Slow-moving Hurricane Sally dumped rain on the western Florida Panhandle Wednesday, causing devastating flooding and in some cases washing out parts of bridges. Sally was downgraded to a tropical storm by Wednesday afternoon.
As of 5 p.m., Governor Ron DeSantis said there hadn’t been any deaths reported in the state.
“So Santa Rosa identified two fatalities, but they don’t think it was caused by the storm, we think these were natural fatalities that happened to be discovered … So we don’t have, at this moment, any credible report that the storm has caused a loss of life,” DeSantis told press during a media briefing at the state Emergency Operations Center.
With further flooding possible in the coming days, DeSantis says, the need could arise for people to evacuate certain areas. He’s asking residents of areas with a heightened flood risk to remain vigilant.
Escambia and Santa Rosa counties, the two farthest west in the state, have experienced the heaviest power outages caused by the storm.
