Most of Georgia is expected to dodge the worst of Hurricane Milton, but the coast is under a tropical storm watch as it barrels toward Florida.
The Category 5 storm is churning just north of the Yucatán Peninsula with 165-mph winds Tuesday evening, according to the National Hurricane Center. It’s expected to continue eastward and weaken slightly ahead of making landfall at some point late Wednesday or early Thursday. It’s forecast to remain a hurricane as it crosses the Florida Peninsula and moves into the Atlantic Ocean.
As Hurricane Milton advances toward Florida, evacuees stream north
Georgia cities like Brunswick, Augusta and Valdosta — still grappling with power outages and heavy damage from Helene — could again be whipped by tropical storm-force winds and 2 to 6 inches of rain starting late Wednesday, with higher totals possible, the NHC predicts.
As a result, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp declared a state of emergency for counties near the Florida and South Carolina borders, and near the coast.