Hurricane Idalia amid supermoon could intensify storm surge: ‘Timing is pretty bad’

An extraordinarily unique supermoon is set to raise tides Wednesday as Hurricane Idalia is expected to make landfall on Florida’s Gulf Coast.

Full moons cause higher tides because the gravitational pull of the moon and the sun are aligned. A supermoon — a full moon that occurs when its orbit is closest to Earth — can push tides into overdrive.

Experts are worried that the hurricane will yield even more treacherous tides than initially anticipated — thanks to Wednesday’s blue supermoon, a phenomenon that occurs every 10 to 20 years.

“I would say the timing is pretty bad for this one,” National Weather Service meteorologist Brian Haines — who is stationed in Charleston, South Carolina, which is along Idalia’s path and bracing for an 8-foot tide — told the Associated Press.

Locations in Florida like St. Petersburg, which is expecting 2 to 3 feet of storm surge, may see double that because of the supermoon, physical oceanographer Gary Mitchum, of the University of South Florida’s College of Marine Science, explained to FOX Weather.

He added that the Tampa Bay area is already having its “highest spring tide of the year,” referring to the aggressive “king tide” water pattern that is commonly associated with full moons.

“We’re at a stage right now where we’ve got both going on, where it’s not only a full moon, but it’s also one of our highest spring tides of the year,” he said.

Across Florida, nearly 30 counties have been given evacuation orders of varying degrees of intensity for Idalia.

Florida’s Big Bend, a geographic nickname for northern counties where the state’s panhandle meets its southward peninsula, is especially at risk of Idalia’s impacts, as it’s feared up to 15 feet of ocean water could make landfall.

Not to mention, Apalachee Bay — the waterfront just south of state capital Tallahassee and a part of the Big Bend — has never experienced a major hurricane, according to the National Weather Service.

“If you have a 15- to 30-foot storm surge, then that’s going to be devastating regardless of what the tide is,” noted Mitchum.