Sunrise Resort Community News Page

Hurricanes Helene and Milton

During September 26-27, 2024, Hurricane Helene skirted along the Gulf Coast of Florida, nearly 100 miles from land before finally making landfall as a Category 4 hurricane near Perry, Florida where it would continue to move north and completely devastate other areas in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. Helene was so large that it was able to cause major damage all along the way on the Gulf Coast and Big Bend areas of Florida. The storm surge from Helene severely impacted our entire area, especially our barrier islands and shores. Before we could get things cleaned up from Helene, less than two weeks later Hurricane Milton made landfall south of us near Siesta Key on October 9th as a Category 3 storm. We were fortunate to escape the worst of the storm surge from Milton, but the winds were severe and caused extensive damage to our area.

As always Steve Furlong was our rock prepping our Resort and then restoring it after the storm. Unfortunately,  his own home had his roof badly damaged. So many have lost so much!

The clean-up of the pool and spa and the installation of new pool/spa equipment was achieved in record time thanks to Colleen's great relationship with our vendors! We appreciate Ryan from Clear Tech Pool Service for being our knight in shining armor! He bought equipment in advance of the storm in order to minimize delays. We knew after Helene that we would almost certainly need new equipment, given the storm surge!  But it was pointless to replace with Milton enroute.  Our Owners and Guests were thrilled to have the pool and spa back in service!