Strength of Isaias catches Bagdad residents by surprise

Before Isaias touched down, many Milton and Bagdad residents would have never imagined that this hurricane would send trees through their roofs and into their living rooms.

James Sutton, who has lived in Milton’s Sundial Estates for 25 years, has never seen any destruction like this in his neighborhood.

“This is the worst one, including Ivan. I think there was tornado embedded in this storm, because the damage we’ve seen driving around is unheard of,” Sutton said.

While Hurricane Sally did strip limbs off his property’s trees, Isaias wedged an entire tree onto the roof of his home, roots exposed.

He was in a different section of the home when it happened, but he followed the drip-drip-drip of his leaking roof to see where it had create a hole, and he heard water seeping through in the darkness.

“My wife lit candles and all, that was the only light we had, and we just listened to the wind blow,” Sutton said. “Just sitting there in the dark, you hear your limbs pelt the house, and acorns pelting the house, and stuff like that. So I knew I was getting hit.”

“I looked out and could see this mound there, and I thought it was just a limb that had fallen down, because I heard this ‘thump,’ and I was hoping it was just a limb instead of the tree,” Sutton said.

While the tree was still lodged Sunday afternoon, Sutton’s yard was immaculate, thanks to a crew of volunteers from Voyage Church who pitched in to bag debris from his yard earlier that morning. Other church crews were out and about helping, one even traveling across state lines from Alabama.

Nearby in the Bagdad area, Wendy Smith is still waiting for insurance to come through for her tree removal, with limbs visible in two different rooms in her home. Tree removal companies flooded her front porch with business cards after climbing over protruding tree limbs guarding her front door.

“I wasn’t that worried (about Isaias) because I’d gone through Ivan, and I thought this was only gonna be a (category) 2,” Smith said. “I didn’t think that was gonna be that bad. And it wasn’t that bad, until it was. Then all of a sudden, it was just really, really strong, powerful, roaring winds, and all the trees started breaking.”

Smith was sitting in her living room when she saw the limbs poke through, water beginning to leak through. In another room, underneath the tree is a pile of insulation on her wet carpet.

She had a gut feeling that her neighbor’s tree was at risk and she urged her family to move away from the front door when she heard debris pattering against it before the entire tree fell. She could tell how strong the wind was by the sound.

“It was just a loud roaring noise. I mean, like, just a constant loud noise. So even if there was a tornado, I wouldn’t have been able to hear it because the winds were so strong and so loud,” Smith said. “It was constant.”

Her mother sheltered with Smith and husband and she kept asking if the tree had fallen yet. While there were a few false alarms. Smith knew that they would know with certainty when it happened.

“I said, ‘When and if it hits the house…it’s gonna sound like a bomb going off.’ And sure enough, it did. It was like, ‘boom!'” Smith recalled. “She screamed, and I said, ‘OK, it’s down now.'”

The limbs that now live in her ceiling is just one thing on her family’s list of problems to solve, including firing up their generator to cook breakfast without power, or navigating the flooding in her hair salon before she can get back to work.

As she surveys her neighborhood, she could tell her home isn’t even the worst one.

All around her neighborhood, trees have barricaded back yards, power lines blocking roads, an RV overturned, and many homes still operating without power on Sunday.

This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Strength of Isaias catches Bagdad residents by surprise

Reporting by Brittany Misencik, Pensacola News Journal / Pensacola News Journal

This story was originally published October 11, 2026 at 2:37 PM.