FL Death Toll From Hurricane Isaias Rises To 6, DeSantis Says

Several days after Hurricane Isaias slammed into the western Florida panhandle, the state’s death toll from the storm has climbed to six, Gov. Ron DeSantis said during a Tuesday news conference.

Isaias made landfall near Destin around 9:30 p.m. ET as a Category 2 storm with maximum sustained winds of 105 mph.

Over the weekend, four deaths were linked to the storm — two in Florida and two in Alabama.

A woman was killed when a tree fell on her Escambia County home, Sheriff Chip Simmons said in a Monday news conference. Her husband, who was in the same room at the time, was injured when the tree crashed through their roof and is expected to survive.

At another Escambia County home, a man died of carbon monoxide poisoning from a generator running in his closed garage, Simmons said.

In Alabama, one person died when a tree fell on a house in Birmingham, while another was killed in a motor vehicle crash involving a downed tree in Barbour County, authorities there said.

DeSantis said during Tuesday’s news conference, which was shared by C-SPAN, that there are four additional deaths connected to Isaias in Florida, bringing the total number to six.

The governor called the newly confirmed deaths “a little bit more post-storm, attenuated from the storm.”

One person died “in a tragic accident” while trying to remove trees damaged in the storm, DeSantis said.

Another was killed in a car crash at an intersection where the traffic signal was out after the storm, “and then two people who had disruptions to some of their medical treatment,” the governor said.

DeSantis added, "You know, the way Florida's typically done this is, it's not just if the storm knocks over your house and somebody gets killed for that to count. They kind of link anything that's even a fallout from the storm.”