Along Florida’s Gulf Coast, close to Tallahassee in Keaton Beach, Hurricane Idalia made landfall as a strong Category 3 hurricane on Wednesday morning.
At 7:45 am on Wednesday, Hurricane Idalia made landfall on Florida’s Gulf Coast as a Category 3 hurricane with 125 mph winds. The storm was not a full circle but it was close to 350 miles across, almost the same size as Colorado which is 380 miles across.
A hurricane-force wind field, roughly the size of New Jersey (7,354 square miles), encompassed 7,850 square miles about 30 minutes after Hurricane Idalia made landfall near Keaton Beach in Florida’s Big Bend coastal region.
The Big Bend is a very wooded and rural region where the state’s peninsula and panhandle meet.
Tallahassee, the state’s capital, is located roughly 65 miles north of where Hurricane Idalia’s eye landfall.
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Hurricane Idalia’s size when it made landfall
The Hurricane Idalia‘s core was 25 miles north of Valdosta, Georgia, as of noon on Wednesday. It was moving 20 mph north-northeast and had sustained winds of up to 85 mph.
State of emergency has been announced by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis in 49 counties that span the state’s northern half from the Gulf Coast to the Atlantic Coast.
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