Isaias Leaves Four Dead After Striking Florida as Category 2 Hurricane
publishers 128articles 217first reported 7 Oct, 10:15 UTCdeveloping since 7 Oct · 12 editions
Isaias left at least four people dead as it moved north across the southern United States after making landfall near Destin, Florida, as a Category 2 hurricane Friday evening.
The storm came ashore around 9:30 p.m. EDT with sustained winds of 105 mph, after weakening from a peak of 120 mph, according to Yale Climate Connections. It was the first Atlantic hurricane of the 2026 season.
Officials reported two deaths in Florida and two in Alabama, Deutsche Welle and France 24 said. The storm tore roofs from buildings, toppled trees and caused widespread power failures. More than 500,000 customers in Florida and Alabama remained without electricity Saturday, according to PowerOutage.com, while an earlier count cited by Yale Climate Connections put outages across Florida, Alabama and Georgia above 900,000.
Florida, Alabama and Georgia declared states of emergency, and about 5,000 Florida National Guard personnel were activated to assist affected communities.
Isaias weakened rapidly into a post-tropical cyclone as it crossed Tennessee and Kentucky toward West Virginia. The National Hurricane Center warned of flash and urban flooding, possible landslides in the southern Appalachians, further damaging wind gusts and power outages. Tornadoes were also possible across eastern Georgia and the Carolinas, while dangerous surf and rip currents were expected along parts of the Gulf Coast.
Climate Central scientist Daniel Gilford said unusually warm Gulf waters strengthened Isaias, estimating that climate change increased its winds by about 7 mph.
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Written from 8 articles, 4 with the publisher's own text; 8 independent newsrooms once syndicated copies count as one; this version written 96 h after the record first saw the story; the editor kept it as written.
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- 8, 4 with the article's own text
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- This version written
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