On Florida's west coast, a race to clear Helene storm debris before Hurricane Milton

Less than two weeks after Hurricane Helene pushed the Gulf of Mexico into tens of thousands of living rooms along Florida’s west coast, a new storm is threatening a repeat. But this time, streets and yards and parks are filled with all of the detritus scraped from those flooded homes — fridges, cabinets, bookcases, drywall and lamps.

All of those belongings could become projectiles in the expected Category 3 winds of Hurricane Milton, which is likely to cross the state sometime Wednesday. The state and local governments are racing to clean up as much as they can before the winds start picking up.

“What’s going to happen with that debris? It’s going to increase the damage dramatically,” Gov. Ron DeSantis said in a Sunday morning press conference. “This is all hands on deck to get that debris where it needs to be.”

DeSantis said that local governments have been doing a good job cleaning up all the junk in the streets, but with a new storm just 72 hours away, he urged them to pick up the pace. He also assigned several state agencies to focus all their resources on helping cleanup and mandated that all landfills and debris management sites be open 24/7.

“Do not take your foot off the gas on this debris mission. You have unprecedented support to help you,” he told local governments. “With the resources that we’re marshaling, that is going to make a difference.”

The directive already led to unusual sights, like state employees cutting the lock on a Pinellas County dump on Saturday evening to allow them to continue dumping debris at all hours.

The dump stopped accepting storm debris earlier in the week due to overcrowding concerns and issues with debris contractors hauling in trash that wasn’t actually from Pinellas County, which would have complicated local efforts to get FEMA refunds, WFLA Tampa reported.

At the press conference, DeSantis defended the action as “totally appropriate.”

“It was locked and no one was there manning it so they basically opened it and they did the debris,” he said. “We’ve got to redouble the efforts there. Those debris missions need to be round the clock.”

In hard-hit Manatee County, Public Safety Director Jodie Fiske urged residents to not put out any additional trash ahead of Milton.

“We’ve been working closely with the State of Florida to add additional debris haulers and will be assisting with debris removal in anticipation of Milton’s arrival,” Fiske said. “Any debris that’s left on the roadside as Milton comes through can clog drains or can become a projectile during high winds.”

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(Bradenton Herald Staff Writer Ryan Ballogg contributed to this article.)

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