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Florida and the southeastern region are still recovering from Hurricane Helene, and now they face the threat of Hurricane Milton, which has been upgraded to a Category 5 storm. It is expected to make landfall in Tampa Bay on the 9th and could cause even more severe damage, with insurance losses estimated to exceed $10 billion. On the 7th, stocks related to U.S. property and casualty insurance plummeted, and shares of Berkshire Hathaway, which has significant exposure in the insurance sector, also fell.

Milton has strengthened to a Category 5 hurricane with maximum wind speeds reaching 160 miles per hour, potentially becoming the first hurricane to directly strike the densely populated Tampa Bay area in a century. Authorities have ordered over a million residents along the Gulf Coast to evacuate, and Governor DeSantis has declared a state of emergency across 51 counties, indicating that a series of evacuation orders will likely follow. Officials described this as the largest evacuation since Hurricane Irma in 2017.

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