As Irma closed in on the island chain known as the Florida Keys, the US National Hurricane Center as announced that the storm has moved up to Category 4. Irma was churning about 70 miles (115 kilometers) south-southeast of Key West, menacing Florida with maximum sustained winds of 130 miles per hour.
Its eye was expected to cross the Lower Florida Keys within hours before moving “near or along” the peninsular state’s west coast, where storm surges could go up to 15 feet – enough to cover a house.
Tens of thousands of people huddling in various shelters watched for updates as the storm swung to the west, now potentially sparing Tampa as well Miami the catastrophic head-on blow forecasters had been warning about. But those few miles meant St. Petersburg could get a direct hit, rather than its more populous twin across Tampa Bay.
The leading edge of the immense storm bent palm trees and spit rain across South Florida, knocking out power to more than 170,000 homes and businesses, as the eye approached Key West.
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