Hurricane Debby has made landfall on the Florida coast, inundating streets, killing multiple people and washing up kilos of cocaine onto beaches.
A good Samaritan reported 25 packages of the drug washed up on the Florida Keys’ coast, according to US border control.
Samuel Briggs, acting chief patrol agent, said: ‘A good Samaritan discovered the drugs & contacted authorities. U.S. Border Patrol seized the drugs, which have a street value of over $1 million dollars.’
It comes just months after the US Coast Guard seized over $63million worth of cocaine during a shootout at sea.
Storm Debby came ashore in Steinhatchee on the Big Bend Coast at 7am on Monday as a Category 1 hurricane with winds reaching 80mph, according to the National Hurricane Center.
A 13-year-old boy was ‘crushed inside a home’ by a fallen tree in Fanning Springs around 8am, according to the Levy County Sheriff’s Office.
His mobile home was roughly 35 miles east of where Debby made landfall as the fourth storm system of the Atlantic hurricane season.
Around 2.30am on Monday, a 64-year-old Mississippi man driving an 18-wheeler lorry lost control and died as the semitruck struck a concrete barrier wall, said the Florida Highway Patrol.
Overnight, two people including a 12-year-old boy and a 38-year-old woman died in a single-vehicle crash on US 19 in Dixie County as the car lost control with ‘inclement weather and wet roadway’ ahead of Debby, stated highway patrol.
Debby is forecast to move through northern Florida slowly, with rainfall totals estimated at 10 to 20 inches.
Major flooding is projected in three areas of the Santa Fe River and the Suwannee River in northern Florida, per the National Water Prediction Service.
The storm is then predicted to bring ‘potentially historic heavy rainfall’ to the Georgia and South Carolina coasts. Some areas including the South Carolinian port city of Charleston could see up to 30 inches of rain this weekend, said the hurricane center’s director Michael Brennan.
Savannah, Georgia, is under a curfew from 10pm Monday to 6am Tuesday.
‘This is a once-in-a-thousand-year potential rainfall event,’ said Savannah City Manager Jay Melder.
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