'Paradise is Still Paradise' - Floridians vow to Rebuild after Two Hurricanes

Chris Fiore was supposed to be accepting delivery of new household appliances and furniture, replacing items that were swamped by Hurricane Helene just a few weeks ago.

Instead, the resident of Siesta Key, the Florida barrier island town where Hurricane Milton made landfall this week, was using a broom to push muck and seawater out of her ground-floor condo, a dream home she purchased just four years ago.

"There is no chance I'm pulling up stakes," Fiore said on Friday, pointing out the waterline where ocean water earlier this week was two feet (60 cm) up a wall. "I'm doubling down, thinking about hurricane windows and doors, figuring out how to stop this water from coming in."

This sentiment was echoed by several residents of Siesta Key who spoke with Reuters on Friday. Residents were outnumbered by clean-up workers and people handing out cards advertising roofing and other construction services following two major hurricanes in two weeks.

All were feeling down from the double whammy of Helene and Milton. But no one seemed defeated, despite the threats of more and stronger hurricanes coming their way in the future.

"Paradise is still paradise, despite this mess," said Pat Hurst, who along with her husband Bill has lived on Siesta Key since 2011 and has been visiting for well over two decades.

"That said, cleaning up from one hurricane while trying to prepare for another was really stressful."

While those living outside hurricane-prone zones may wonder why their residents choose to stay, it is easy to see Siesta Key's appeal, even after a hurricane. The place is a Jimmy Buffet song come to life. The mix of low-slung homes and three-story condos are painted in pleasant pastels, and downtown is lined with appealing restaurants and bars.

After Milton, fine white beach sand covered roads several blocks inland. Homes were turned inside out, with every imaginable household possession ruined by Helene heaped along roads. Coconuts were blown from trees and thrown asunder.

Boats normally docked in canals were tossed on land. Dumpsters already full from the Helene cleanup were being topped by Milton's debris.

Milton, the fifth-most-intense Atlantic hurricane on record, intensified quickly from a Category 1 storm to the maximum Category 5 at sea in less than 24 hours, the latest example of a worrying trend that has seen storms growing more powerful, more quickly, due to climate change.

Milton made landfall as a Category 3. At least 16 deaths were attributed to Milton, CBS News cited the Florida Department of Law Enforcement as saying.

Asked by reporters about possible discussion of not letting people rebuild, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said on Friday that "the reality is people work their whole lives to be able to live in environments that are really, really nice, and they have a right to make those decisions with their property as they see fit.

"It is not the role of government to forbid them or to force them to dispose or utilize their property in a way that they do not think is best for them," DeSantis said.

Sherry Tom, 49, convinced her husband and three daughters to leave Pittsburgh's cold winters and move to Siesta Key in 2021.

"This place is my whole heart," she said. "But I will admit - I'm worried about living in fear that this will happen again. But if we can, we're staying."

Tom said she thinks that they will have to knock down what remains of their home and build from scratch. She wasn't certain how they will get that done, but was resolute about staying.

Marko Radosavljevic, 54, owns one of the original homes built by Siesta Key's first developer, Frank Archibald. It's a coral green beauty built with pecky cypress wood, known for its water resistance. Water and wind have nonetheless done damage in the past two weeks.

As he worked to clean out debris from the house he's owned since 2017, Radosavljevic said that he was not even considering leaving behind a place "with a special island vibe."

"I refuse to be pushed out," Radosavljevic said, referring to both storms and drives to put up hotels in place of the older homes like his.

Another in a series of unusually strong solar storms hitting Earth produced stunning skies full of pinks, purples, greens and blues farther south than normal, including into parts of Germany, the United Kingdom, New England and New York City.

There were no immediate reports of disruptions to power and communications.

The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued a severe geomagnetic storm alert on Wednesday after an outburst from the sun was detected earlier in the week. Such a storm increases the chance of auroras — also known as northern lights — and can temporarily disrupt power and radio signals.

NOAA's Friday forecast shows continued higher-than-normal activity, but the chances for another overnight show are slim farther south of Canada and the northern Plains states.

What causes northern lights? The sun sends more than heat and light to Earth — it sends energy and charged particles known as the solar wind. But sometimes that solar wind becomes a storm. The sun's outer atmosphere occasionally “burps” out huge bursts of energy called corona mass ejections. They produce solar storms, also known as geomagnetic storms, according to NOAA.

The Earth's magnetic field shields us from much of it, but particles can travel down the magnetic field lines along the north and south poles and into Earth’s atmosphere.

When the particles interact with the gases in our atmosphere, they can produce light — blue and purple from nitrogen, green and red from oxygen.

Why have there been so many solar storms lately? Solar activity increases and decreases in a cycle that last about 11 years, astronomers say. The sun appears to be near the peak of that cycle, known as a solar maximum. It's not clear exactly when the cycle will begin to slow.

In May, the sun shot out its biggest flare in almost two decades. That came days after severe solar storms pummeled Earth and triggered auroras in unaccustomed places across the Northern Hemisphere.

How can you best see the northern lights? NOAA advises those who hope to see the northern lights to get away from city lights.

The best viewing time is usually within an hour or two before or after midnight, and the agency says the best occasions are around the spring and fall equinoxes due to the way the solar wind interacts with Earth’s magnetic field.

'Paradise is Still Paradise' - Floridians vow to Rebuild after Two Hurricanes