A hurricane hunter with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) who has been flying into Hurricane Milton said he is worried about the devastation the storm will bring to central Florida.
Nick Underwood, who has been collecting data from the eye of the storm all week, told CNN he has been helping his family and neighbors prepare in between flights. Underwood lives in St. Petersburg, one of the places that could be in the cone of Milton.
“I’m scared of what I’ll come home to.”
Underwood said.
Underwood said he has been a hurricane hunter for eight years. While every hurricane he flies through is different, he said Milton is a “powerful storm.”
“People who decided not to evacuate, now is the time to shelter in place. Now is the time to be as safe as you can,” he said.
The job of hurricane hunters are essential. While they are flying through a storm, they are collecting atmospheric and oceanographic data that feeds the National Hurricane Center’s forecasts and models, he said. This data is what the NHC uses to issue watches and warnings to people living in those areas.
“The better job we can do in the air, the most accurate those predictions are going to be and the earlier we can warn people that the storm’s coming their way,” Underwood said.
