Over 1.8 million Floridians are without power. This includes a growing number in Hillsborough and Polk Counties in the last several hours. Widespread outages remain in the counties directly impacted by Ian’s landfall. These include Pinellas, Manatee, Sarasota, Charlotte, Lee and Collier. Rural DeSoto and Hardee Counties have also been hard-hit in terms of loss of power.

There are thousands of outages that remain in Miami-Dade and Broward, which were caused by the initial feeder bands of Ian which delivered a punch to urban south Florida in the form of gusty squalls and Tornadoes.

Speaking of Tornadoes, we have had multiple reports of Tornadoes or potential Tornadoes in Osceola and Polk counties today. As Ian weakens and its feeder bands become less potent, the threat shifts from Tornadoes to devastating flooding with a slow moving storm – think Harvey or Allison in Houston or even Tropical Storm Fay here in Florida in 2008.

So while winds are drawing down from Ian, do not let your guard down. The dangers remain potentially catastrophic.