PHOTOS: Category 4 Hurricane Helene Devastates FL, GA

TAMPA, FL — Hurricane Helene made landfall as a category 4 storm in the panhandle of Florida Thursday evening, but storm surge and winds brought damage and killed at least five people in the Tampa metro as the storm passed offshore.

One person died on a highway in Tampa because of a falling sign, according to Gov. Ron DeSantis, and another was killed in Dixie County, about two hours southeast of Tallahassee, when a tree fell on a house.

Five people died, at least two by drowning, in coastal communities in Pinellas County, Bob Gualtieri, the sheriff, said Friday morning. He said that two of the victims were found on Treasure Island, two in Indian Rocks Beach and one in Dunedin.

The storm brought dangerous storm surges and nightmarish winds to the state, knocking out power and flooding several neighborhoods in its wake. As the hurricane made its way to shore, the 14o mph winds from Helene reached nearly the same ferocity as last year's Hurricane Idalia. Over a million homes and businesses have reported power outages in Georgia, while the outage number in Florida dropped to about 978,000 by midday Friday after topping 1 million overnight.

See the photos below of the destruction the category 4 hurricane caused in the Southeast.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.