After two landfalls and a week of rain, Tropical Storm Eta is finally done with Florida
Tropical Storm Eta’s winding path through Florida finally ended Thursday afternoon as the storm re-entered the Atlantic Ocean north of Jacksonville.
The storm made landfall twice in the Sunshine State this week, knocking out power for tens of thousands and drenching nearly the entire state with rain. Pockets of South Florida, where Eta dumped up to 16 inches of rain in some spots, still had standing water on Thursday due to Eta’s seemingly never-ending rain clouds.
In the Tampa Bay area, thousands are still without power and floodwaters still soaked low-lying parts of the region, the Tampa Bay Times reported.
The National Hurricane Center said the storm is expected to dissipate in the next few days as it enters the cooler waters of the northeast.
Eta was born just south of Hispaniola on October 31 and quickly strengthened into a Category 4 hurricane that devastated Central America. Nearly two weeks after Eta made landfall in Nicaragua, the death toll has risen to nearly 150 people. Eta’s intense rainfall set off devastating mudslides that wiped out entire villages and left thousands stranded on their roofs without food or water as they await rescue, Reuters reported.
From there, Eta curved north through Honduras and back out into the Caribbean as a tropical depression. It picked up steam and crossed Cuba and the Caribbean as a tropical storm, killing at least two in Jamaica and causing “severe” damage.
The first of Eta’s soaking rains reached South Florida on Saturday as the storm was still crossing Cuba, and moisture associated with the storm continued to drop more rain on the region Thursday.
Eta made landfall on Matecumbe Key Sunday night around 11 p.m., but the Keys were largely spared its winds and rain, which were clustered to the northeast of the storm’s center.
Southern Broward County and northern Miami-Dade caught the brunt of Eta’s rain, which overwhelmed the district’s flood control systems and left deep puddles in suburban neighborhoods that rarely flood.
By Tuesday, the steering currents that forced Eta into such a sharp left turn over the Keys died down, freezing the storm in place just north of western Cuba for most of the day.
Eta made its third curve in its sinuous path Tuesday, back toward Florida. It raked the storm’s west coast, blanketing the region with flood watches, tropical storm warnings and even — briefly — a hurricane watch.
It’s second landfall, at 4 a.m. Thursday, was near Cedar Key.
This story was originally published November 12, 2020 at 5:27 PM.
