DELRAY BEACH, Fla. — On the day after Hurricane Irma roared through their state, many Floridians emerged blinking from boarded-up homes and shelters on Monday to survey the damage — and were surprised it wasn’t a whole lot worse.
There were plenty of downed trees and long lines at gas stations. More than 6.5 million residents were without power, and officials said it’ll take weeks to restore electricity to everyone. And as the flood waters began to recede, police search and rescue teams began the grim task of looking for potential storm victims.
In northern Florida, downtown Jacksonville was contending with record flooding as Irma, now a tropical storm, pushed farther north and — in a parting shot — hammered the area with high winds and driving rain.
Gov. Rick Scott warned that Irma could still cause rivers to flood, especially in northern Florida. He said he just saw the damage in the Florida Keys, where Irma made landfall in the state on Sunday, and there were lots of destroyed homes and boats and general “devastation.” It could take weeks to restore power, water and sewage service, he said.
But, Scott added, “I didn’t see the damage I thought I would see.”
Robert Tishkevich, who rode out the storm at his home in the Huntington Pointe retirement community, said he had a similar reaction as looked around his neighborhood in Delray Beach, 150 miles east of where Irma made landfall Sunday at Cudjoe Key. And he was counting his blessings.
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“It was really scary, but we have far less trees down on the property than I thought,” Tishkevich said. “It’s far less worse than I thought.”
His neighbor, Melissa Baer, 68, agreed they were “very lucky.” She said her sister survived Hurricane Andrew, a Category 5 hurricane that devastated south Florida in 1992 and flattened the city of Homestead.
“I have all these pictures in my head,” she said of the damage from Andrew. “I was worried the eye was going to hit Delray like it did Homestead.”
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But when Baer came out on Monday, the sun was shining, the remaining palm trees were gently swaying and all the buildings in her development were still standing.
“No flooding in the homes,” she said. “And we’re lucky trees didn’t fall on any of the houses.”
Baer, who is from Jersey City, New Jersey, said all of her praying appears to have paid off.
“I’m Jewish, I go to services every Saturday,” she said. “Maybe that helped. Finally that helped.”
But they were relying on Florida Power and Light to restore power because it was getting hot and humid again, as the temperature approached the 90s. When they saw the FPL trucks, Baer and the other residents began waving their arms in joy.
Tanker trucks were also being dispatched to replenish supplies at gas stations across the state. At one Shell station near Pompano Beach, nearly 100 people waited to fill up.
“I have half a tank but that’s not why I’m here,” said Frank Benvenuto, who lives in Coral Springs. ”I’m here to get gas for my generator. It’s almost out. We’re more than 48 hours without power, and the generator is about to run out.”
Benvenuto, 59, said they lost power on Saturday. “The worst part is having no A/C,” he said.
Debbie Deblaker, 31, said her generator was about to run out of gas, “and I have three little ones at home who will be really unhappy if it does.”
She said she didn’t know when the gas would be delivered, but she wasn’t budging. “I don’t have anything better to do,” Deblaker said.
In Tampa, the city’s entire police force was in Raymond James Stadium, home of the NFL’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers, when Irma roared past.
Many forecasters feared Irma would make a direct hit on Tampa, but it veered east and spared the city.
At 3 a.m. Monday, when Tampa police returned to the streets, they found puddles in places and some downed trees and street signs, but not much in the way of visible damage.
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In Naples, there were downed trees everywhere and some of the streets were flooded and impassible. And there was the buzz of city workers with chainsaws cutting them down to size.
Many residents who had spent the night in shelters returned to homes that appeared to have suffered minor damage from falling tree limbs. Few appeared to have water lines — the tell-tale markings of flooding.
But officials have warned that it will take days, if not weeks, before they know the full extent of the damage Irma inflicted on cities like Naples and the rest of the state.
In Miami, Mayor Tomás Regalado urged residents to stay off the streets so workers can repair downed power lines, clear toppled trees and search for the missing in still-flooded areas.
On Marco Island, there were no reports Monday of any storm-related injuries, let alone fatalities, the Miami Herald reported.
There were reports of collapsed roadways in Melbourne and major damage to the water filtration systems of about a dozen cities on the Atlantic Coast.
But Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn, who had warned residents on Sunday that the city was about to get “punched in face,” expressed relief Monday as officials prepared to reopen the Port of Tampa and the bridges to Pinellas County.
“It’s looking good,” Buckhorn said. “The first blush is that not only did we dodge a bullet, but we survived pretty well. Not a lot of flooding. Tree removal, debris — don’t want to say it’s negligible, but it’s manageable.”
In South Florida, the mayor of Broward County, Barbara Sharief, whose constituency includes Fort Lauderdale and many Miami suburbs, said they, too, were relieved.
“Broward County has made it through the worst of Hurricane Irma with undetermined impact but much less than any of us would have imagined just a few days ago when we were in a line for a direct hit from this monstrous storm,” Sharief said. “We were bracing ourselves for the worst.”
Kalhan Rosenblatt reported from Delray Beach, Jim Seida from Naples, and Corky Siemaszko from New York.