Florida Gov. Rick Scott urges evacuation ahead of 'unbelievable, massive, destructive,' 'killer' Irma

Florida Gov. Rick Scott on CBS

Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) continued to issue grave warnings to his state Saturday in advance of the arrival of Hurricane Irma. "I just want to make sure everybody understands this is an unbelievable, massive, destructive storm, and it's a killer," Scott said in a CBS appearance. "This is going to impact both of our coasts. This is a big, big, big storm," he added. "But the storm surge is what really scares me."

On Saturday morning, Irma slowed to Category 3 with winds up to 125 miles per hour. The storm began raking through the Florida Keys Saturday afternoon and is expected to move up the Gulf Coast toward Tampa overnight, ramping back up to Category 4 as it goes. More than 6 million Floridians have been ordered to evacuate. Irma could drop as much as 20 inches of rain, producing serious flooding.

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Bonnie Kristian

Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.