Tampa mayor issues dire warning before Hurricane Milton: ‘If you choose to stay … you are going to die’

The mayor of Tampa Bay, a city that’s in the crosshairs of Hurricane Milton, issued a grave warning to Florida residents who don’t heed calls to evacuate ahead of the monster storm.

“If you choose to stay … you are going to die,” Mayor Jane Castor bluntly said on CNN while talking about the dangers of Milton, a “literally catastrophic” Category 5 hurricane that’s barreling toward the Sunshine State’s coast.

The powerful storm could hit Florida as early as Wednesday and may be more destructive than deadly Hurricane Helene, which ripped through parts of the Sunshine State just last week.

Castor emphasized that attempting to ride out the storm would – not could – prove fatal. The time to flee is now, she urged residents in evacuation zones.

“I can tell you right now they might have done that in others, there’s never been one like this,” Castor said on CNN. “And Helene was a wakeup call, this is literally catastrophic.

“And I can say without any dramatization whatsoever if you choose to stay in one of those evacuation areas, you’re gonna die.”

Castor, who has been in office since 2019, noted some of the forecasts predict a tidal surge of 10-12 feet. Helene’s tidal surge was 6-feet.

“And that was literally devastating to so many in our coastal area,” she said of Helene’s disastrous path.

Milton is already the second-strongest Gulf hurricane in recorded history – and experts believe it’ll only grow stronger as it approaches Florida. The storm’s winds are already a stunning 180 mph with heavy downpours also expected.

“This is something that I’ve never seen in my life and I can tell you anyone born and raised in the Tampa Bay area has never seen anything like this before,” she stressed. “People need to get out.”

“If we have this predicted storm surge, this is not survivable,” she reiterated.

A long line of cars were already on the road Monday night and shelves in supermarkets across the area were barren from panic buying.