Hurricane Isaias makes U.S. Gulf coast landfall as Category 2 storm

FEMA prepares response as storm tests agency after staffing cuts

Hurricane Isaias pushed ashore late Friday along the northern U.S. Gulf coast as a Category 2 storm with sustained winds of 105 mph, making it the first Atlantic hurricane of what has been a very late 2026 season. The National Weather Service warned that Isaias could produce a “life-threatening storm surge” along parts of the northern Gulf coast, where churning winds force ocean water up onto land and the storm’s lower atmospheric pressure helps squeeze the water ashore.

The National Hurricane Center warned that the storm would bring a “life threatening” storm surge and “devastating winds likely across the Florida panhandle and Alabama coasts.” Up to 9 feet of storm surge was forecast between Dauphin Island, Alabama, and Indian Pass, Florida. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration warned that surge could reach from southeast Louisiana to Suwannee in northeastern Florida. The shallower the continental shelf, the higher the threat of a dangerous surge, and water from a surge can take a couple of days to fully subside.

Isaias could bring 4 to 8 inches of rain, with locally higher totals up to 15 inches (380 millimeters), across parts of the Gulf coast. Forecasters warned of significant flash and river flooding, especially across southern Alabama, the Florida Panhandle and southwestern Georgia. The NHC said 2 to 5 inches would fall across much of the remainder of the Southeast, with localized higher amounts up to 10 inches possible in the southern Appalachians and coastal Carolinas. Hurricane-force winds were expected to spread inland as far as 100 miles (160 kilometers) from the Alabama coast, the NHC said, and warnings were issued of possible tornadoes in Isaias’s outer rain bands late Friday or Saturday.

Governors in Florida, Georgia and Alabama declared states of emergency. Mandatory evacuations were ordered in some coastal communities, and evacuation shelters opened across Florida, Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi. About 5,000 National Guard troops were expected to mobilize in Florida, where at least four school districts cancelled late-week classes.

The American Red Cross said it was supporting the response with more than 370 trained disaster workers and was pre-positioning cots, blankets, shelf-stable meals and other supplies across the region.

Before the storm arrived, oil and gas producers shut down a significant share of offshore production in the Gulf of Mexico, which accounts for almost 15 percent of crude oil pumped annually in the United States.

El Niño conditions have shaped a quieter-than-usual Atlantic season this year. While the pattern warms sea-surface temperatures in the Pacific, where storm activity has been greater, it also increases wind shear — changes in wind speed and direction with height — over the Atlantic, which can disrupt tropical storms before they strengthen into hurricanes. The Atlantic hurricane season runs from June 1 through the end of November, with the typical peak running from mid-August to mid-October.

Isaias is the first hurricane to make U.S. landfall since Hurricane Milton came ashore near Siesta Key, Florida, on October 9, 2024. Milton followed Hurricane Helene by roughly a month; Helene killed more than 250 people and was the deadliest hurricane to strike the mainland United States since Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Isaias is also expected to test the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s capacity to respond to a major hurricane after significant staffing cuts and an overhaul of the agency under the Trump administration. About 17 percent of FEMA’s workforce departed in fiscal year 2025 as part of the administration’s push to downsize the agency and shift more responsibility to states. Chris Currie, director of homeland security and justice at the Government Accountability Office, said the staffing reductions were not carried out systematically to ensure FEMA could still meet its statutory obligations. “It’s not whether FEMA is going to respond. They’re going to respond. It’s more about the depth,” Currie said.

FEMA, in a statement, said it was deploying Incident Management Assistance Teams to Alabama and Florida, embedding personnel in state emergency operations centers, and pre-positioning emergency supplies at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama, to supplement state resources if requested.