With Idalia almost certain now to make landfall in the Big Bend region it will be first direct landfall of a major Hurricane n the region since Easy in 1950. Category 2 Gladys in 1968 made landfall in Homosassa in 1968, south of the Big Bend (and the closest landfall to the Tampa Bay area since 1921). Hurricane Elena in 1985 approached he Big Bend but in an odd path took a turn and made a landfall in Mississippi. But it battered the Big Bend as well as the Panhandle as it meandered along.

Hurricane Hermine, a minimal storm made landfall at St Marks in 2016.

Idalia without a doubt will be the event of a lifetime for residents of Dixie, Taylor and Levy counties. Suwanee and Columbia will be impacted as well, though they had the experience of horrible flooding from 1964’s Hurricane Dora, the last storm to make landfall on the First Coast.