In Florida, a major clean-up operation is underway as residents return after the US state was hit by the deadly Hurricane Milton.
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00:00The big return is in full swing now. Floridians from the Tampa Bay area who had evacuated just
00:05a few days ago are rushing back, eager to learn what Hurricane Milton did to their homes and properties.
00:13And this is what most of them find. Toppled trees, downed power lines, partially destroyed buildings,
00:19plenty of homes, entire neighborhoods flooded, others impassable for now, with homes crushed
00:25by trees that Hurricane Milton's Category 3 winds catapulted into their houses. East Tampa,
00:32old neighborhoods from the 50s and 60s, hard-working regular people live here,
00:37the so-called average Joes. This is Nolan Monroe and his two sons.
00:43I ain't never seen nothing this bad. This bad? Bad, yes, bad. Worst I've ever seen in 40 years.
00:50Nolan sends us down the street to the bottom of his neighborhood. Houses are close to the
00:55river there. They had it even worse, he adds, as we leave. We meet Heather. She just arrived back
01:00at her house after evacuating a couple of days before Milton made landfall. She invites us into
01:05her home. It suffered significant flood damage, not from Milton, but from the storm that hit here
01:11two weeks earlier, Hurricane Helene. And everything is a goner, yeah? Yes. You're saying? Yes. And my coverage
01:19was not good for any of my contents in the house that had to be thrown out. A lot of stuff has
01:23already been thrown out. Yeah, of course, yes, yes. Across from her, a property owned by an elderly couple,
01:29a total loss, Heather thinks. But local, state or federal officials, nor any insurance representatives
01:34have shown up yet to confirm that. We leave for the East Tampa River Grove neighborhood. It got
01:41hit badly by Hurricane Milton. A similar picture, crushed houses and cars. The whole neighborhood is
01:46without power since Wednesday. Everybody here is waiting for anybody to show up and help, at least
01:51with restoring power as soon as possible. I have my insulin in here. I'm trying to keep it cool.
01:59I'm praying and I'm hopeful. I'm hoping that they will come because this is going to become
02:06extremely difficult to maneuver with my health issues. As we leave here, the first utilities
02:15truck of the local power company arrives in the neighborhood. However, Antoine Richards with the
02:20Institute for Diversity and Inclusion and Emergency Management tells us that even when it
02:25comes to emergency response after disaster strikes, not all neighborhoods are equal. In the immediate
02:31aftermath of Milton, like how we're meeting today, everybody is trying to get assistance. Everybody's
02:36trees are down. Power, you know, people are working. But give it a few more days and then you'll start
02:41to see these neighborhoods have power and these neighborhoods don't. People are still hungry here.
02:47People aren't hungry there. With at least more than 1.5 million people in Florida still without
02:52power, most face equal challenges. What unites all of them is their hope
02:56for help and assistance by authorities delivered quickly and dispersed equally.