AccuWeather's Ali Reid reported live from deep storm surge flooding hours after Hurricane Milton's landfall.
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00:00Our team coverage continues right now with AccuWeather's Allie Reed. She joins us live from Fort Myers, Florida.
00:06Allie, every storm is different. This one has had a strong punch on the end of its life as the storm moves through many areas.
00:15It looks like a lot of water behind you. How's the storm surge behaving now compared to a few hours ago?
00:22Right, Jeff. I think it's important to note, just as you said, that even after landfall, it can really pack a punch.
00:31And that is what we saw here. It was quiet when the eye was moving through, especially here in the Fort Myers area.
00:39But now, not only are we getting that strong wind, but we're getting the rain now, too.
00:44That is something that we haven't really seen a whole lot of here in the Fort Myers area.
00:48But you mentioned the flooding behind me here. It is very dark, so it is going to be difficult to see.
00:54But if you take a look here, what is important to note is that anywhere really in the Fort Myers downtown area is going to look a lot like this.
01:03Flooding nearly on every single street here. And it has gotten very, very bad.
01:09We've seen it progress over the last few hours, and it's progressively gotten worse.
01:14Let's see. I just want to take a walk for a second here. I'm not going to walk too far from you, Andy. Don't worry.
01:19When you get to about the middle of the street here, it does get up to about your knees.
01:25We are about two and a half, three blocks from the river. That storm surge, though, definitely still coming through.
01:32I believe high tide is going to happen around midnight.
01:36That's going to be something to watch because if it's already up to my knees, even higher in some locations, that's going to be a problem.
01:44Now, as we've been driving throughout the area over the last couple of hours, Fort Myers Beach was inundated.
01:50That was starting back at 6 o'clock this evening.
01:52In fact, our crew had decided that for our own safety, we needed to leave that area.
01:58We did hold our breath as we were driving through the Fort Myers Beach area because we had realized that even within the 20 minutes that we were there,
02:05it got so high up into our car that we really just needed to take a second, get through it and keep on moving.
02:12The problem is, though, that with this storm surge, so much flooding and Fort Myers, as we've been talking about, has just been inundated with past storms.
02:20We've been talking about Hurricane Ian as most recently as Helene, and it's been such an issue here for those folks.
02:27Earlier this morning, that tornado ripped through this area, too, even in areas that didn't have mandatory evacuation zones.
02:35Unfortunately, we're faced with mass destruction, roofs ripping off of homes.
02:40These families then sitting there wondering, what do we do next?
02:44A lot of them saying we were going to hunker down and stay in the storm and then unfortunately had to leave because of this severe damage.
02:52Now again here, really, depending on the street that you're in, some streets have power, others do not.
02:59Jeff, about 20 minutes ago, 30 minutes ago, our hotel does not have power.
03:05This area, though, again, does not have power.
03:08But then you go to the next street and it does.
03:10So it really just depends where you are in the Fort Myers area is what you're going to expect here.
03:15But again, clearly, as you can see, Andy wiping the camera here, the rain making its way through.
03:21And this is what we've been saying, that Milton, it made landfall.
03:26Do not underestimate what Milton can do even after the eye wall has moved through.
03:32Really just packing a punch here.
03:34And I just saw a power surge that way, too.
03:36That's the other thing.
03:37The light, the sky has just been lit up blue, teal blue at times when we've seen these power surges.
03:43And this area has lost even more power in the last few seconds here that we've been live.
03:48All right, Jeff, we're going to send it back to you in studio.
03:51The rain coming down much harder than what we've seen over the last few hours here, mixed with that wind now.
03:57And the 11th hour, a hard punch here from Hurricane Milton.
04:01Thank you for your reporting there, Allie Reed in Fort Myers, Florida.