The storm that spent the afternoon over Collier crossed into Lee at 4.23 p.m., and the National Weather Service put coastal and inland Lee under a special weather statement until 5 p.m. with 40 to 50 mph gusts from Cape Coral through Fort Myers to Estero
The National Weather Service office in Tampa Bay Ruskin issued a special weather statement for coastal and inland Lee County at 4.23 p.m. on Wednesday. It runs until 5 p.m.
The office headline is that strong thunderstorms will impact south central Lee County through 5 p.m.
At 4.23 p.m. Doppler radar was tracking a line of strong thunderstorms extending from Harlem Heights to near Naples Park, moving northwest at 10 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 to consider seeking shelter inside a building if you are outdoors. The office adds that torrential rainfall is occurring with these storms and may lead to localized flooding, and repeats that drivers should not go through flooded roadways.
It also carries a lightning line. Frequent cloud to ground lightning is occurring with these storms, and the office notes that lightning can strike 10 miles away from a thunderstorm, advising shelter inside a building or a vehicle.
The locations the office named are Cape Coral, Fort Myers, Bonita Springs, San Carlos Park, McGregor, Pine Manor, Lovers Key State Park, Harlem Heights, Iona, Cypress Lake, Villas, St. James City, Whiskey Creek, Page Park, Page Field Airport, Punta Rassa, Fort Myers Villas, Estero and Saint James City.
This is the first alert of the afternoon for Lee County. A reading of the same alert feed at 4.15 p.m. returned nothing for Lee.
What changed is that the storm crossed the county line. The Miami office had it over Marco Island Airport at 3.26 p.m., over Golden Gate Estates at 3.47 p.m. and over Vineyards near Naples at 4.05 p.m. At 4.21 p.m. it was over North Naples, near Bonita Springs.
On the Collier side a severe thunderstorm warning remains in effect for west central Collier until 4.30 p.m., with 60 mph gusts and hail up to three quarters of an inch. That is a level above what Lee has.
Collier is also under a flood advisory until 5.45 p.m., issued on the back of two to three inches of rain already recorded by radar. No flood advisory was in effect for Lee County as of 4.28 p.m.
The Florida Highway Patrol incident board carried one Lee County entry at 4.27 p.m. It is a crash with injuries and a roadblock on the terminal access road at Southwest Florida International Airport, at the ramp to Interstate 75 southbound, dispatched at 4.17 p.m. and marked roadway clear at 4.22 p.m.
The board states no cause for that crash, and nothing in it connects the crash to the weather. It appears here because it is the only state road entry in the county this hour.
That board covers state roads, which means I-75, US-41 and the state routes. City and county streets in Cape Coral and Fort Myers 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.
No county power figure is given here. The poweroutage.us page for Lee County returned a bot challenge rather than data when it was requested at 4.28 p.m., and no outage number is asserted from an unread source.
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.
