Environment

In what spokesman Michael Hernandez describes as "the biggest evacuation in history," Miami-Dade has expanded its mandatory evacuations orders to Zone C, forcing over 650,000 to leave Florida in a "traffic nightmare" as Cat-5 Hurricane Irma bears down.

An earlier order included just Miami Beach, other low-lying and barrier island areas and all mobile-home residents, but as the storm grew in intensity and the cone of uncertainty narrowed, County Mayor Carlos Gimenez issued the order this afternoon expanded to Zone C.

As Hurricane Irma looks to be hurdling straight for a direct hit on Southern Florida, meteorologists from Weather Underground are warning that the most devastating impacts of the storm could be felt much further north in towns along the coast of Georgia and South Carolina where the storm surge could be a catastrophic 20-28 feet high in certain areas.  To put that in perspective, Hurricane Katrina in 2005 set a record for the largest storm surge ever recorded along the U.S. coast at 27.8 feet.

After laying waste to the Northern Caribbean and leaving most of bankrupt Puerto Rico without power - perhaps for months - Hurricane Irma, still a category five storm, is expected to make landfall near Miami this weekend. Florida Gov. Rick Scott has already declared a state of emergency, and last night more than 100,000 Miami-Dade residents in Miami Beach and low-lying mainland areas were instructed to leave their homes by Miami Mayor Carlos Gimenez, who issued his first evacuation order.

After laying waste to much of the Leeward Islands and leaving most of Puerto Rico without power, Hurricane Irma is continuing its destructive march through the Caribbean which is expected to culminate with landfall in Miami sometime this weekend.

As we noted yesterday, Irma's catastrophic 185+ mph winds left 90% of the dwellings on the island of Barbuda completely leveled, according to Prime Minister Gaston Browne.

Authored by Michael Snyder via The American Dream blog,