Tropical Storm Nicole may have stirred up the Gulf of Mexico enough to send red tide onto beaches in Sarasota County.

The state Department of Health said elevated levels of the toxin have been found at all 16 beaches in the county. Medium levels have also been reported in Manatee County, at Anna Maria Island and Longboat Pass. Health officials recommend that anyone experiencing irritation of the eye, nose or throat to stay indoors, run your air conditioner and avoid the beach.

Red tide is is caused when algae grows out of control. The name “red tide” comes from the fact that overgrown algae can cause the water to change color.

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It closed because of high winds this morning just before seven.

Officials in Sarasota and Manatee Counties say some services that were closed ahead of the storm are beginning to reopen.

Manatee County Animal Welfare’s three shelters reopened at 1 this afternoon along with several library branches and the county's one "safe haven" storm shelter is now closed.

Sporadic power outages have been reported in both Manatee and Sarasota Counties but officials say they don't expect long term issues with restoration.

Bus and transit service along with storm debris pickup will resume tomorrow in both counties.

Jamie Carson, a spokesperson with Sarasota County, says officials continue to monitor conditions.

"Everything else is business as usual in Sarasota County, we continue to ask drivers when your on the roadways to proceed with caution, allow for some extra travel time, and please be patient out there."

Little change in strength is expected while Nicole is over the Gulf of Mexico as it makes its way to Florida's panhandle tonight.

Several bridges and roads on the Space Coast and First Coast are closed Thursday following flooding and erosion from Tropical Storm Nicole.

Nicole has brought significant road closures from New Smyrna Beach up through Jacksonville. New Smyrna Beach, Port Orange, Ormond Beach and Daytona Beach have closed bridges to barrier islands. Flooded coastal roads, and in some cases major road erosion, have been reported in Flagler Beach, Crescent Beach, Vilano Beach and in the City of St. Augustine.

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There was a lot of rain and wind today, but the city of Tampa reports little damage.

During a Thursday news conference, Mayor Jane Castor said the city experienced gusts as high as 49 mph.

"That means a lot of tree limbs, some trees downed, some power lines down as well," Castor said. "I've been in contact with Archie Collins from TECO, and they have wavered between 12,000 and 19,000 customers out of electricity."

Castor said Tampa International Airport has been kept open, but about 75% of the flights have been cancelled. Some localized flooding was reported, mostly along Bayshore Boulevard and south Tampa.

Gov. Ron DeSantis

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After Hurricane Nicole made landfall early Thursday south of Vero Beach and started traveling up the state as a tropical storm, Gov. Ron DeSantis called it less “significant” than September’s Category 4 Hurricane Ian.

But DeSantis said he anticipated that Nicole, which made landfall as a Category 1 hurricane before heading to Central Florida and North Florida, would cause flooding and further damage coastal areas that sustained erosion in Ian.

“This is obviously not as significant storm as Hurricane Ian was, but coming on the heels of that, you're seeing communities, particularly in the Volusia County area, that had a lot of that erosion on the coastline,” DeSantis said during a midmorning news conference at the state Emergency Operations Center. “This has put some of those structures in jeopardy, and they've been working very hard to make sure everybody's safe.”

Nicole’s winds had knocked out power to about 330,000 electricity customers, with outages covering 23 percent of Brevard County, 17 percent of Indian River and smaller percentages in Seminole, Volusia, Putnam and Orange counties, DeSantis said.

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Dan Scanlan

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WJCT

Heavy rains from Tropical Storm Nicole are flooding roads in Jacksonville.

You can see some powerful images here from our coverage partners at WJCT.

Walt Disney World will reopen this afternoon using a staggered approach.

All four theme parks will welcome back residents and visitors, as the eye of the storm passed over the Osceola County area leaving it mostly unscathed earlier in the day.

Here’s the reopening schedule:

• Magic Kingdom Park: Noon-6 p.m. (Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party is scheduled for 7 p.m.-midnight.)
• EPCOT: 1-9 p.m.
• Disney’s Animal Kingdom Theme Park: 1-7 p.m.
• Disney’s Hollywood Studios: 2-10 p.m. (Fantasmic! will not be presented today)

Transportation to the parks will start running a half hour before each individual park reopens.

Disney water parks and mini-golf locations will remain closed today. For more updates, follow @waltdisneyworld and @disneyparks.

Universal is also supposed to reopen its parks in a staggered approach today.

Florida Power and Light: 149,873
Duke Energy: 94,032
TECO: 18,209
Withlacoochee River Power COOP: 2,219

More than 350,000 are without power across the state.

Wilfredo Lee

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AP

Tropical Storm Nicole hit Florida as a hurricane Thursday, sending hits highest storm surges to places that lost their seawalls during Hurricane Ian only weeks before. In Daytona Beach Shores, rising seas threatened the foundations of at least a dozen high-rise condos and houses.

Nicole remains a sprawling tropical storm, covering nearly the entire weather-weary state of Florida at one point early Thursday while also reaching into Georgia and the Carolinas. Tropical storm-force winds extended as far as 450 miles (720 kilometers) from the center in some directions as Nicole turned northward over Central Florida.

Krista Dowling Goodrich, who manages 130 rental homes in Daytona Beach Shores as director of sales and marketing at Salty Dog Vacations, witnessed the beachfront disappear behind some of the properties as evacuations were under way just ahead of the storm. She was trying to reach the scene Thursday morning to see how they fared.

“While we were there the whole backyard just started collapsing into the ocean. It went all the way up to the house,” she said. The water also compromised the remaining land between a row of tall condominium buildings nearby, she said.

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Gov. Ron DeSantis provides an update on Tropical Storm Nicole:

Krista Dowling Goodrich, who manages 130 rental homes in Daytona Beach Shores as director of sales and marketing at Salty Dog Vacations, witnessed the beachfront disappear behind some of the properties as evacuations were under way.

“While we were there the whole backyard just started collapsing into the ocean. It went all the way up to the house,” she said. The water also compromised the remaining land between a row of tall condominium buildings nearby, she said.

Officials in Daytona Beach Shores deemed multiple multi-story coastal residential buildings unsafe, and went door-to-door telling people to grab their possessions and leave.

“These were the tall highrises. So the people who wouldn’t leave, they were physically forcing them out because it’s not safe,” Goodrich said. “I’m concerned for the infrastructure of the area right now because once the seawalls are gone, they’re not going to just let people go back in ... there will be a lot of people displaced for a while."

The St. Johns River has risen again to a major flood stage in Astor due to Tropical Storm Nicole.

The river was less than 3 inches below the record level on Thursday morning.

The National Weather Service also reports that water levels have risen to a moderate stage near DeLand, at Sanford and above Lake Harney.

The river had dropped significantly in the weeks following Hurricane Ian.

As of 8:30 a.m., the following customers are without power:

Tampa Electric: 18,337

Florida Power & Light: 163,133

You can find updated power outage numbers here.

Click here to check your flight status.

Tropical Storm Nicole is starting to knock out power across parts of the state and the greater Tampa Bay region.

As of 6 a.m., 6,373 Tampa Electric customers are without power, along with 2,864 in Polk county.

Widespread power outages are also being reported along Florida's east coast, where Nicole made landfall near Vero Beach around 3 a.m.

You can click here for county-by-county power outage updates.

Florida Public Radio Emergency Network

Tropical Storm Nicole made landfall around 3 a.m. near Vero Beach. The path is taking it closer to the greater Tampa Bay area, and we could see heavy winds and rains most of Thursday.

WUSF's Steve Newborn talked with Megan Borowski, a meteorologist with the Florida Public Radio Emergency Network, about what we can expect to see from Nicole.

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Hurricane Nicole made landfall Thursday at approximately 3 AM near Vero Beach and will continue to bring rain, wind, and an isolated tornado risk to the central and northern half of the state through Thursday.

Much of the state will experience tropical-storm-force winds Thursday, as well as continued storm surge along both the east coast and Nature Coast along the Gulf of Mexico.

Nicole is forecast to move across the Peninsula in a generally northwest direction. The center of Nicole is forecast to nearly parallel the Nature Coast through Thursday evening before moving into the Panhandle.

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Tropical Storm Nicole forced people from their homes in the Bahamas and threatened to grow into a rare November hurricane in Florida, shutting down theme parks and airports while prompting evacuation orders that included former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago club.

Hundreds of people sought shelter in the northwestern Bahamas before the approaching storm, which had already sent seawater washing across roads on barrier islands in Florida.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center said the center of the sprawling storm make landfall on Great Abaco island around midday with estimated maximum sustained winds of 70 mph.

“We are forecasting it to become a hurricane as it nears the northwestern Bahamas, and remain a hurricane as it approaches the east coast of Florida," Daniel Brown, a senior hurricane specialist at the Miami-based National Hurricane Center, said earllier Wednesday.

Nicole is the first storm to hit the Bahamas since Hurricane Dorian, a Category 5 storm that devastated the archipelago in 2019, before hitting Florida.

National Hurricane Center

Portions of Florida's west coast — including the greater Tampa Bay region — are under a tropical storm warning as Tropical Storm Nicole continues to strengthen as it approaches the state just shy of hurricane strength.

The National Hurricane Center issued the warning along the west coast, from Bonita Beach to Indian Pass, and a storm surge watch is in effect from Tarpon Springs north to Indian Pass.

As of Wednesday at 4 p.m., Nicole was located about 135 miles east of West Palm Beach and moving west at 13 mph. Maximum sustained winds are 70 mph with higher gusts.

Nicole is forecast to make landfall on Wednesday night.

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Seminole County Emergency Manager Alan Harris says residents should prepare for flooding during and after Nicole. 

Harris says several key areas that flooded during Hurricane Ian are expected to flood again, causing more damage to the area.

He says residents who live in mobile homes or low-lying flood prone areas are encouraged to evacuate to a family or friend’s home or to an emergency shelter.

> Read more from our coverage partners at WMFE.

NASA is again postponing the launch of its new moon rocket because of a storm threatening the state.

Fuel leaks have kept the rocket grounded since August. Then Hurricane Ian forced the rocket back to the hangar at Kennedy Space Center at the end of September.

The rocket was moved back to the pad last week, and NASA was aiming for a launch attempt early Monday.

But on Tuesday, the space agency said it was delaying the launch until at least next Wednesday because of Tropical Storm Nicole, which is expected to hit Florida's Atlantic coastline as a Category 1 hurricane on Wednesday.

The space center was under a hurricane warning but NASA is keeping the rocket at the launch pad. NASA said the rocket is designed to withstand heavy rains and high wind.

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Tropical Storm Warnings have now spread into North Central Florida with Nicole expected to bring heavy winds and rain to much of the state on Thursday.

Schools across the greater Tampa Bay region will be closed on Thursday, along with universities and government offices.

Here a list of closures, shelters, and sandbag locations throughout the area. This list will be updated as more information becomes available.

Tropical Storm Nicole is set to begin impacting Florida Wednesday, with tropical storm conditions continuing into Thursday.

Counties in Florida have started calling evacuation orders and opening shelters as Nicole approaches. Find out if you reside in an evacuation zone here.

You can also find if you live in a flood-prone area here.

Note that different counties use different evacuation terminology, but regardless of whether a voluntary or mandatory evacuation is called for your area, emergency managers suggest you take the order seriously.

> Updates on evacuation orders