'We've got a problem': Sheriff scolds residents for ignoring Helene evacuation order

A Florida sheriff on Thursday admonished residents who were not heeding an evacuation order as Hurricane Helene raced toward the state, threatening to unleash what forecasters have described as an "unsurvivable" storm surge along Florida's northwest coast.

“We’ve got a problem, and the problem is that way too many people in Zone A aren’t listening,” said Bob Gualtieri, the sheriff in Pinellas County, which encompasses Clearwater and St. Petersburg, in a Thursday morning news conference. “We’ve been out there this morning, there’s just way too many people in the area.”

Other local and state officials, including Gov. Ron DeSantis, warned residents to leave vulnerable areas before the massive storm unleashes a barrage of life-threatening conditions, including flooding rains and winds potentially as high as 131 to 155 mph Thursday night.

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"If you're in an evacuation zone or you've been told to evacuate, you do have time to do it now – so do it. But don't wait another six hours, seven hours," DeSantis said early Thursday.

Gualtieri said that while the county won’t face much danger from rain and wind, the barrier islands and low-lying coastal areas face 5 to 8 feet of storm surge.

“This is dangerous. No question about it and it’s not something we’ve seen recently,” he said. “They’ve got to get out, and there’s going to reach a point where you’re on your own because we’re not going to get our people killed because you don’t want to listen to what we’re saying.”

Officials across the state issue dire warnings ahead of Helene

The highest storm surge – projected at 15 to 20 feet – is forecast to rage ashore along a stretch of the panhandle and Big Bend coast south of Tallahassee. In a morning update on the storm, the National Weather Service described the projected rush of water as "catastrophic and unsurvivable."

While nearly every county along the western coast of Florida has ordered evacuations, four of them, including Franklin,  Taylor, Liberty and Wakulla have ordered all residents in the county to leave.

"This will not be a survivable event for those in coastal or low lying areas," Wakulla County Sheriff's Office Sheriff Jared Miller said in a Facebook post. "There has not been a storm of this magnitude to hit Wakulla in recorded history."

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A.J. Smith, the sheriff in Franklin County, said he's never seen as many residents evacuate before a hurricane as he has in recent days. He said, however, there were still people who decided to stay for various reasons.

"I've said publicly that when the storm comes in and the weather's so bad that the first responders can't get out, you're on your own because we can't get to you," he said, adding: "If I wasn't sheriff, trust me – I wouldn't be here."

Residents in vulnerable coastal areas stay despite grave warnings

In Steinhatchee, a seaside community in Taylor County, Paul Nawlin, a local church pastor, spent his Thursday morning riding around his golf cast, checking on residents living along the area's river banks who chose to hunker down for the storm.

Since some of his neighbors in the town of about 500 people are staying, so will he.

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"We're going to trust the Lord – no matter," Nawlin told the Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Network. "He didn't ask us to understand everything. Just trust."

In Wakulla County's Saint Marks, a coastal fishing town about 30 miles due south of Tallahassee, stone crab fisherman Philip Tooke, 63, told USA TODAY he and his brother plans to ride out the storm on their fishing boats, letting out line as the water rises.“You have to jump from one to another to let them keep rising with the tide,” he said. “It gets a little hairy.”

Contributing: Trevor Hughes, USA TODAY; Antonio Fins, Palm Beach Post