Important Takeaways:

• With residents preparing for whatever Milton brings, Tampa Mayor Jane Castor sat down with CNN on Monday to discuss what’s at risk for residents who don’t heed evacuation orders.
• As the Gulf Coast prepares for yet another strong hurricane, Tampa Bay officials are urging residents to take evacuation orders seriously, especially if they live anywhere near the coast.
• Hurricane Milton poses a threat to the region that likely no one in the region has ever seen in their lifetimes, as the last time the Tampa area was hit by the eye of a major hurricane was on Oct. 25, 1921. The hurricane had no official name but is known locally as the Tarpon Springs storm, for the seaside town where it came ashore.
• “The number one message, as it has been for several days now, is that you need to prepare. Do whatever you need to do and then get out of the evacuation zones which now are evacuation zones A and B, and as we all have heard so many times now, you hide from the wind and run from the water and we are talking about, right now, the possibility of a direct hit with 10 to 12-foot tidal surge — put that in perspective, Hurricane Helene, which just left the Tampa Bay area a week ago, there was 6-foot storm surge and that literally devastating to so many in our coastal areas,”
• “Helene was a wake-up call, this is literally catastrophic and I can say without any dramatization whatsoever: If you choose to stay in one of those evacuation areas, you are going to die,” Castor warned.
• She went on to explain that she’s never given that warning before but given the unprecedented circumstances of Milton and the threat of a direct hit to the Tampa Bay area, the warning could save residents’ lives who are on the fence about staying or leaving.

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