Hurricane Andrew
Though Andrew was a small tropical cyclone for most of its lifespan, it caused extreme damage, especially in the Bahamas, Florida, and Louisiana. The vast majority of the damage was as a result of extremely high winds, although a few tornadoes spawned by Andrew caused considerable damage in Louisiana. Throughout the areas affected, almost 177,000 people were left homeless. Outside of the Bahamas, Florida, and Louisiana, effects were widespread, although damage was minimal. Overall, $27.3 billion in losses and 65 fatalities were attributed to Andrew, with some estimates ranging as high as $34 billion. Andrew was the costliest hurricane in U.S. history at the time, but is now seventh following hurricanes Katrina (2005), Ike (2008), Sandy (2012), Harvey (2017), Irma (2017), and Maria (2017).
Effects of Hurricane Andrew in Florida
Outside of Collier, Broward, Miami-Dade, and Palm Beach counties, rainfall totals remained below , though over of precipitation fell over a small portion of southern Lake Okeechobee. Winds in Lee County left sporadic power outages, uprooted trees, and damaged the roofs of some houses, though losses overall were fairly minor. Additionally, high winds resulted in the closure of the Cape Coral Bridge. Along the coast, the hurricane produced a storm tide of at Fort Myers Beach. Winds reached in Captiva. Abnormally high tides were observed as far north as Homosassa in Citrus County, which reported a storm surge of at least in height. At the Miccosukee Indian Reservation, the huts and trailers of the Miccosukee were severely damaged. A young girl at the reservation went missing and was not found until nine days later. In Glades County, the emergency operations center recorded a wind gust of . Twelve funnel clouds were reported in Highlands County, though they remained unconfirmed. Effects from the storm in Central Florida were limited to light rainfall and winds in a few counties. Brevard County reported elevated wind speeds, though winds were no more than at any of the locations. Precipitation of at least occurred as far north as Alachua County.