A post on X claims to show the Anna Maria City Pier Bait and Grill Shop drifting into the ocean after being damaged by Hurricane Milton.

Anna Maria Islands City Pier Bait and Grill Shop is floating out into the ocean after being ripped from the rock by hurricane Milton pic.twitter.com/U9rQe9mR2Q

— Frank Fighting For Freedom 🇺🇸 (@thinktankfranks) October 14, 2024

Verdict False 

The video shows the pier shop still attached to its stilts. Only the walkway connecting the shop to the land was damaged by the storm.

Fact Check

Hurricane Milton made landfall on Florida’s west coast on Oct. 9, 2024, causing widespread damage, including flooding and tornadoes. Following the storm, aerial footage of the Anna Maria City Pier was shared on social media with claims that the pier shop was floating out to sea after being ripped away by the hurricane.

However, this claim is inaccurate. The footage, taken by WFLA News Channel 8’s helicopter on Oct. 12, does show a structure surrounded by water and a broken pier walkway, but the shop itself remains securely attached to its stilts. Readers familiar with the pier have pointed out that the shop is in its usual position and that the video is misleadingly captioned to spread false information.

On the reader notes on X it was stated the following:  “This pier is not floating. This is the distance and location it usually is,” and went on to call the post “deliberate spreading of false information for clicks and views.” Official sources, such as the City Pier Grill’s Facebook and Instagram posts from Oct. 11, confirm that only the walkway was significantly damaged, not the shop itself.

Brian Seymour, a managing member of GSM Partners LLC, which operates the City Pier Grill and Bait Shop, also debunked the rumors in an email to Reuters, stating, “The City Pier Grill and Bait Shop is not floating out to sea, or the Gulf of Mexico. It is firmly in its original place… We did in fact lose between 400 to 500 feet of the pier walkway that connects us to land.”

Google Street View and satellite images from before the storm show the pier shop in the same location, and local media outlets confirmed the damage was limited to the pier’s walkway.

This is not the first time Check Your Fact has debunked false information about Hurricane Milton.