By Yan Zhuang

FLORIDA -Residents along Florida’s Gulf Coast were fleeing in droves Tuesday (8) before Hurricane Milton’s predicted landfall, in what officials said was likely to be the biggest evacuation the state has seen since Hurricane Irma struck in 2017. Evacuees have faced hours-long traffic jams on highways and gas stations running out of fuel.

Nine counties in Florida, including some inland ones, have ordered mandatory evacuations for Milton, the strongest Gulf storm since 2005. Officials were preparing for “the largest evacuation that we have seen, most likely, since 2017’s Hurricane Irma,” Kevin Guthrie, the executive director of Florida’s Division of Emergency Management said in a news conference Sunday (6).

That storm prompted the largest hurricane evacuation in the state’s history, with about 6.5 million people fleeing their homes.

Officials have warned residents in evacuation zones to leave as early as possible to avoid traffic jams. “This will be one of the largest evacuations along our state’s west coast. If you wait, you will get stuck in traffic,” the government of Sarasota County, which issued evacuation orders, said Monday (7) on social media.

But those who fled north Monday were already reporting heavy traffic, gas stations that had run out of fuel and trips taking several hours longer than usual.

Jacqueline Camenisch, 62, from Kentucky, cut short her family vacation in Orlando and drove north Monday evening with her children and grandchildren to Panama City. She had initially wanted to evacuate the family to Gainesville, about 100 miles north, she said but found that all accommodation was completely booked.

Speaking from her car at about 2:30 a.m. Tuesday, Camenisch said the drive, which would usually take less than six hours, had already taken her 7 1/2 hours, with another hour or so to go.

“I had never seen the amount of traffic,” she said, adding that Interstate 75, which runs along Florida’s west coast and through the north-central part of the state, “was horrible,” packed bumper to bumper and moving slowly.

In Hillsborough County, where mandatory evacuation orders were issued, the sheriff’s office warned on social media of extended road delays on sections of I-75 and Interstate 275. The officials shared a video of traffic on the northbound lane of I-75 slowing to a crawl for several miles.

On social media, drivers also reported heavy traffic on Interstate 4 and Interstate 95. To help alleviate traffic jams, the Florida Department of Transportation announced Monday that it had opened up the shoulder lanes on some highways to allow more cars to leave. Camenisch added that she had struggled to find fuel at gas stations and that rest stops were packed. When she eventually did find a gas station with fuel, there were maybe six or seven people waiting for each pump, she said.

Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida said in a Monday news conference that gas stations that had run out of fuel would be resupplied and that there was no fuel shortage. “You may be in line, but if your gas station runs out, there will be more fuel on the way,” he said.

Although Orlando, where Camenisch had been staying, was not under an evacuation order, she said that after seeing the destruction of Hurricane Helene, she did not want to take a risk. “I learned from Asheville that you take it seriously,” she said. “I did not want to be put in that situation with my grandkids.”

-New York Times