Lee County

The National Weather Service has two special weather statements running over Lee County until 7.15 p.m. Monday, one issued at 6.37 p.m. for Cape Coral, Punta Gorda and the Burnt Store corridor and a second at 6.47 p.m. for Estero, San Carlos Park and Lehigh Acres, both carrying radar indicated gusts of 40 to 50 mph

Money & World

The Editorial Team · August 10, 2026

A heavy grey storm cloud spread across the whole sky above a wide stretch of open water, broken in the upper middle where sunlight burns through a gap and lights the cloud from behind. A low, flat, bare shoreline runs along the horizon. No signage, lettering or place name is in the frame. A generic illustration, not a photograph of Charlotte Harbour or Cape Coral: the distant shore is treeless and bare rather than the mangrove and development of this coast, and the light is daytime rather than the early evening this storm sat over the county. — *Photo: Francesco Ungaro / Pexels*

What it changes

There are now two of these running at once, over opposite ends of Lee County, and they are two different storms rather than one alert being reissued. The first, out at 6.37 p.m., covers coastal Charlotte, inland Charlotte and coastal Lee, and the office narrows the Lee part of it to north central Lee. The second, out ten minutes later at 6.47 p.m., covers coastal and inland Lee and is aimed at southeastern Lee: Lehigh Acres, Three Oaks, San Carlos Park and Estero. Both expire at 7.15 p.m. and both carry the same hazard, radar indicated gusts of 40 to 50 mph and no hail. If you are in the middle of the county, between Cape Coral and Estero, you are strictly speaking in neither, though a storm on either side of you is close enough to be worth watching. Collier is in neither statement, and no flood advisory is in effect for Lee, Collier or Charlotte, which is worth saying plainly rather than leaving people in Naples or Marco Island to assume an alert to their north reaches them. The two storms are moving in different directions, which is the detail that tells you which one is yours. The northern line is crawling west at 5 mph off the Charlotte Harbour shoreline. The southeastern cell was 8 miles northwest of Big Corkscrew Island at 6.47 p.m., or 10 miles south of Lehigh Acres, and it is moving northwest at 10 mph, so it is tracking up out of the Collier boundary country toward the Estero and San Carlos Park corridor and the stretch of Interstate 75 that runs through it. The Lee place the first statement names is Cape Coral. The rest of the named list runs up into Charlotte: Punta Gorda, Port Charlotte, Burnt Store Marina, Pirate Harbor, Solana, Tropical Gulf Acres, Harbour Heights, Charlotte Park, Cleveland, Charlotte Harbor and Charlotte County Airport. That is the Burnt Store corridor either side of the county line more than it is Fort Myers or the beaches. Speed is what makes the northern one more than a passing shower. At 5 mph that line is moving at walking pace, slower than the 10 mph line that crossed the county on August 5, and a slow line means the same neighbourhoods sit under it for most of the time left on the clock rather than getting a few minutes of wind and then clear sky. West is also the direction that carries it off the Charlotte Harbour shoreline and out over the water, which matters for anyone still out on it. The southeastern cell is the quicker of the two at 10 mph, so it should pass a given street faster, and it is the one to watch if you are driving the stretch of Interstate 75 below Fort Myers. Take the stated hazard for what it is and no more. Gusts of 40 to 50 mph are radar indicated rather than measured on the ground, and the impact the office prints is tree limbs coming down and unsecured objects blowing around. In practice that is what is loose on a lanai, at a construction site, on a dock or on a boat lift, rather than damage to a building. The office rates both statements Moderate, and the only instruction attached to either is the single line to consider getting inside a building if you are outdoors. There is no severe thunderstorm warning here, no hail listed and no interior room instruction, and this site is not going to add urgency the forecaster did not write. On the ground, nothing has broken so far. Power is close to normal in both counties this evening: Lee County was showing 310 customers out of 535,456 without power when the figures were read, most of them on the Florida Power and Light system, and Collier was showing 53 out of 283,180, on a page that had refreshed 11 minutes earlier. Neither figure is a storm outage in any meaningful sense. The state road picture is nearly as quiet. The Highway Patrol board carried one open Charlotte entry, logged at 6.42 p.m. as a brush or forest fire with possible smoke in the area on Interstate 75 northbound at mile marker 152 near Punta Gorda, still showing no unit arrival and no all clear. That entry sits inside the alerted area and five minutes after the statement went out, but the Highway Patrol states no cause for it, so treat it as smoke to expect on that stretch of I-75 rather than as anything caused by the storm. The only Lee entry on the board, a crash on I-75 northbound at mile marker 130 in Fort Myers, was dispatched at 6.22 p.m. and cleared by 6.30 p.m. with no roadblock. Remember what that board does not cover. It carries state roads, so I-75, US-41 and the state routes, and it does not carry the city and county streets in Cape Coral and Punta Gorda, which are municipal and sheriff calls and are the ones that pond first in a slow moving storm. One road condition in Lee is unrelated to this weather but still worth knowing if you are driving this evening: McGregor Boulevard remains shut in both directions at Bay Drive after power lines came down across it early on Monday afternoon, hours before this storm, and the sheriff's office has not posted a reopening. Nobody has connected that closure to the weather and this site is not doing so either.

The National Weather Service office in Tampa Bay Ruskin has two special weather statements running over Lee County on Monday evening, for two different storms at opposite ends of the county. Both expire at 7.15 p.m.

The first was issued at 6.37 p.m. It covers coastal Charlotte, inland Charlotte and coastal Lee. The office headline is that strong thunderstorms will impact central Charlotte and north central Lee counties through 7.15 p.m.

At 6.36 p.m. Doppler radar was tracking strong thunderstorms along a line extending from near Charlotte County Airport to near Punta Gorda to 8 miles northwest of Palmona Park. The line is moving west at 5 mph.

The hazard is wind gusts of 40 to 50 mph, radar indicated. The stated impact is that gusty winds could knock down tree limbs and blow around unsecured objects. The alert lists no hail.

The instruction attached to it is a single line: if outdoors, consider seeking shelter inside a building. Unlike the statement this office issued for Lee County on August 5, this one carries no lightning guidance and no flooded roadway guidance, so none is repeated here.

The locations the office named are Cape Coral, Punta Gorda, Port Charlotte, Charlotte County Airport, Burnt Store Marina, Pirate Harbor, Solana, Tropical Gulf Acres, Harbour Heights, Charlotte Park, Cleveland and Charlotte Harbor.

Cape Coral is the only Lee County location on that list.

The office issued the second statement ten minutes later, at 6.47 p.m., for coastal and inland Lee. Its headline is that a strong thunderstorm will impact southeastern Lee County through 7.15 p.m.

At 6.47 p.m. radar was tracking a single strong thunderstorm 8 miles northwest of Big Corkscrew Island, or 10 miles south of Lehigh Acres, moving northwest at 10 mph. The locations named on it are Lehigh Acres, Three Oaks, San Carlos Park and Estero.

Its hazard, source and impact wording is identical to the first, and so is its one line instruction. It lists no hail.

These are two separate storms rather than one alert reissued. They were live in the same reading of the alert feed, they name no place in common, and they are moving in different directions, the northern line west at 5 mph and the southeastern cell northwest at 10 mph.

Collier County is in neither statement.

No flood advisory is in effect for Lee, Collier or Charlotte. The Florida alert feed carried four active alerts statewide when it was read at 6.53 p.m., and these two statements are the only ones of them that touch these counties.

Power was close to normal in both counties when the figures were read at 6.45 p.m., as the northern line sat over the Burnt Store corridor. Lee County showed 310 customers without power out of 535,456 tracked, of which Florida Power and Light accounts for 304. Collier showed 53 out of 283,180.

The Florida Highway Patrol incident board carried two entries for the three counties when it was read.

One is open. A brush or forest fire was logged in Charlotte County at 6.42 p.m. on Interstate 75 northbound at mile marker 152 near Punta Gorda, with the comment that there is possible smoke in the area. Neither a unit arrival nor an all clear had been entered on it.

That entry falls inside the alerted area and five minutes after the statement was issued. The Highway Patrol states no cause for it, and no connection to the weather is asserted here.

The other Lee entry is closed. A crash on Interstate 75 northbound at mile marker 130 in Fort Myers was dispatched at 6.22 p.m., reached at 6.25 p.m. and cleared at 6.30 p.m. with no roadblock.

That board covers state roads, which means I-75, US-41 and the state routes. City and county streets in Cape Coral and Punta Gorda are municipal and sheriff calls and do not appear on it, so an empty result there is not an all clear for the streets most likely to pond.

Separately, and not because of this storm, McGregor Boulevard in Lee County remains shut in both directions at Bay Drive. The Lee County Sheriff's Office reported power lines down across the road there at about 2.58 p.m., hours before this statement, and has posted no reopening.

A special weather statement is not a severe thunderstorm warning. It is the level the office uses for a storm strong enough to be worth telling people about, without the damage threshold that triggers a warning.

The document: NWS Tampa Bay Ruskin, two Special Weather Statements covering Lee and Charlotte, issued August 10, 2026 at 6.37 p.m. and 6.47 p.m. EDT, both to 7.15 p.m. EDT.

Naples Zoo is shut all week for scheduled maintenance, a closure its own site dates from Monday through Friday, August 14, and one worth checking before you drive over with visitors or turn up on a membership expecting to get in

A crash with a roadblock landed on Bonita Beach Road at the Interstate 75 interchange in Bonita Springs at a quarter past four on Monday afternoon, and the Highway Patrol entry was off the state dispatch board about ten minutes later