Dramatic photos show the trail of destruction Hurricane Irma carved through Florida

Hurricane Irma smacked the coast of Florida on Sunday as a Category 4 storm and made its way up the northwestern coast, weakening slightly to tropical storm status on Monday. The National Hurricane Center forecast suggested the storm could further soften to a tropical depression by Tuesday afternoon.

In its wake, Irma left a trail of destruction.

Some 6.3 million people in Florida were ordered to evacuate before Irma made landfall, according to the Florida Division of Emergency Management. With winds of up to 70 mph, the storm overturned boats, like this one seen in Biscayne, Florida on Monday.

Streets flooded all along the coast and in North Miami, forcing people to flee their homes with garbage bags.

Homes were destroyed, power lines were toppled, and cars were sunk by Irma's raging winds and torrential rains. A mobile housing park in Naples, Florida, was nearly razed to the ground.

Maida Esteves, one of the residents of the mobile home park, stood in what was once her living room on Monday after Irma destroyed her home.

Cars and boats were also damaged. Jorge Gonzalez, Esteves' neighbor in Naples, walked by his vehicle on Monday after his home was badly battered.

Elsewhere, residents of flooded suburbs had to flee. In Orlando, Army National Guard Spc. Thomas Hogan rescued a dog from a submerged neighborhood.

Irma's roaring winds also brought down power lines, like the one shown here in front of an oceanfront condo building in Boca Raton.

In Daytona Beach, a man waded into a flooded residential street.

All kinds of property was crushed in Irma's powerful grip.

On the oceanfront A1A state road in Boca Raton, a police cruiser secured a fallen power pole.

The destruction was felt in a handful of cities. In Tampa, a man walked past an uprooted tree along Bayshore Boulevard as threatening clouds continued to loom overhead.

In North Port, police officers tried to salvage a car that had been swallowed by the storm.

Some homes were almost completely smashed, like this one in Tampa.

The worst of the storm was seen on Sunday, when Floridians had to wade through flooded streets, like this one in downtown Miami.

In other parts of the city, entire vehicles were overturned by the gusty winds.

The winds and floodwaters were strong enough to topple this large truck in Miami.

Trees were uprooted as well.

This felled tree in a condo community in Kissimmee narrowly missed hitting a home.

The Miami-Dade police tweeted this video showing power lines, trees, and signs strewn across a road:

The storm assaulted this gas station in North Redington Beach.

The siding of a DoubleTree hotel in Orlando was ripped out.

Thomas von Grünigen, a correspondent for Swiss Public Broadcasting, tweeted these photos of the DoubleTree Hotel Orlando Airport on Monday morning.

Damage from hurricane #Irma... @ Thomas von Gr#emo#nigen

Abgebrochene Fassade unsere... @ Thomas von Gr#emo#nigen

Sand from Fort Lauderdale Beach swept onto the nearby boulevard.

Flooding in Jacksonville reached a 53-year high.

Floods reached 60.4 inches there Monday morning, surpassing the record set by Hurricane Dora in 1964.

Christopher Hong, a reporter for The Florida Times-Union, tweeted this video of downtown Jacksonville on Monday morning.

Water from the St. Johns river overflowed near Jacksonville's St. Vincent's Medical Center.

Local WJAX-TV reporter Paige Kelton tweeted this video:

St. John's river pushes int... @ Paige Kelton

Photographer Sarah Heddon also captured a video of the scene in downtown Jacksonville.

Approximately 5.8 million homes and businesses across Florida and Georgia have lost power.

Sebastian Murdock, a reporter at HuffPost, tweeted this photo from his hotel in Miramar:

Power is out at hotel in Mi... @ Sebastian Murdock

Dramatic photos show the trail of destruction Hurricane Irma carved through Florida

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