Hurricane Milton is continuing to rapidly intensify before its expected landfall along Florida’s Gulf Coast sometime Wednesday. The National Hurricane Center on Monday issued a hurricane watch for a stretch of the coastline including Tampa Bay, which remained roughly in the middle of the forecast cone.

Milton, which became a hurricane Sunday, is predicted to reach Category 3 status and capable of causing ''devastating damage.''

Hurricane Milton’s forecast cone covers almost the entire west coast of Florida as the state prepared for the largest mass evacuation since 2017. Milton could be a major hurricane when it