By Breitbart News Network | Created at 2026-10-10 14:41:48 | Updated at 2026-10-10 15:50:03
2 hours ago
The first hurricane in two years to make landfall on U.S. soil hit the Florida Panhandle Friday night with over 100 mile an hour winds as Isaias downed trees, damaged buildings, and cut power to nearly a half million residents.
With uncanny timing, the Category 2 storm slammed into the coast near Deston, Florida at 8:30 p.m. (CT), exactly two years to the day and the same clock time of hurricane Milton’s landfall near Sarasota two years earlier at 8:30 p.m. (ET), according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) data.
After hitting the cost, it rapidly weakened over Alabama and has transitioned into a post-tropical cyclone, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) reported Saturday at 4 a.m. (CT) in its final advisory on the storm.
“The cyclone should move northward and north-northeastward this weekend and gradually weaken as it moves across Tennessee and Ohio Valleys,” the advisory concluded.
Reports of the aftermath have been slow to come in Saturday morning with no word yet of the damage that may have been caused by an expected six-to-nine-foot storm surge or whether it even occurred.
However, as the storm hit the coast it provided plenty of visuals on social media from storm chasers and citizen videographers.
One dramatic video shows the roof of the Relax and Rest Inn in Pensacola.
Another by a resident shows how quickly the storm went from rough seas to raging winds and damage in Fort Hamilton Beach.
Seemingly fearless hurricane and tornado chaser Reed Timmer, who also has a doctorate in meteorology, posted his dramatic report in the heart of the maelstrom as he was lashed with waves and wind on the coast.
The storm also gave network correspondents the opportunity to demonstrate their weather mettle, with some like Fox Weather’s Robert Ray seemingly determined to report in the worst possible conditions while taking the opportunity to instruct viewers how to stand in a hurricane-driven wind.
On Friday evening in Florida, Lt. Gov. Jay Collins (R) predicted the aftermath would be extensive.
“This thing hit like a freight train. It was fast. It came in like a Mike Tyson punch,” Collins told Fox News. “It’s real, I’m sure there is going to be real damage.”
Collins said some 900,000 people had heeded official warnings and vacated the hurricane’s path.
However, the New York Post reported that “preliminary reports didn’t show any catastrophic damage to the Sunshine State.”
The lieutenant governor was cautiously optimistic about initial damage reporting.
“The real extent of the damage as this thing crested and it hit shore, I think you’ll start to see good feedback coming through,” he said. “We’re not hearing anything dire at this moment, God willing that’s how it stays.”
About 429,773 Floridians were without power as of 7 a.m. Saturday, according to tracker PowerOutage.US.
Wind speeds during the storm were tracked as high as 118 mph in the Panhandle, according to Fox Weather.
Reduced to a post-tropical storm, wind gusts are running around 30 mph this morning in the area stretching from Chattanooga, Tennessee through Gainesville, Georgia and across into Greenville, South Carolina, the outlet also reported.
The NHC predicted the Atlantic basin will remain calm for the rest of the week, according to the outlet.
Breitbart contributor Lowell Cauffiel is the best-selling author of the Los Angeles crime novel Below the Line and nine other crime novels and nonfiction titles. See lowellcauffiel.com for more.
