebook read.
The NWS Charleston says that this could result in significant beach erosion in Beaufort County.
Beaufort County likely to see significant rainfall late on Oct. 9 and into Oct. 10 which could cause some localized flooding in the area.
While not expected to be as strong as they were during Hurricane Helene, wind gusts are a concern for many in Beaufort County as they could knock down trees that have been weakened by Helene, potentially resulting in additional power outages.
Beaufort County is not expected to get the tornado activity that it saw during Hurricane Helene and Tropical Storm Debby, according to the NWS Charleston.
Hurricane grew to a Category 5 hurricane on Monday, Oct. 7, dropped to a Category 4, then returned to a Category 5 early Tuesday evening.
Meteorologists have predicted that the hurricane could weaken to a Category 3 hurricane before making landfall on Wednesday evening.
Delayna Earley, who joined The Island News in 2022, formerly worked as a photojournalist for The Island Packet/The Beaufort Gazette, as well as newspapers in Indiana and Virginia. She can be reached at delayna.theislandnews@gmail.com.
