Sheriff scolds residents for ignoring Hurricane Helene evacuation order

A Florida sheriff on Thursday admonished residents who failed to obey an evacuation order as Hurricane Helene barreled toward the state, threatening to unleash a storm surge forecasters described as “unsurvivable” along Florida’s northwest coast.

“We have a problem, and the problem is that far too many people in Zone A are not listening,” Bob Gualtieri, the sheriff in Pinellas County, which includes Clearwater and St. Petersburg, said in a news conference Thursday morning. “We were out there this morning, there are just way too many people in the area.”

Other local and state officials, including Gov. Ron DeSantis, warned residents to leave vulnerable areas before Thursday night’s massive storm unleashes a spate of life-threatening conditions, including flooding rains and winds of up to 131 to 155 miles per hour.

More: Hurricane Helene Tracker: See the ‘catastrophic’ storm’s forecast path as Florida prepares

“If you are in an evacuation zone or have been told to evacuate, now is your time to do so – so do it. But don’t wait another six, seven hours,” DeSantis said early Thursday.

Gualtieri said that while the county does not face a major threat from rain and wind, barrier islands and low-lying coastal areas face a storm surge of 5 to 8 feet.

“This is dangerous. No question, and we haven’t seen anything like that recently,” he said. “They have to get out, and at some point you’re going to reach a point where you’re on your own because we’re not going to have our people killed because you don’t want to listen to what we say.”

Officials across the state are issuing dire warnings ahead of Helene

The highest storm surge — expected to be 15 to 20 feet — is expected to hit onshore along a section of the Panhandle and Big Bend coasts south of Tallahassee. In a morning update on the storm, the National Weather Service described the forecast surge as “catastrophic and insurmountable.”

While nearly all counties along Florida’s west coast have ordered evacuations, four of them, including Franklin, Taylor, Liberty and Wakulla, have ordered the evacuation of all county residents.

“This will not be a survivable event for those in coastal or lowland areas,” Sheriff Jared Miller of the Wakulla County Sheriff’s Office said in a Facebook post. “In recorded history, Wakulla has never experienced a storm of this magnitude.”

More: Hurricane Helene is now a severe Category 3 storm and is heading toward Florida: Live updates

Franklin County Sheriff AJ Smith said he has never seen so many residents evacuate from a hurricane as he has in recent days. However, he said there were still people who chose to stay for various reasons.

“I’ve said publicly that when the storm hits and the weather is so bad that first responders can’t get out, you’re on your own because we can’t get to you,” he said, adding: “If… “I wasn’t a sheriff, believe me – I wouldn’t be here.”

Residents of vulnerable coastal areas remain despite serious warnings

In Steinhatchee, a coastal community in Taylor County, Paul Nawlin, a local church minister, spent his Thursday morning riding around his golf course looking for residents who lived along the area’s riverbanks and were hiding from the storm.

Since some of his neighbors are staying in the town of about 500, he will stay too.

More: The “catastrophic” storm surge from Hurricane Helene brings back danger and catastrophic memories

“We will trust the Lord no matter what,” Nawlin told the Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Network. “He didn’t demand that we understand everything. Let’s just trust.”

In Saint Marks, Wakulla County, a coastal fishing town about 30 miles south of Tallahassee, 63-year-old stone crab fisherman Philip Tooke told USA TODAY he and his brother plan to ride out the storm on their fishing boats, letting the line out like the water.” You have to jump from one to the other so that they continue to rise with the tide,” he said. “It gets a little hairy.”

Contributor: Trevor Hughes, USA TODAY; Antonio Fins, Palm Beach Post

Sheriff scolds residents for ignoring Hurricane Helene evacuation order

ByJasper

Officials across the state are issuing dire warnings ahead of Helene

Residents of vulnerable coastal areas remain despite serious warnings

By Jasper

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