Gov. Ron DeSantis warned on Monday that uncertainty over Milton’s precise path would lead to evacuations over a wide area, especially because the memory of Hurricane Ian was still fresh in Southwest Florida. That storm killed 150 people in 2022, some of whom did not heed calls to evacuate to the mainland from barrier-island communities.

Stores across the central Florida region saw runs on bottled water, flashlights, and generators. Long lines of vehicles jockeyed for sand and sandbags — scarce, in some places that offered