Hurricane Milton rips off Tropicana Field’s roof after landfall. Look at catastrophic damage

Hurricane Milton made landfall as a powerful Category 3 storm with home-destroying storm surge and devastating winds. Although it has started to weaken, cities across Florida’s Gulf Coast are still being pounded.

While Milton came in just south of Tampa Bay, landing on Siesta Key, the area is seeing catastrophic damage. Some of the worst flooding may have been avoided, but strong winds ravish the region.

READ MORE: Hurricane Milton makes landfall near Sarasota. Two million are already without power

In St. Petersburg, Milton destroyed the roof of Tropicana Field, the home stadium for the Tampa Bay Rays that was being used as a shelter for emergency responders. The shredded remains of the roof blew in the wind as the lights remained on.

The arena, which opened in 1990 as the Florida Suncoast Dome, is also the homefield for the Tampa Bay Rays baseball team. In the days leading up to Milton’s landfall, the facility was set up as a camp to house 10,000 emergency workers and debris cleanup personnel.

In another part of the city, a construction crane also came down, smashing into the Tampa Bay Times office building .

READ MORE: Which Florida counties are without power after Hurricane Milton hit? Take a look

Elsewhere along Florida’s coast, Milton laid waste:

Streets in downtown Fort Myers saw storm surge spill into the city, a grim reminder of the ferocious impact of Hurricane Ian in 2022. Several feet of water rose as Milton washed ashore.

In Brandon, a Tampa suburb little more than 60 miles north of the landfall site, rain and wind swirled furiously, knocking out fences and branches. Power outages spread throughout the area as exploding transformers lit up the sky with blue-green flashes.

In Lithia, further inland, the roar of the wind was deafening as thick rain completely obscured views outside of windows.

Along Bayshore Boulevard, Tampa Bay’s water was sucked out as Milton’s counterclockwise winds drained the Bay — a reassuring sign for residents in Hillsborough County as neighboring communities to the south bore the brunt of the hurricane.

NewsNation reporter Brian Entin shared a video of the waterless bay in Tampa.

In Sarasota, around 100 mph winds battered the city as water levels due to storm surge. Storm chaser Matthew Cappucci shared a video on X of the worsening situation in downtown Sarasota.

In Venice Bay, a mobile home community on Robert’s Bay was submerged by Milton’s surge. The roads in Venice Bay Adult Park, a community for people 55 and older, were rivers.