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Dangerous flooding continued to inundate Tampa Bay well after Hurricane Milton passed.
There are dangerous flood conditions on several local rivers because of excessive rainfall during Hurricane Milton.
Mark Fulkerson is the Chief Professional Engineer with the Southwest Florida Water Management District.
“We are seeing flooding occur in areas that aren’t mapped for it, just because of the amount of historic rainfall we got with this storm, and how wet things were prior,” Fulkerson said, “Some of the rivers, over the next several days, we’re going to see those water levels dropping. And, you know, it may take a week or more, two weeks, before they’re back below flood levels.”
Areas like the Hillsborough River have already peaked, but Fulkerson says we’re not in the clear.
“There are many other areas outside of these river systems that got a tremendous amount of rain that are flooded, you know, that we don’t have gauges on – that we can’t monitor, and I just think water’s going to sit in those areas for quite a while,” Fulkerson said.
Some neighborhoods might see a different timeline than others.
“But some of these other areas back in the neighborhoods where maybe a river came out of its banks and flooded into a neighborhood, and then the river’s receded, but the water level in that neighborhood has no way to get out now. So it may sit there for quite a while, could be several weeks,” Fulkerson said.
