TAMPA, Fla. — As the city of Tampa begins the long recovery process after Hurricane Milton, Mayor Jane Castor said the first priority was getting electricity up and running and moving gasoline back into the city.
Mayor Jane Castor:
- Solid waste is already out and picking up, starting with household debris on Davis Islands and south Tampa from Helene. They started at 6 a.m. from Columbus north clearing yard waste
- South Tampa flooding
- Two areas were flooded because of pump and generator failures
- South of Fowler between 23rd and 30th along with Forest Hills
- The mayor said there were pumps moving 30,000 gallons a minute trying to get the floodwaters out
- Additionally, some areas that typically don't flood did this time because of the back-to-back storms
- North Boulevard and Curiosity Creek along with 109th North and Ashley
- 3 pumps are currently working at Curiosity Creek and the city said the area should start seeing improvement by the end of the day on Friday
- PortTampa
- Location provides gasoline to 17 counties, and while there's plenty of gas there, the locations are surrounded by rainwater and inaccessible.
- Pumps are being used to clear out the water
- Goal is to have 3 providers out of port by the end of Friday
- Tampa officials said it's still best to conserve fuel for now, but that the focus will be to get gas to the areas hit by Milton as soon as possible
- Castor said she has been in contact with FEMA about support, especially getting power back online
Tampa officials update city on Hurricane Milton recovery efforts
Mary Lou Carn of TECO:
- TECO said the large number of outages is causing a longer restoration time than the company has experienced with previous storms
- Nearly 600,000 outages have been reported thus far, or roughly 70% of customers
- TECO said they have the largest deployment of workers in the company's history
- More than 6,000 utility workers from as far away as Canada are working on the outages
- Carn said TECO will have a timeline on when the power will be back on later Friday evening
Tampa Police Chief Lee Bercaw:
- 65% of traffic lights are out, but a majority have officers at the intersections
- Officers are at many of the intersections with traffic lights that are out
- They remind drivers to slow down and treat the intersection as a four-way stop.
- Chief Bercaw said every officer is still on duty working around the clock to help the city
Tampa Fire Chief Barbara Tripp:
- Chief Tripp said everyone should focus on safety first as they start to access areas and homes
- Remember to shut off your breaker if you have no power or water as it could cause a fire
- If you're leaving, fire officials said to shut the breaker off as well
A South Tampa man turned to Susan Solves It after he said ADT told him he had to keep paying for a security system at his Hurricane Helene-damaged home, even though the system was so new that he never had a day of service.
ADT tells man to keep paying for security at hurricane destroyed home
