Millions Are Without Power After Milton Tore Through Florida

Also, Republicans appear poised to win control of the Senate. Here’s the latest at the end of Thursday.

Hurricane Milton carved an uneven path of destruction across Florida. It maintained hurricane-strength winds from its landfall on the Gulf Coast last night until its exit this morning into the Atlantic Ocean. Coastal neighborhoods were swallowed by storm surge, inland towns were flooded with rain and nearly three million homes and businesses — about a quarter of the state — remain without power.

The storm also caused several intense tornadoes on Florida’s Atlantic coast that killed at least five people, including some in a retirement community. Two other hurricane-related deaths were confirmed, and emergency workers rescued hundreds of people from damaged buildings and flooded vehicles. But the densely populated Tampa Bay region appeared to have been spared from the worst-case projections of the storm’s potential damage.

“Some people along the Gulf Coast are pretty relieved,” my colleague Patricia Mazzei, who spent the day reporting from the Tampa Bay area, told me. “But the ones facing a second or third flood inside their homes are exhausted.”

Patricia saw lots of wind damage in the area, but less devastating storm surge than had been expected. The winds ripped the roof off Tropicana Field, the home of Tampa’s baseball team, and slammed a tower crane into a building in downtown St. Petersburg housing the region’s major newspaper, The Tampa Bay Times.

Efforts to get people to follow evacuation orders and warnings appear to have worked. President Biden said over 80,000 Floridians safely sheltered from the storm.

For more: My colleague Jenna Russell detailed the scene when Milton crashed ashore. Here are images comparing neighborhoods before and after the storm.

Republicans appear poised to win control of the Senate

Control of the Senate appears likely to flip from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party this fall, according to new Times polls. That would significantly obstruct Kamala Harris’s ability to accomplish her goals, if she is elected.

Senator Jon Tester of Montana, the incumbent Democrat, trails his Republican challenger, Tim Sheehy by seven percentage points. The best opportunity for Democrats to secure a 50-50 split may be in Texas, where Representative Colin Allred trails Senator Ted Cruz, a Republican seeking his third term, by four percentage points.

On the campaign trail

The presidential election is 26 days away.

• Donald Trump proposed making the interest on car loans tax-deductible.
• Barack Obama is hosting a rally tonight, the first in a series to support Kamala Harris.
• Here’s everything you need to know about when to vote in your state.

Strikes in Beirut killed at least 22 people

Israeli airstrikes today in a densely populated area of central Beirut killed at least 22 people and wounded at least 117 others, Lebanese officials said. They appeared to be the deadliest strikes in Lebanon’s capital in more than a year of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.

The strikes hit an area of Beirut where displaced residents had been sheltering after weeks of bombardments. The Israeli military, which has systematically targeted Hezbollah leaders and the group’s infrastructure in Lebanon, has not yet commented on the strikes.

Rafael Nadal announced his retirement

Rafael Nadal, the 38-year-old Spanish tennis legend, released a video today to announce that he would retire after next month’s Davis Cup.

He is widely considered to be one of the greatest tennis players of all time. Nadal won 22 Grand Slam titles and was by far the most dominant clay-court player ever.

We asked some of his top rivals about what it was like to compete against Rafa, as many called him. “First he takes your legs, then your mind,” one said.

More top news

• Economy: U.S. consumer prices rose 2.4 percent in the year through September, another month of milder inflation.
• Business: TD Bank pleaded guilty and agreed to pay $3 billion in fines in a money-laundering case brought by U.S. authorities.
• Tesla: The company plans to unveil a prototype of a self-driving taxi.
• Ukraine: Parliament approved the biggest tax hike of the war to support the country’s army.
• Space: The U.S. is under a solar storm watch, which could bring visible Northern Lights to much of the country tonight, along with electrical grid problems.
• Climate: In a first, a gas utility was sued over climate-related deception claims.
• Exploration: At 18, Nima Rinji Sherpa became the youngest person to summit the world’s 14 tallest mountains.
• Health: What, exactly, is moderate drinking? Here’s how the experts think about it.
• Lives Lived: Ethel Kennedy, the widow of Robert F. Kennedy, devoted her life after his assassination to the causes he championed. She died at 96.

TIME TO UNWIND

Han Kang was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature

The Swedish Academy announced today that it had awarded this year’s Nobel Prize in Literature to the South Korean author Han Kang. She is best known for her surreal, subversive novel “The Vegetarian,” and she is the first writer from her country to receive the award.

The prize’s organizer said that Han received the honor “for her intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life.”

For more: Our critic asks if literary greatness is overrated.

This painting started a revolution

Claude Monet’s “Impression, Sunrise” is one of the most famous and influential paintings in all of French art. But it wasn’t always beloved. The work of Monet, Degas and Renoir was considered radical and unrefined when it was introduced exactly 150 years ago — the paintings were mocked by critics as simple impressions.

Now their works, which we call Impressionism, are among the most popular in the world. But before they were posters in your dentist’s waiting room, these were images of postwar life. Our critic Jason Farago urges us to embrace the defiance in their beauty.

Dinner table topics

• An in-demand choreographer: Parris Goebel is changing the way women move.
• Playoff pumpkin: Some New York Mets fans are pinning their postseason hopes on a lucky gourd.
• Ask our climate desk: How can I get so-called forever chemicals out of my life?
• The dachshund bag: Brands have embraced a new handbag shape that evokes the skinny, elongated bodies of wiener dogs.

WHAT TO DO TONIGHT

Cook: You don’t have to be a dedicated baker to yield a stunning brioche loaf.

Listen: Fresh off the big film festivals, our critics share their favorite fall movies on “The Culture Desk.”

Read: A new biography of Marie Curie also focuses on the 45 women who worked in her lab.

Dine: Here’s our list of the 25 best restaurants in Nashville right now.

Cope: Putting your own needs first often means letting others down. We asked therapists for advice on setting boundaries.

Hunt: What two-bedroom apartment can you find in London for just below 1 million British pounds?

Play: Here are today’s Spelling Bee, Wordle and Mini Crossword. Find all of our games here.

ONE LAST THING

She’s the Freud of fashion. Really.

Bella Freud says she hasn’t really read the psychoanalysis books written by her great-grandfather Sigmund Freud. But that hasn’t deterred her from adopting some of his methods for a podcast called “Fashion Neurosis.”

Rather than offering therapy, the younger Freud, a London-based designer, uses her show to ask celebrities about their innermost thoughts. On one episode, the designer Rick Owens mused that his childhood body dysmorphia might have contributed to his designs.

Have a therapeutic evening.

Thanks for reading. I’ll be back tomorrow. — Matthew

Sean Kawasaki-Culligan was our photo editor today.

We welcome your feedback. Write to us at evening@nytimes.com.