Overall death figure rises to 38; tropical storm heads out of Florida

Downgraded from a hurricane to a tropical storm, Irma flooded several northern Florida cities with heavy rain and high storm surge on Monday as it headed out of the State after cutting power to millions and ripping roofs off homes.

The Cuban government reported on Monday that 10 people had been killed after Irma battered the island’s north coast with ferocious winds and 36-foot (11-m) waves over the weekend. This raised the overall death toll from Irma’s powerful rampage through the Caribbean to 38.

Landfall in Florida

Irma, once ranked as one of the most powerful hurricanes recorded in the Atlantic, hit a wide swath of Florida over the past day, first making landfall on the Florida Keys archipelago and then coming ashore south of Naples and heading up the west coast.

Irma, now a tropical storm with sustained winds of up to 70 miles per hour (110 km per hour), was located about 35 miles (56 km) west of Gainesville and headed up the Gulf Coast, the National Hurricane Center said at 8 a.m. ET (1200 GMT).

The sheriff’s office in Jacksonville, on Florida’s northeast coast, reported that it was making a rescue from waist-deep water on Monday morning and urged people to stay off unsafe roads. The National Weather Service issued a flash flood warning for the city, with nearby St. Augustine also seeing flooding. Florida’s largest city, Miami, was spared the brunt of the storm but was still battered. Utility crews were already on the streets there clearing downed trees and utility lines.

Irma seriously damaged Cuba’s already dilapidated sugar industry and flooded and flattened an extensive area of sugar cane, state-run media reported on Monday.

Some 300,000 hectares (7,40,000 acres) of cane were affected to different degrees, Liobel Perez, spokesman for AZCUBA, the state sugar monopoly, was quoted as stating.

He said 40% of the country’s mills were also damaged, as were warehouses and other parts of the industry’s infrastructure.