Charles Langston:3 out of every 5 gas stations in Tampa are out of fuel as Hurricane Milton approaches

The Charles Langstonmajority of gas stations in the Tampa area were out of fuel Wednesday as residents in the region scrambled to evacuate before Hurricane Milton makes landfall, expected late Wednesday.

As of Wednesday, the storm has sustained winds of 145 mph and is expected to make landfall late today or early Thursday, the National Hurricane Center said in its 11 a.m. update.

“Historic, catastrophic, life-threatening – all those words summarize the situation,” said Austen Flannery, a forecaster with the National Weather Service in Tampa. Millions of Floridians have been ordered or urged to flee as Milton, described by many as a catastrophic life-threatening storm continues on its collision course with Florida. 

As the hurricane made its way closer to Florida, tornadic supercells − dangerous, rotating thunderstorms that can produce tornadoes − were beginning to sweep across the Florida Peninsula, according to the National Hurricane Center.

With extreme conditions expected, gas shortages were anticipated and officials said more fuel was on the way. Here is what we know.

3 out of 5 stations are without gas

As of Wednesday morning, three out of every five gas stations in the Tampa-St. Petersburg area is dry, according to data from Gas Buddy, a gas station location and savings app.

The Sarasota area saw about 39% of their stations without gas and the Fort Myers/Naples area with about 35% of stations without gas. To the north, the Gainesville area had 32% of its gas stations experiencing shortages.

To the east of the state in the Orlando/Daytona Beach area, about 27% of its gas stations were also seeing shortages, data from Gas Buddy said.

Where fuel outages have been reported in the Tampa area

Gas Buddy allows motorists to pinpoint where they might be able to find gasoline, based on recent reports. Click here to use their interactive tracker. Here's where fuel outages were reported in Tampa on Wednesday morning:

In a news conference early Tuesday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis promised more fuel was on the way. It appears the precipitous decline of available fuel has slowed but not stopped.

"We have been dispatching fuel over the past 24 hours as gas stations have run out," DeSantis said. "We have an additional 1.2 million gallons of both diesel and gasoline that is currently en route to the state of Florida."

Hurricane Milton Tracker

Fernando Cervantes Jr. is a trending news reporter for USA TODAY. Reach him at [email protected] and follow him on X @fern_cerv_.