St. Anthony’s Hospital looked well set to ride out Hurricane Milton.
The downtown St. Petersburg hospital had its own generators and backup systems. It had 24,000 bottles of water and extra medical supplies on hand. Its location 52 feet above sea level offered protection from storm surge.
Just over 361 patients, including five evacuated from other hospitals, and 800 workers were in the 448-bed facility the night of landfall. The late-shift crew of doctors, nurses and other essential workers arrived five hours ahead of their 7 p.m. start to ensure road and bridge closures didn’t prevent them from getting to work. The day-shift crew they relieved would spend the night on cots in classrooms and other sleeping areas and be back on duty by 6 a.m…