SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — Florida residents are looking to bounce back after Hurricane Milton made landfall late Wednesday. The storm brought rain, heavy winds and even tornadoes.
As Milton hit Florida, it left plenty of damage in its wake. Deborah Atkinson, who lives in Sarasota and has been stranded in Sioux Falls since last weekend, has learned about damage to her home.
“Our family was able to get into our subdivision about 6 hours after the hurricane and noticed that we had lost a shed in the back that housed all of our lawn equipment, that kind of stuff. We lost a partial cement wall on the other side,” Atkinson said.
They also have some damage to their gutters and to a fence, but Atkinson is just thankful that it wasn’t worse.
“We feel very blessed that we had minimal damage. Any time it can be fixed, that’s okay. We will fix it and move on,” Atkinson said.
Former longtime KELOLAND News anchor Steve Hemmingsen lives in Englewood and decided to ride out the storm.
“The wind started whipping up about 5 p.m. About 9 p.m., I think we hit the eye roughly, and then the wind really howled, and I actually went to bed about 10:00 p.m. I’ve been through one or two of these things now, and I woke up at 1 a.m. because of the dead silence. The wind just died down. That was it. In my area, we didn’t even have any rain,” Hemmingsen said.
The damage that Hemmingsen had to his property was also minimal, but both Hemmingsen and Atkinson have neighbors that weren’t so lucky.
“The houses along what we call Lemon Bay, which is basically an estuary of the Gulf of Mexico, they got flooded twice. It’s hard to tell where Hurricane Helene ended and Milton took over. They got washed twice. Some of those people are just done for,” Hemmingsen said.
“We have many neighbors who lost way more than we did, so we are so grateful and really want to get back and see what we can do to help others in our neighborhood,” Atkinson said.
And Florida’s long road to recovery starts now.
“A South Dakota blizzard would look just inconvenient right now,” Hemmingsen said.
“From a grateful heart, I appreciate all of the linemen who came down and went without sleep for many days to try and get our power back,” Atkinson said.
Atkinson has been the voice behind KELOLAND promos for the past 13 years. Atkinson’s father and mother-in-law were in assisted living homes during the hurricane. Both were unharmed. Hemmingsen had some branches fall as well as some minor damage to his home but he also reported boats in the street and cars in the water.
