Hurricane Hermine: Man killed as storm batters Florida and Georgia

First hurricane to hit Florida in a decade leaves trail of devastation, with storm surge, high winds and torrential rain

One man was killed and hundreds of thousands were left without power as Hurricane Hermine battered Florida, bringing a storm surge that wrecked beachside building and unleashed monsoon rain

In Florida’s capital, Tallahassee, falling trees brought down power lines and injured people in their homes.

Hermine made landfall early on Friday morning, becoming the first hurricane to hit the state in more than a decade.

As Friday morning wore on, it weakened from a peak wind speed of 80 mph to a tropical storm as it moved into southern Georgia.

From there it is forecast to move into the Carolinas and up the East Coast with the potential for drenching rain and deadly flooding.

News reporter doing a stand-up report near a sea wall in Cedar Key, Florida

Resident Nancy Geohagen walked around collecting photos and other items for her neighbours that had been thrown from storage.

“I know who this baseball bat belongs to,” she said plucking it from a pile of debris.

An unnamed spring storm that hit the beach in 1993 killed 10 people as most residents refused to evacuate. This time, only three residents stayed behind. All escaped injury.

A homeless man in Marion County, south of Gainesville, was killed when he was hit by a tree as the storm moved through, according to Rick Scott, the governor of Florida.

At Florida’s Dekle Beach, just south of the state’s Big Bend where the peninsula meets the Panhandle, the storm surge damaged numerous homes and destroyed storage buildings and a 100-yard fishing pier.

Melvin Gatlin walks to the back door of his father's house in Valdosta, Goergia, beneath a pine tree that crashed on to the roof

Hurricane Hermine Tracker | FindTheBest

At nearby Keaton Beach, about two dozen people waited on a road just after sunrise trying to get to their homes. Police had the road blocked because of flooding. Taylor County Commissioner Jody DeVane said several homes were damaged.

Dustin Beach, 31, had rushed there early Friday from a hospital in Tallahassee where his wife had given birth Thursday night to a girl to see if his home still stood.

“When my wife got up this morning she said, ‘go home and check on the house. I need to know where we're going after we leave the hospital,”' he said.

Pedro Muacaj rests on higher ground in front of a gift shop along a flooded section of Dodecanese Boulevard in Tarpon Springs, Florida

Cindy Simpson was waiting near her car, hoping her beach home and boats had made it. “It’s a home on stilts so I put everything upstairs. We have two boats in the boat house and I hope they’re still there,” she said.

High winds knocked trees on to several houses in Tallahassee, injuring residents inside, fire rescue spokesman Mike Bellamy said. He said an unknown number were taken to area hospitals with injuries that weren’t thought to be life threatening.

Mr Bellamy said his agency responded to more than 300 calls overnight. Mayor Andrew Gillum estimated as many as 100,000 area residents were without electricity Friday morning.

The last hurricane to strike Florida was Wilma, a powerful Category 3 storm that arrived on October 24, 2005. It swept across the Everglades and struck heavily populated south Florida, causing five deaths in the state and an estimated $23bn in damage.

Mr Scott had declared an emergency in 51 counties. He said 6,000 National Guardsmen were poised to mobilise for the storm’s aftermath. The governors of Georgia and North Carolina also declared states of emergency.

Associated Press and Reuters