Conditions deteriorate dramatically as Hurricane Milton approaches Florida

Storm chaser Aaron Jayjack reported live on AccuWeather on the evening of Oct. 9, as Milton's impacts began ratcheting up.

Transcript

00:00Our team coverage continues with Storm Chaser Aaron Jajak.

00:03All right, he joins us live from North Port, Florida with the latest there.

00:06So Aaron, give us an update of where you are and what you're seeing.

00:12Yeah, so things have deteriorated dramatically since we last talked.

00:16We're getting hit by some significant winds now, you know, getting that tropical storm force winds.

00:22We have Milton sitting just offshore, maybe 60 miles to our west.

00:26And it is raining here because a lot of rain has been happening here.

00:30It's starting to pile up on the roads here, in the roadways, on the side of the road,

00:34and also the creeks.

00:35There's a creek here that we just got an alert on our phones about.

00:38The Myakahachi Creek has reached its limits of holding water,

00:43and they've warned people in the area to take shelter.

00:46As you can see behind me, there's also vehicles that have been parked here in the median,

00:50a high area.

00:51They're worried about their cars being flooded out in this area.

00:54This is pretty well inland from the coast,

00:56but we are also going to have the surge problems here shortly.

00:59You know, the storm is getting close to the coast,

01:01and we're expecting that wall of water to start impacting points in our area here,

01:06further to the south, the Punta Gorda area, Fort Myers as well, all the way up north to Tampa.

01:13And Aaron, you have shown that obviously people responding with their vehicles.

01:17Where have you found people locating themselves as far as where they're spending the night?

01:21The dark hours obviously can be quite scary with these winds and the storm surge coming in.

01:28Yeah, well, we saw quite a few people at our hotel just a little bit ago in Punta Gorda.

01:32So most people that are in those flood-prone zones have gotten out of those areas.

01:37In fact, I'm actually surprised there are still quite a few cars driving around right now.

01:42Maybe they're trying to get to safety,

01:44trying to get to where they're planning to ride the storm out.

01:46I'm not sure, but you know, now is the time.

01:49If you are out on the roads, you do not want to be out on the roads.

01:52It's dangerous conditions out there even without the full-on hurricane impacts with flooded water.

01:57Hydroplaning will be an issue out here,

01:59especially when you're getting hit with occasional strong gusts right now.

02:02So time to get in and take shelter.

02:05All right, Storm Chaser Aaron Jajak, thank you for the update.

02:08Stay safe, and we'll check in with you coming up.