Meteorologists Are Sharing The Deadliest Mistake People Make Before A Hurricane

On Monday, Hurricane Milton strengthened into a Category 5 storm and continued barreling toward Florida. (Editor's note: As of mid-day Tuesday, Hurricane Milton is designated as a Category 4 hurricane. ) The system will bring life-threatening hazards like storm surges, flooding, and catastrophic winds to the region when it makes landfall midweek.

The hurricane is coming less than two weeks after the state experienced the devastation of Hurricane Helene . But if you’re a Floridian or know someone who is, do not let storm fatigue prevent you or a loved one from taking action this time. This extremely dangerous new storm is set to be a historic event.

“If the storm stays on the current track, it will be the worst storm to impact the Tampa area in over 100 years,” warned the National Weather Service of Tampa Bay, Florida. The National Hurricane Center told HuffPost in a statement that “Milton is the third-fastest rapidly intensifying storm on record in the Atlantic.”

Whether you live in the path of a hurricane right now or could be in that path in the future, you need to learn what weather warnings to take seriously so you can make the best informed decision for yourself and your family.

Take it from the experts who study hurricanes for a living. HuffPost asked meteorologists about the deadliest mistakes people make before a hurricane strikes. Here’s what they said, plus some other errors to avoid.

The biggest mistake? Underestimating the deadly effects of rising water.

Storm surge, or what happens when a hurricane’s strong onshore winds push a sudden rise of tidal water onto coastal areas, is the top reason people die in hurricanes, according to the National Hurricane Center.

“Water in every way is the deadliest part of a hurricane,” said Austen Flannery, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service for the Tampa Bay region. “Everything from the storm surge piece to the flooding rainfall, that is the most dangerous part that people often underestimate.“

As of Monday, parts of Florida are expected to see between 8 and 12 feet of storm surge.

To be better informed about your storm surge risks, you should know what flood evacuation zone you are in ― and not ignore an evacuation order. You can look up your storm surge risk with the National Hurricane Center here . Florida’s Division of Emergency Management also maintains a Know Your Zone map where you can type in the address of a place and see your estimated flood risk. Zone A is the most vulnerable and the most likely to be evacuated first.

“If you’re in Zone A for your home and you evacuate to a hotel that’s also in Zone A, you’re still in a dangerous situation,” Flannery said.

Sometimes, panicked residents may want to drive far to escape the storm, but since Milton is affecting the entire Floridian peninsula, this is a misguided goal, Flannery said. Instead, Flannery said, it is better to evacuate to a shelter outside of a flood evacuation zone, which may not be as far as you think.

“If you’ve got somebody in a safe, sturdy structure that’s away from the water, that can be a safe place to go, and that doesn’t have to be hundreds of miles away,” he said.

Even if you live inland, you’re not safe from fatal flooding risks. Understand that heavy rainfall could be deadly even if you live far away from the coast during a major storm.

On Tuesday morning, Hurricane Milton was a Category 5 storm that was sustaining winds of 175 miles per hour . Joseph Trujillo Falcón, a researcher in the department of climate meteorology and atmospheric sciences at the University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign, said this Category 5 designation “gives a really good sense of the potential wind damage, but it doesn’t take into consideration storm surge, rainfall-induced flooding.”

But this kind of deadly rain-related damage “could extend hundreds of miles away from the coast,” Trujillo Falcón said.

Just look at what happened in landlocked cities in North Carolina after Hurricane Helene as a recent cautionary example. “The rainfall from Helene wiped out towns in North Carolina,” said David Ryglicki, director of meteorological research for weather application MyRadar, who previously worked at the National Hurricane Center.

Once it starts raining hard during a storm, you might need to shelter in place. Follow what local officials tell you to do.

“It takes only about six inches [of rainfall] to drag a car away,” Trujillo Falcón said. Walking or driving through floodwaters is also dangerous, because that water may also be electrically charged from downed power lines, FEMA warns .

Other Mistakes

Besides the fatal effects of storm surge and heavy rainfall, people should be aware of two common hurricane misconceptions that are harmful to believe, according to meteorologists:

Assuming You’ll Be OK Because You Survived The Last Hurricane

“People think ‘I survived the last storm, I’ll be fine this time.’ That’s survivor’s bias,” said Matthew Cappucci, a senior meteorologist for MyRadar.

“Two storms of identical strength and landfall location will have vastly different impacts based on size, speed and scores of other factors,” Cappucci continued. “I implore folks to heed storm surge evacuations.”

With Hurricane Milton, in particular, Flannery noted that the last storm of this magnitude to hit Tampa was in 1921.

“Nobody really alive today is going to have any frame of reference to compare this to,” he said. “And it makes it difficult to be able to fathom the scope of what that actually could mean as far as impacts go.”

Relying On One Projected Path Instead Of What Meteorologists Say

From forecast cones to spaghetti plots, there are a variety of storm track and intensity models and visual diagrams that meteorologists use when sharing their forecasts with the public.

The spaghetti plots that you might see are a collection of 20 to 40 models that visualize where each individual storm track may go, Ryglicki explained. But do not rely on a single projected path that a forecast model suggests. “The Hurricane Center doesn’t even do that,” Ryglicki said.

Instead, he said, the National Hurricane Center will use a consensus of what many computer models are saying to create its forecast cone , which represents the storm center’s probable path.

Right now, Flannery said, he is seeing a “fair amount of people in denial over the scope of the impacts that we’re looking at with this storm [Milton].” As a result, people will “look for solutions that suggest that it’s going to be better than it actually is, and that’s dangerous too,” he said.

In other words, they might be interpreting the forecast cone incorrectly.

With Milton, “what that cone means is that the center of the storm could be anywhere from essentially Cedar Key to Fort Myers [in Florida] ... and that says nothing about the impacts,” Flannery said. “Impacts will be felt well away from the center. North of the center is going to be strong winds, flooding, rain. South [of the center will be experiencing] storm surge.“

Deciding when or where to evacuate and how badly your home will be affected by a storm is a life-or-death matter during a major hurricane. That’s why Cappucci said members of the public shouldn’t be interpreting forecasts on their own to make such decisions and should be following meteorologists instead.

Meteorologists have the subject matter expertise to interpret models, along with years of pattern recognition and experience with model biases to make their forecasts, he said.

“It’s imperative to find a trusted source — not User79274928 on TikTok who downloaded a weather map — but a degreed meteorologist,” Cappucci said. “Take your weather information from them, and your evacuation information from state and local officials.”

This article originally appeared on HuffPost .