Atlanta, Georgia: Around six million people have been ordered to evacuate their homes in Florida and Georgia as Hurricane Irma arrives. The storm has taken category 5 and is leading to the largest evacuation to take place in the US history.
Imran has so far taken 12 lives and several have gone homeless.
The hurricane on Saturday had first battered coast of Flordia on Saturday as forecasters predicted the storm would increase in ferocity. The latest forecast predicted US landfall on Sunday southwest of the Miami metropolitan area, home to some 6 million people, before moving up the state’s Gulf Coast, reports DW.
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Over a quarter of the population in Florida have been ordered to evacuate and another 540,000 people were told to leave the Georgia coast. The authorities have opened hundreds of shelters for those who have decided not to leave.
“We are running out of time. If you are in an evacuation zone, you need to go now. This is a catastrophic storm like our state has never seen,” Florida Governor Rick Scott told reporters.
“If you are planning to leave then do not leave tonight, you will have to ride out this extremely dangerous storm at your own risk,” Scott said.
Irma is the largest Atlantic hurricane on record and is expected to cover the whole state of Florida coast-to-coast. Forecasters have predicted winds of 260 kilometers (160 miles) per hour a storm surge of 6 to 12 feet (1.8 – 3.6 meters) above ground level along Florida’s southwest coast and in the Florida Keys.