MARCO ISLAND, Fla. - Hurricane Wilma roared across Florida on Monday, its 125-mph winds leaving a... Wild Wilma lashes both Flo
MARCO ISLAND, Fla. - Hurricane Wilma roared across Florida on Monday, its 125-mph winds leaving at least six dead and a swath of downed trees, power outages and blown-out windows that stretched from the tony beachfront neighborhoods of Naples through the state's rural middle to the downtown buildings of Miami and Fort Lauderdale.
Wilma made landfall about 5:30 a.m. Fort Wayne time Monday just a few miles from this island of suburban homes and waterfront high-rises before defying expectations on both sides of the state. Although damage was less than officials anticipated on the Gulf Coast, Wilma remained unexpectedly potent as it moved eastward, wrecking mobile homes, blowing out windows and causing outages all the way from Miami to Daytona Beach.
After shellacking south Florida, Wilma headed out into the open Atlantic and seemed unlikely to make landfall again. Forecasters projected the storm would pass east of North Carolina's Outer Banks and possibly reach the Canadian Maritimes late tonight or early Wednesday morning.
All told, about 3.5 million customers in Florida were without power Monday evening, authorities said. The insurance industry said losses could be anywhere from $2 billion to $9 billion. Large parts of Key West were underwater from a storm surge that cut the city off from the rest of the state by flooding Highway 1.
Meanwhile, the full extent of Wilma's devastation became clearer in Central America and the Caribbean. The death toll reached 13 each in Haiti and Jamaica, and six in Mexico, authorities reported.
In Cuba, nearly 250 people had to be rescued with inflatable rafts and amphibious trucks after Wilma set off waves that swamped Havana neighborhoods up to four blocks inland. In Mexico, troops and federal police were called out to control looting in Cancun, and officials struggled to evacuate an estimated 30,000 stranded tourists.
Florida officials, for their part, offered a mixed assessment in the wake of the storm's path. On the Gulf Coast, officials seemed relieved that damage was not worse, while in the Keys and on the Atlantic Coast, residents and authorities appeared surprised by the extent of the devastation.
In Naples and on Marco Island, the damage was largely limited to trees, signs, screened porches and scattered roof shingles, as well as some flooding. Naples Mayor Bill Barnett spent the night alone in City Hall, sleeping on his office couch, hearing the winds howl.
"I tell you it was really scary, and this morning I thought there'd be a lot more damage," Barnett said. "After Hurricane Charley, houses were decimated. We didn't see any of that here."
Still, authorities reported at least six deaths. On the Gulf Coast, Collier County emergency officials confirmed two storm-related deaths, one in a roof collapse and one in an apparent heart attack.
The Associated Press also reported four other deaths in other areas, from falling debris, a downed tree and - in one case - a woman who was in a car crash while trying to evacuate over the weekend.
After leaving Florida's west coast, Hurricane Wilma carried an unexpected punch. Hurricanes often dissipate swiftly after landfall, but Wilma dropped only from a Category 3 to a Category 2 hurricane during its seven-hour surge across the Florida peninsula.
Low-lying and agriculture-heavy Glades County reported significant damage to mobile home parks, as did Broward, where 40 percent of the county's mobile homes were left uninhabitable, said Dave Erdman, spokesman for the Broward County Sheriff's Office.
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