board up

“All the landscaping was gone. The boathouse was a mess. The bandstand was boarded up.”

After residents emptied their rooms, the workers “boarded up the doors in front of our faces and then they gave us the check,” Phillips said.

A short walk through the town centre to the Market Place takes in empty shop after empty shop – some boarded up, others with "to let" signs propped up in the windows.

The building's windows are boarded up so the drones can't look inside, but the minute anyone steps out of the door, they are at risk of being hit.

With Hurricane Milton making landfall in Florida on Wednesday evening, millions of Sunshine State residents have evacuated their homes or boarded up businesses to brace for the impending storm.