The anniversary of Hurricane Helene making landfall is Sept. 26. The eye of the storm did not make a direct hit on the Tampa Bay region. Still, it did have a devastating impact on many Floridians.
"Don't just take the intensity of the storm and be like, 'OK, it's just a tropical storm. I'm going to be fine,' " Florida Public Radio Emergency Network (FPREN) Senior Meteorologist Megan Borowski said.
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Take Helene for example. It was an extratropical cyclone when it reached the Carolinas and then dumped tremendous amounts of rainfall.
"We've seen many, many, many times tropical storms dump feet worth of rainfall over a particular area," Borowski said.
"So don't think that if a storm is a quote, unquote, 'a weak storm,' that you might not have catastrophic impacts. ... Take each storm seriously, because each storm is different."
Hurricane season runs June 1 through Nov. 30
WUSF News Director Mary Shedden spoke with Borowski about the 2025 season and the impacts still being felt from the 2024 season, especially from Hurricanes Debby, Helene, and Milton.
"We're having a conversation about the work we do," Shedden said. "But also some of the things that you can think about as this year is underway."
In the conversation below, Shedden and Borowski discuss how coverage changes from 10 days prior to the storm to after it has passed.
"This year, we're looking at anywhere from six to 10 hurricanes ... three to five of which actually could be major hurricanes," Borowski said.
Borowski shares how FPREN tracks storms. She said it's important people do not judge a storm based on its classification from the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale.
The conversation was presented by the Community Foundation Tampa Bay at the Firehouse Cultural Center in Ruskin.
Read the full transcript here.
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