At least 17 dead after Hurricane Milton, 1.5 million customers in Florida still without power

Hurricane Milton has claimed at least 17 lives in the state of Florida as 1.5 million customers in the Sunshine State are still without power. 

Milton hit Florida less than two weeks after Hurricane Helene, which ripped through Florida and killed about 20 people. First responders have reportedly rescued over a thousand people stranded by Milton.

As of 9 a.m. on Saturday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said that 2.4 million customers have gotten power restored, according to CNN.

Tampa International Airport reopened on Saturday after service was suspended for three days. 

The White House announced that on Sunday President Joe Biden would be visiting parts of Florida that were impacted by the hurricane. 

DeSantis said Thursday during a press conference that the counties that have the most significant storm outages are Hillsborough, Manatee, Pinellas and Sarasota.

Hillsborough County Sheriff Chad Chronister said that recovery was going to take a lot of time and money.

“We’ve had a lot of flooding,” Chronister said during a news conference. “Storm surge comes in, does its damage and leaves. With 16 inches of rain and flooding, the water doesn’t subside as rapidly as all of us would like, so, this healing, this recovery is taking a lot longer.”