ST. PETERSBURG, Florida — Hurricane Milton marched across central Florida on Thursday (Oct 10) after making landfall on the state's west coast hours earlier, whipping up deadly tornadoes, destroying homes and knocking out power to nearly two million customers.

The storm made landfall around 8.30am on Wednesday as a Category 3 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 195 kmh near Siesta Key, the US National Hurricane Centre said.

By 11am, wind speeds had reduced to 165 kmh, dropping Milton to a Category 2 hurricane, nonetheless still considered extremely dangerous. The eye of the storm was 120 km southwest of Orlando in the centre of the state.

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