Hurricane Irma hits lower Florida Keys

Hurricane Irma’s eyewall slammed into the lower Florida Keys Sunday, lashing the island chain with fearsome wind gusts, the US National Hurricane Centre said. The eye of the Category 4 storm was 24km southeast of Key West as of 1100 GMT, bringing maximum sustained winds of 130mph and threatening dangerous storm surges. “This is an extremely dangerous and life-threatening situation!” the National Weather Service in Key West had warned, urging those who had not heeded dire warnings to evacuate to take shelter “now to protect your life!” The hurricane was moving eight miles per hour northwest, with Florida’s west coast cities of Naples, Fort Myers and the densely populated peninsulas of Tampa Bay in its crosshairs. Irma was upgraded to a Category 4 storm hours earlier as more than six million Floridians had been ordered to evacuate their homes ahead of the monster storm. For those people still at home, it was too late to escape the wrath of what could be the worst hurricane in storm-prone Florida. In Key West, police had opened a “shelter of last resort” for those who had ignored mandatory evacuation orders. More than 430,000 homes and businesses were without power across the state, mainly in southern Florida. Irma smacked the Keys 57 years to the day that Hurricane Donna hit the same area in 1960, destroying nearly 75%of the island chain’s buildings.Disaster declarationFlorida Governor Rick Scott said on Sunday he has requested a major disaster declaration from President Donald Trump and warned that devastating storm surges will hit the western coast of Florida as Hurricane Irma churns northward. “There is a serious threat of significant storm surge flooding along the entire west coast of Florida and 15 feet of impact above ground level in southwest Florida,” he said at a news conference.