On Thursday night, Hurricane Helene, classified as a Category 4 with winds of up to 160 mph, struck the North Florida coast, marking the third hurricane to hit the rural and lightly populated Taylor County within the past 13 months.

“It’s an unbelievable situation,” remarked Joy Towles Ezell, a lifelong resident of Taylor County, now living in Athena, Taylor County. She noted that these hurricanes consistently approach the coast in the same way and land at the identical location.

Hurricane Helene wreaked havoc on coastal communities such as Dekle Beach, Keaton Beach, and Steinhatchee, plunging the area into darkness and despair.

The paths of the hurricanes – Helene, Idalia in August 2023, and Debby in August 2024 – were only about 23 miles apart, based on coordinates from the National Hurricane Center. However, it is not the calm center of the storm, or the eye, that leads to the substantial damage reports that surfaced on Friday.

The most destructive forces of a hurricane – including the strongest winds, lowest atmospheric pressure, and highest storm surge – are situated to the right, within the eyewall, surrounding the calm center.

Residents in the area are fed up with storms. Recently, they have faced more hurricanes than the rest of Florida’s extensive coastline combined.

Devastating winds, waves, and rain have struck Taylor County and a strip of coast extending into Dixie and Levy counties. With a population of under 22,000 and a median household income of $46,000, Taylor County has suffered the brunt of these storms.

Ezell evacuated during both Idalia and Helene, heading north with friends to another friend’s place in Tallahassee, which is approximately 75 miles away from where Helene inflicted the most damage.

Tallahassee had prepared for a recovery initiative involving 2,000 personnel, including assistance crews from nine states and contracted laborers.

As she relocated, she continuously received updates regarding the damage to her community.

“My home is still intact, which is surprising,” she expressed. “It’s quite an old building.” However, she learned that her roof sustained damage, along with both her hay and horse barns.

Her neighbor faced greater destruction, as a new workshop that had been built just two years prior, partly from concrete blocks, “has vanished.”

“Steinhatchee is essentially ruined,” she recounted, noting the devastation she was hearing. “Roy’s restaurant is no longer there.”

In Keaton Beach, the location where Idalia landed, Ezell received reports that “nearly all the homes have been destroyed.” She also learned that Dekle Beach, the area closest to the hurricane’s center, “has been obliterated.”

Helene marks the first Category 4 hurricane recorded to strike this coastal region where Florida bends around the northeastern edge of the Gulf of Mexico.

“It’s the worst we’ve experienced,” Ezell commented. She believed the destruction is “even greater than the unprecedented ‘storm of the century’ in 1993, a reference point many longtime Floridians use to gauge the severity of other storms.

A tremendous storm surge

Helene’s anticipated storm surge peaked at 15 to 20 feet, hitting swiftly and violently. The tide gauge at the Steinhatchee River reported a staggering 11.4 feet rise in only about 75 minutes, but subsequently ceased reporting, according to NOAA data.

Storm surge represents a massive wall of water crashing against structures, exerting 1,700 pounds of force per cubic yard. The northern Gulf Coast is particularly vulnerable to such events. Idalia also caused a significant but less intense storm surge in this area.

Further south, Cedar Key experienced a storm surge that exceeded 8 feet according to a NOAA gauge, surpassing the previous record set by Hurricane Idalia the previous year.

Signs of the disaster were visible as early as Thursday night. The National Weather Service in Tallahassee released images captured by a storm chaser showing several mobile homes displaced from their bases and grouped together in Steinhatchee.

Before dawn on Friday, residents began to come out to assess the damage and report to those who had evacuated. “The winds are harsh, accompanied by heavy rain,” said Mark Southerland, a 63-year-old life-long resident of Perry in Taylor County. “I just checked my place and it seems I’m fortunate to have no damage.”

Some counties narrowly avoided disaster, but power outages affect many

Hurricane Helene cut off electricity to over a million accounts across Florida, according to a YSL News power outage tracker. Almost all residents in Hamilton, Madison, Suwannee, and Taylor counties found themselves without power.

In Tallahassee, where Ezell and her friends took refuge, Leon County Administrator Vince Long reported in the early hours that they had received a few reports of trees down on structures but no widespread damage had been noted.

Damage was reported to several buildings. Even though emergency calls were fewer than anticipated, more reports of damage were expected to come in as the day went on.

“We were kind of in the line of fire for a long time as the storm made its way into the Gulf and edged closer to us,” said Long. “Even minor shifts in the storm’s path can greatly alter its impact here.”

Wakulla County, which is located south of Tallahassee and west of Taylor County, was also alerted about a potential landfall. Fortunately, it narrowly avoided being directly hit, and the anticipated storm surge “didn’t really happen based on the storm’s actual course,” noted Capt. Jeffrey Yarbrough. “Our thoughts are with Taylor County, which is facing this challenge once again.”

What’s Causing Taylor County’s Frequent Storm Hits?

Ezell, like many others, is puzzled by this situation.

“I can’t understand what keeps bringing these storms here,” she said. “It’s quite strange to me.”

“It’s pretty remarkable,” stated Jasmine Montgomery, a meteorologist from NWS Tallahassee. “There’s no clear explanation. These storms generally form in the Caribbean, move through the Gulf of Mexico, and continue until they makes landfall. The Gulf Coast is particularly vulnerable to hurricanes.”

Much of this phenomenon can be attributed to chance, according to Michael Mann, a climate scientist and director of the Center for Science, Sustainability & the Media at the University of Pennsylvania.

What causes a small part of a massive coastline to face repeated storms? Why are strong hurricanes striking areas that haven’t experienced such intense tropical systems since record-keeping began in the 1850s?

Large atmospheric patterns influence hurricane trajectories, including powerful jet streams that circulate globally, affecting the movement of weather fronts and troughs above us.

“It’s likely that the current behavior of the jet stream is favoring these storm paths,” Mann said. He also indicated that this hurricane season’s emerging La Niña in the Pacific could play a role.

“Both climate change and El Niño influence the jet stream’s variability, which affects large-scale airflow and storm paths,” Mann explained.

The intensity of these storms raises another issue, as YSL News highlighted while millions braced for Helene’s arrival. The destructive capabilities of hurricanes are partly fueled by the warm water they encounter. This year, sea surface temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico have reached record highs.

“The extreme intensity of these storms upon landfall, due to their rapid growth in the Gulf of Mexico, is likely exacerbated by climate change,” remarked Jim Kossin, an atmospheric scientist and science advisor at the nonprofit First Street Foundation. “The excessive warmth in the Gulf is significant, and climate change has played a role in that.”

Uncertain Recovery Ahead

Long-term residents are left wondering about the future of Taylor County’s recovery.

Before the storm, Janalea England, owner of Steinhatchee Fish Company in the county’s southern part, expressed concern after speaking with fellow business owners who questioned if they could reopen if Helene caused enough damage. The community was just starting to recover from Idalia, she pointed out.

Ezell expressed that Taylor County “is going to face devastation.”

“It’s going to be a huge setback,” she said. “How many times can a person rebuild? How often can you start over?”

(This story was revised to fix a misspelling/typo.)