Floridians recovering from Hurricane Milton, many of whom were journeying home after fleeing hundreds of miles to escape the storm, spent much of Saturday searching for petrol as a fuel shortage gripped the state.
In St. Petersburg, scores of people lined up at a station that had no petrol, hoping it would arrive soon.
Among them was Daniel Thornton and his nine-year-old daughter Magnolia, who arrived at the station at 7am and were still waiting four hours later.
A road lies broken in Manasota Key, Florida following the passage of Hurricane Milton (Rebecca Blackwell/AP)
“They told me they have gas coming but they don’t know when it’s going to be here,” he said. “I have no choice. I have to sit here all day with her until I get gas.”
Governor Ron DeSantis told reporters on Saturday morning local time that the state opened three fuel distribution sites and planned to open several more.
“Obviously as power gets restored … and the Port of Tampa is open, you’re going to see the fuel flowing. But in the meantime, we want to give people another option,” Mr DeSantis said.
Officials were replenishing area petrol stations with the state’s fuel stockpiles and provided generators to stations that remained without power.
Those who reached home were assessing the damage and beginning the arduous cleaning process.
Some, like Bill O’Connell, a board member at Bahia Vista Gulf in Venice, had thought they were done after the condo association hired companies to gut, treat and dry the units following Hurricane Helene. Milton undid that work and caused additional damage, Mr O’Connell said.
“It reflooded everything that was already flooded, brought all the sand back on our property that we removed,” Mr O’Connell said.
The two hurricanes left a ruinous mess in the fishing village of Cortez, a community of 4,100 along the northern edge of Sarasota Bay. Residents of its modest, single-storey wood and stucco-fronted cottages were working to remove broken furniture and tree limbs, stacking the debris in the street much like they did after Hurricane Helene.
“Everything is shot,” said Mark Praught, a retired street sweeper for Manatee County, who saw four-foot storm surges during Helene. “We’ll replace the electrical and the plumbing and go from there.”
A child’s swing still hangs on a tree, surrounded by debris from homes destroyed by Hurricane Milton (AP/Rebecca Blackwell)
Mr Praught and his wife, Catherine, have lived for 36 years in a low-lying home that now looks like an empty shell.
All the furniture had to be discarded, the walls and the brick and tile floors had to be scrubbed clean of muck, and drywall had to be ripped out.
Catherine Praught said they felt “pure panic” when Hurricane Milton menaced Cortez so soon after Helene, forcing them to pause their cleanup and evacuate. Fortunately, their home was not damaged by the second storm.
“This is where we live,” Catherine Praught said. “We’re just hopeful we get the insurance company to help us.”
Milton killed at least 10 people after it made landfall as a Category 3 storm, tearing across central Florida, flooding barrier islands and spawning deadly tornadoes.
Officials say the toll could have been worse if not for the widespread evacuations.
Overall, more than a thousand people had been rescued in the wake of the storm as of Saturday, Mr DeSantis said.