ESCAMBIA COUNTY, Fla. — The center of Tropical Storm Bertha is forecast to slide by Northwest Florida to our south. But county and city officials have spent the day preparing for every scenario.
The main threat right now will be along the beaches. The surf conditions have already warranted an upgrade to the beach warning flags.
The day started at a yellow flag and upgraded to a single red already. Officials anticipate it to be upgraded to double red flags.
Pensacola Beach lifeguards spoke with beachgoers all day, warning them about the dangers.
“Heavy strong surf and strong rip currents are definitely going to pose hazards to anyone going near the water,” said Escambia County Deputy Chief of Water Safety Alex Johnson. “And we expect to be flying double red flags as we go into tomorrow and into Wednesday, so we’ll be keeping all swimmers out of the water.”
Watch Johnson’s full interview below:
WEAR News interviews Escambia County Deputy Chief of Water Safety Alex Johnson.
Further down the island, Fort Pickens was shut down. Campers were told to evacuate by 3 p.m.
“We’re going to get the wind on the coastline and possibly some erosion, coastal erosion,” Escambia County Public Safety Director Eric Gilmore. “So we’ll watch that heavily.”
Escambia County officials met with the Mobile Weather Service Monday morning. They decided where emergency relief and shelters would be staged if the storm worsens, and identified where major problem areas could be.
“Here’s the thing, we all know what Sally did,” Gilmore said. “We kind of lingered out there and had no steering cards. The next thing, we were getting it. So we just want to make sure that we’re not making any last minute decisions, just in case something goes sideways.”
Both Escambia and Santa Rosa counties are offering free sand for residents.
“We don’t know where it’s going to flood at,” Gilmore said. “It’s not going to be a widespread flooding event. It’s going to be isolated. So those people in those lowland areas, you know, they can take advantage of the sand that we have out there just in case.”
Pensacola Mayor D.C. Reeves shared a video going over the city’s preparations ahead of the storm.
The City of Pensacola’s emergency vehicles were gassed up, generators were checked and contractors with big projects — like the Baptist site, Palafox, and Fricker Center — were told to make sure their equipment was tied down.
“Our stormwater team is inspecting all of our assets,” said Reeves. “The city ponds and pump systems are being turned on now to draw water down ahead of the rain.”
Problem intersections and roadways were also identified.
“Crews were out today clearing inlets and gutters so water has somewhere to go when the rain starts,” said Reeves.
A word of advice from every official: stay weather aware.
“Just monitor, be weather aware. Make sure that they know what the storm is doing. and any intensification is not expected to get beyond the tropical storm. And, you know, with that, they’re looking at one to two foot storm surge at high tide. But just be weather aware and just keep monitoring in case anything does change.”
Right now, the Emergency Operations Center is not activated, but Gilmore says teams are still monitoring the conditions to determine if they need to.