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Hurricane Idalia is picking up steam: It's expected to bring 100-plus mph winds, destructive storm surge, and heavy rains to Florida.

Many of the worst impacts will happen in parts of the state's Gulf Coast, where Idalia will make landfall Wednesday morning. For those interested in following or understanding the effects of such a powerful storm, there are a number of live webcams showing the event, which you watch below.

Idalia, a tropical storm on Monday, has now intensified into a Category 4 hurricane as of Wednesday morning. The National Hurricane Center observed rapid intensification of the storm as conditions become more favorable for a hurricane, notably the decrease in wind shear (which are winds that can impede the formation of a strong, coherent storm). What's more, Idalia has traveled over extremely warm ocean water, which provides energy for these storms. The water in Idalia's path is the warmest it's been in at least decades.

This all set the stage for the storm to strengthen.

"We expect it to rapidly intensify," Joel Cline, the National Weather Service Tropical Program manager, told Mashable on Monday evening. "This will be a rapid intensifier from a tropical storm."

Although an intense storm is unfortunate news for many people in the Florida region, the good news is this intensification expectation has been forecast days in advance, allowing people to follow the informed guidance from local officials, Cline noted.

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SEE ALSO: Why the U.S. will get a whole lotta sea level rise

The impacts will be serious.

"There is a danger of life-threatening storm surge inundation from Idalia along portions of the Florida Gulf Coast where a Storm Surge Warning is in effect, including Tampa Bay & the Big Bend," the National Hurricane Center wrote. "Residents in these areas should follow advice from local officials." (Storm surge is caused by potent winds pushing water into the shore, at times causing violent inundations.)

Heavy rains from Idalia pose great risk, too. In recent years, freshwater flooding from heavy deluges has driven the majority of tropical storm-caused deaths. After landfall, Idalia will weaken but still carry potent rain bands over Florida, in a wide area between Tallahassee and Jacksonville. The ocean will certainly cause coastal flooding, but expect lots of flooding from rainfall in both coastal and inland areas.

"The rain will come down heavily at times," Tony Fracasso, a National Weather Service meteorologist, told Mashable.

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Tampa Bay Riverfront webcam

Tampa Bay is expected to see some four to seven feet of storm surge, along with hurricane force winds.

St. George Island beach cam

A rental vacation home on St. George Island shows a clear view of the beach. This region will experience some storm surge.

Frenchy's Clearwater Beach Cam

Live footage of Clearwater Beach from Frenchy’s Rockaway Grill. Clearwater beach is located just west of Tampa.

Homosassa Springs live webcam

This webcam is situated just inland of the coastal Homosassa region, at Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park. Some of Florida's iconic manatees live in these springs.

Gulf Coast live webcams

The following live webcams aren't on YouTube, so they couldn't be embedded in this post like the livesteams above, but they are situated close to where Hurricane Idalia will make landfall. You'll have to click on the links:

- Homosassa Live View: A webcam at MacRae's of Homosassa, just inland of Crystal River National Wildlife Refuge.

- Cedar Key Beach Webcam: Live webcams at Cedar Key, Florida, near where Hurricane Idalia will make landfall.

- St. George Island Webcam: St. George Island, located in the NHC's "Hurricane Warning" zone, is located off the Florida Panhandle.

How is Hurricane Idalia related to climate change?

Climate change is impacting hurricanes. Some of these impacts are clear, particularly more serious rainfall and historic flooding, along with higher storm surges. Other impacts, like how the relentless warming oceans are affecting how strong these storms grow, are an intensive and ongoing area of research.

An enormous stretch of seaweed measuring 5,000 miles wide is set to bring stench, pests, and bacteria to the beaches of Florida and Mexico.

The "Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt" is a massive bloom of brown algae that stretches from the coast of West Africa to the Gulf of Mexico. It is the largest seaweed bloom in the world — weighing approximately 20 million tons — and is visible from outer space.

This year's bloom is the biggest on record for the month of March, and it's expected to grow from here, peaking in June or July. Scientists are increasingly concerned about the impacts of the algae.

It's important to note that seaweed is usually fairly innocuous and actually has benefits like providing habitats for fish and absorbing carbon dioxide. But that's when it's out in the open ocean.

Sargassum, like the bloom spanning about twice the width of the US right now, could wreak havoc on beaches as ocean currents push the brown algae towards land.

Because once the seaweed reaches shore, "the [blooms] degrade water quality, they smell bad, they attract insects and bacteria, they chase away tourists. It's a bad impact on the economy," Chuanmin Hu, a professor of oceanography at the University of South Florida College of Marine Science who leads a team to monitor and track sargassum blooms using satellites, told Insider.

The algae can also destroy coastal ecosystems, suffocate coral, harm wildlife, threaten infrastructure, and decrease air quality.

As beached sargassum dies and rots, it has a distinct rotten-egg smell, which has caused a huge problem for tourism in both Mexico and Florida.

Hotels and resorts in Mexico, for example, spend millions each year to get rid of beaches of sargassum, hiring workers to collect it and move it elsewhere.

"Increasing sargassum blooms are good for the ocean ecosystem, but pretty bad for some local residents," Hu said.

It's a mystery why sargassum blooms are growing

There are hundreds of different species of sargassum. Some of those that populate the Atlantic Ocean grow on the surface of the water, since they don't form roots to attach themselves to rocks like other algae.

This makes it easy for small clumps to move together and form larger clumps as winds between South Africa and the Gulf of Mexico push them together, Hu said. That's what makes the great seaweed belt across the Atlantic each spring and summer.

"We have a lot of such clumps, but only 0.1% of the ocean surface within this belt is covered by this plant," Hu said. "Sargassum does not fully cover any part of the ocean, and sargassum is not toxic."

Still, the consequences of the Sargassum Belt have concerned scientists for the past decade. Experts say this year's bloom is particularly alarming, according to reporting by Denise Chow for NBC News published Saturday.

"It's incredible," Brian LaPointe, a research professor at Florida Atlantic University's Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute, told NBC News. "What we're seeing in the satellite imagery does not bode well for a clean beach year."

LaPointe, who has studied sargassum for four decades, told the news outlet that beaches in Key West are already being covered with the algae, despite the piles usually washing ashore in May. Beaches in Mexico — like in Cancun, Playa del Carmen, and Tulum — are also preparing for a large build-up of sargassum this week.

Blooms have continued to grow, on average, larger and larger over the past five years. In 2018 and 2022 having record-breaking increases, Brian Barnes, an assistant research professor at the University of South Florida's College of Marine Science, told NBC News.

This year is approaching these records, and could surpass them, Hu said.

One study in 2019 suggested that deforestation and fertilizer use may be responsible for the alarming rate at which the mass is growing — the effects of which are all exacerbated by climate change.

"I think I've replaced my climate change anxiety with sargassum anxiety," Patricia Estridge, CEO of Seaweed Generation, told The Guardian.

"Both climate change and human activity play a role, but nobody can tell how much each one contributes to this. There are multiple factors because the Atlantic ocean is huge," Hu said. "It's a complex picture. That's all we can say now, and we're still doing research to understand why."

This post has been updated. It was originally published on March 15, 2023.

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A raft of brown-colored seaweed in the Atlantic Ocean is so vast it can be seen from space.

Spanning roughly 5,000 miles — about twice the width of the United States — the thick blanket of sargassum floats between the Gulf of Mexico and the shores of West Africa.

In open water, these giant mats of algae are mostly harmless and even have some benefits, including serving as a habitat for certain fish and crustaceans and absorbing carbon dioxide. But ocean currents are pushing sargassum west, causing hundreds of tons of seaweed to wash up on beaches across the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico.

There, it can choke corals, wreak havoc on coastal ecosystems and diminish water and air quality as it rots.

Scientists say this bloom is one of the largest on record, stoking fears that seaweed invasions of beaches in the coming weeks and months could be particularly severe.

"It’s incredible," said Brian LaPointe, a research professor at Florida Atlantic University’s Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute. "What we’re seeing in the satellite imagery does not bode well for a clean beach year."

Sargassum’s growth varies from season to season. LaPointe, who has studied it for four decades, said huge piles typically come ashore in South Florida in May, but beaches in Key West are already being inundated with algae. Parts of Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula, including Cancun, Playa del Carmen and Tulum, are preparing for up to 3 feet of sargassum buildup in the coming days.

Giant mounds of sargassum are more than a nuisance and an eyesore, said Brian Barnes, an assistant research professor at the University of South Florida’s College of Marine Science.

"Even if it’s just out in coastal waters, it can block intake valves for things like power plants or desalination plants, marinas can get completely inundated and boats can’t navigate through," he said. "It can really threaten critical infrastructure."

Last summer, the U.S. Virgin Islands declared a state of emergency after unusually high quantities of sargassum caused water shortages on St. Croix.

Other impacts to human health are coming into focus. As the seaweed rots, it releases hydrogen sulfide, which can cause respiratory problems for tourists and residents in the vicinity, LaPointe said.

"Following the big 2018 blooms, doctors in Martinique and Guadeloupe reported thousands of people going to clinics with breathing complications from the air that was coming off these rotting piles of sargassum," he said.

Then there are the economic concerns. Sargassum invasions can stifle tourism, and removing hundreds of tons of algae from beaches is costly.

Scientists noticed more than a decade ago that sargassum blooms were beginning to grow at staggering rates. Researchers have since documented the algae's proliferation in the tropical Atlantic.

"Before 2011, it was there but we couldn’t observe it with satellites because it wasn’t dense enough," Barnes said. "Since then, it has just exploded and we now see these huge aggregations."

A 2019 study in the journal Science estimated that more than 20 million metric tons of sargassum blanketed the Atlantic in what has been nicknamed the "Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt."

Barnes said the mass of seaweed appears to be increasing each year, but 2018 and 2022 had the largest accumulations. This year is approaching those records, he added.

In investigating the factors driving this dramatic growth in sargassum, scientists, including LaPointe, have found that human activities and climate change are seeding rivers that flow into the Atlantic with nitrogen and other nutrients. That then feeds the algae blooms.

"You have the Congo, the Amazon, the Orinoco, the Mississippi — the largest rivers on the planet, which have been affected by things like deforestation, increasing fertilizer use and burning biomass," LaPointe said. "All of that is increasing the nitrogen concentrations in these rivers and so we’re now seeing these blooms as kind of a manifestation of the changing nutrient cycles on our planet."

Many of these effects are exacerbated by climate change, he said, which can increase flooding and runoff into major waterways.

Typically, floating rafts of sargassum accumulate in a part of the North Atlantic called the Sargasso Sea. The Gulf Stream shuttles the plants around the Atlantic basin, which allows the seaweed to spread and take hold in different parts of the ocean.

Barnes and his University of South Florida colleagues use NASA satellite data to map the Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt and its movements. The bloom’s size in recent years would have been inconceivable decades ago, he said.

"Historically, as far back as we have records, sargassum has been a part of the ecosystem, but the scale now is just so much bigger," Barnes said. "What we would have thought was a major bloom five years ago is no longer even a blip."

Denise Chow

Denise Chow is a reporter for NBC News Science focused on general science and climate change.

Josiah Acheampong contributed.

FLORIDA - CONTENT WARNING: The following story contains graphic images of a shark bite that might be disturbing to some viewers.

2 shark bites in 24 hours in Florida

2 shark bites in 24 hours in Florida

Two people reported shark bites within 24 hours. One of them said he's chalking it up to a lesson of knowing when to come back to shore.

Two surfers in Central Florida were bitten by a shark in under 24 hours this week.

Bill Eveland was surfing Monday afternoon in Satellite Beach with his friends when he noticed pods of mullet nearby. One of his friends decided to head back to shore, but Eveland went in for one last set.

"When I came up from the wave is when the shark kind of hit a glancing blow to my lower right back, and I knew I'd been hit," Eveland said. "I glanced to the right and I could see the back end of the shark coming off, like where my board [was] and enter back into the water."

Caught in the middle of a feeding frenzy, he waited safely on his board before making his way back. His shark encounter cost him a trip to urgent care and 25 stitches.

While he doesn’t regret his decision, he has learned his lesson.

"I pushed my luck a little bit too far. I probably shouldn't have paddled out. I should've paddled in after that last wave. And now I learned from that, you know, chalk it up to a learning experience and a cool story," Eveland said.

On Tuesday morning, another surfer miles north in New Smyrna Beach came face to face with a shark.

Volusia County Beach Safety said the 38-year-old South Carolina man had jumped off a wave near the jetty and encountered a shark underwater which bit his face. He suffered non-life-threatening injuries.

Gavin Naylor, director of the University of Florida's Program for Shark Research, said what happened to the surfer is unusual.

"A bite on the face is really rotten luck, and I feel bad for the guy," he said. "If he landed on it, then the shark probably felt sort of violated, turned round and responded and bit him on the face."

With surfers hoping to take advantage of the high surf brought on by Hurricane Lee this week, Eveland has one piece of advice.

"When those mullet pods are coming down the beach, your best bet is to get out and wait for them to pass, and then you can get back out and get some more waves," he said.

Seven large great white sharks have converged off North Carolina, according to satellite trackers monitored by the nonprofit OCEARCH.

The apex predators range in size from 7 to 13 feet, and they are lingering along 250 miles of coastline, from Pea Island south to Carolina Beach, according to a Shark Tracker page.

By coincidence, the gathering is happening during Spring break for U.S. colleges, which peaks “the last two weeks of March,” according to Springbreak.com.

The largest of the sharks is a 13-foot, 3-inch male named Breton who weighs 1,437 pounds. He was tagged in 2020 off Nova Scotia and has since traveled just over 24,000 miles, records show.

“This mature male white shark is joined by many of our juvenile sharks who have spent the last few weeks in the same region,” OCEARCH said in a Facebook post.

“This is also the area we plan to be at next month during Expedition Northbound. Many of our animals use the productive continental shelf waters around the Outer Banks, NC as a spring staging area before making their migration north for their summer residency.”

Locations of the sharks are known from satellite tags attached to their fins as part of an OCEARCH project to study shark migrations.

Barrier islands along North Carolina are suspected to be a hot spot where the white sharks gather and mate. The area is also unique as a point where northbound and southbound currents collide, bringing along plenty of prey for sharks, OCEARCH says.

OCEARCH research has shown white sharks make “predictable annual migrations” from Newfoundland into the Gulf of Mexico.

“The sharks spend summer and fall primarily in coastal waters off New England and Atlantic Canada, feeding on high-calorie prey such as seals, before heading back south to warmer winter waters off the southeast U.S. from South Carolina to the Gulf of Mexico,” OCEARCH says.

“White sharks demonstrate strong site fidelity, with individuals returning to the same location in multiple years, suggesting these animals use complex navigational cues to migrate over thousands of miles every year.”