2 dead in separate Florida car crashes prior to Idalia making landfall

Two Florida men died in separate, single-vehicle crashes early Wednesday morning as the outer bands of Hurricane Idalia lashed the region with heavy rain.

The Florida Highway Patrol said the first crash happened just before 6 a.m. on a long curve on Southeast Hawthorne Road, just southeast of Gainesville, Fox 35 Orlando reported. A 59-year-old man failed to negotiate the curve in heavy rain and his Toyota pickup truck crossed over a ditch and crashed into the woods, according to the news station.

The man was pronounced dead at the scene by Alachua County Fire Rescue, Fox 35 reported.

The second fatal crash took place just minutes later but about 100 miles south of Gainesville, according to the news station. A 40-year-old man, also in a pickup, was driving “too fast for the conditions” when his truck left the road and hit a tree, FHP said. He died at the scene, Fox 35 reported.

While there is no standard methodology for calculating the death toll of extreme weather events like Hurricane Idalia, according to the Associated Press, the two fatal crashes are among the first deaths that could be indirectly attributed to the storm. The National Hurricane Center tallies death tolls using only “direct deaths,” which include fatalities caused by a storm surge, falling trees or flying debris. These causes of death are relatively rare and can underestimate the effects of a natural disaster.

According to the AP, death tolls are often reported as a range of “excess deaths” during the time period around the disaster. The methodology takes time, but a statistical spike in deaths in connection with a hurricane is more likely to incorporate all deaths, both direct and indirect.