More than $1m worth of cocaine washes up on Florida beach after Hurricane Debby

Several packages of cocaine with a street value exceeding $1m have washed up on a Florida beach after Hurricane Debby crashed ashore in the state on Monday and progressed up the eastern seaboard.

The acting chief patrol agent of the US border patrol’s division in Miami, Samuel Briggs, shared a picture of the confiscated drugs on X, showing the 25 packages – or 70lb – of cocaine washed up on a Florida Keys beach.

Briggs said a passerby “discovered the drugs [and] contacted authorities”.

“US border patrol seized the drugs, which have a street value of over $1m dollars,” he added.

The unusual confiscation provided a humorous postscript to Florida’s encounter with Debby after the storm made landfall north of Steinhatchee, about 80 miles west of Gainesville. The storm has since been downgraded to a tropical storm. But, still packing heavy rainfall and gusty winds of 40 to 50mph, Debby on Tuesday remained a threat to neighboring states and even those farther north.

Georgia and eastern South Carolina could see “potentially historic heavy rainfall” through Friday, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) said.

Joe Biden approved emergency declarations for Florida, Georgia and South Carolina, which let the president release federal aid into the region as recovery efforts get under way.

At least five people have died amid the storm, according to local news reports . Among those who were killed in the harsh weather were a 13-year-old boy in Fanning Springs, Florida, and a 19-year-old man in south Georgia – both of whom were killed when trees fell on top of houses.

Debby caused flash flooding, closures of schools and roads, and downed power lines. Sixty-one counties were placed under evacuation orders by state officials on Monday, many of which had been lifted by Tuesday.

But nearly 109,000 homes and businesses in Florida remained without power as of Tuesday, according to PowerOutage.US. And a combined 50,000 homes and businesses across Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina were also grappling with power outages.

Although Debby encroached on the US during peak hurricane season, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) predicted “an above-average 2024 Atlantic hurricane season” due to global warming and warmer ocean temperatures, primarily caused by the burning of fossil fuels.

“This storm looks to be a significant flooding event for millions of residents in the south-east,” the Federal Emergency Management Agency administrator, Robert Samaan, said. “For anyone already affected, listen to your local officials, check on your neighbors and monitor the weather in your area.

“To everyone else further down the storm’s path, there is still time to make last minute preparations for you and your family.”