The record-breaking Hurricane Milton has left a massive path of devastation in its wake as it plowed through Florida into the Atlantic Ocean on Wednesday and Thursday. But it has also generated a ragged trail of misinformation that officials are still trying to combat.
On Thursday, President Joe Biden was asked at a press conference if he had spoken with former President Donald Trump about the hurricanes. Biden responded first by rhetorically asking, "Are you kidding me?" The president detailed how the Republican candidate incorrectly told voters that they would only get $750 in emergency relief, explaining that “Mr. Trump and all those other people know it’s a lie to suggest that’s all they’re going to get. It’s just bizarre. They got to stop this. They’re being so damn un-American with the way they’re talking about this stuff.”
At one point, Biden looked directly at the camera and said, "Mr. President Trump — former President Trump — get a life, man. Help these people.”
At least 12 people are confirmed dead from Hurricane Milton. More than 3.2 million people remain without power throughout Florida and evacuation orders have been in place for 7.2 million people in 15 Florida counties. Hurricane Milton made landfall on Wednesday near Siesta Key, off the west coast of Florida. Five of the confirmed deaths are in Florida’s St. Lucie County, where tornadoes struck along the state’s east coast.
While cleanup efforts are going to be an enormous undertaking, misinformation is proving to be almost as much of a major headache.
To cope with the resource shortages, at least seven large tanker vessels are heading to South Florida within the next two days to provide tens of millions of gallons of gasoline and diesel. Throughout the entire state, Fitch Ratings estimates that the total losses will add up to between $30 billion and $50 billion from the combined assaults of the rain, tornadoes and wind. This will make Hurricane Milton one of the most expensive hurricanes in history, close to the expenses incurred when Hurricane Ian caused $60 billion in damages in 2022.
A satellite image from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration shows Hurricane Milton on Tuesday October 08, 2024. (NOAA NESDIS STAR GOES-East/GEOCOLOR)
But while cleanup efforts are going to be an enormous undertaking, misinformation is proving to be almost as much of a major headache, such as claims that FEMA is limiting payouts to $750, that the organization is blocking supply planes from landing in affected areas or that money was stolen from emergency relief efforts and given to undocumented immigrants.
Trump has personally spread much of this misinformation. The $750 Trump mentioned in his Butler, PA speech (returning to where he was nearly the victim of an assassination attempt) is for what’s called Serious Needs Assistance, an initial direct relief payment intended to help cover emergency supplies like food, water, baby formula and other basics.
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There is also misinformation spreading on Twitter saying that Disney World was flooded by Hurricane Milton — complete with an AI images created by Russia. The misinformation has particularly spread on social media platforms like Twitter/X, owned by right-wing billionaire Elon Musk. It has spread both the aforementioned misinformation and incorrect messages about government authorities harming locals or that hurricanes are caused by Jews. Meteorologists have reported getting death threats because of some of the misinformation. At a press conference on Wednesday, President Biden urged Americans to disregard the flood of lies, describing it as “beyond ridiculous” and adding, “it’s so stupid, it’s got to stop.” Biden has previously criticized climate change deniers as “neanderthals.”
But here’s the facts about Milton: Although it was not as severe as anticipated, thankfully losing momentum as it hit the peninsula, it still led to a lot of extreme weather. Tornadoes were sighted across the state, and winds were so fierce that they tore the roof off of Tropicana Stadium, home to the baseball team the Tampa Bay Rays. The hurricane also toppled a crane that was in the process of constructing Florida’s largest residential tower.
"I fear that we should expect such Category 5 storms to become more frequent."
The wind speeds were recorded as fast as 120 mph, or classifiable as a Category 3 hurricane. The storm did not move mostly into the Atlantic Ocean — to the point where it could be considered a post-tropical storm with winds up to 75 mph — until Thursday afternoon.
There were some silver linings to the news reports. Hurricane Milton did not make direct impact with the city of Tampa, as some had feared, and therefore avoided some of the more populated areas of the state. At the same time, the storm did pour up to 18 inches of rain in some parts of the area. Sarasota County was hit the worst, with the storm causing 8 to 10 feet (2.5 to 3 meters) of flooding.
Because Hurricane Milton comes only one week after Hurricane Helene battered the American southeast, scientists are worried that more superstorms could be coming. Speaking with Salon earlier this week on the subject, Michael Wehner, a senior scientist in the Computational Research Division at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who analyzes climate change data, said that “one would be more than enough,” but with waters in the Gulf of Mexico having “warmed so much because of climate change, I fear that we should expect such Category 5 storms to become more frequent.”
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Other experts are drawing attention to the links between Hurricane Milton, Hurricane Helene and the human-caused factor driving so much extreme weather: climate change.
"There is growing evidence that hurricanes like Milton — a hurricane that rapidly intensified from a Category 1 to a Category 5 in a few hours — are made more likely by the global warming to date, and will be more so with continued global warming," Gabriel A. Vecchi, a Princeton University professor of geosciences, told Salon.
Dr. Mark Serreze, director of the National Snow and Ice Data Center, wondered if Milton will be the event that will cause such skeptics “to get their heads out of the sand and accept what is happening.”
“How many more storms like Helene do we need to convince the denialist crowd that climate change is real?” Serreze asked.
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