Florida braces for rare November storm as Hurricane Nicole forms

(Rebecca Blackwell/AP)

A Florida-bound storm has strengthened into Hurricane Nicole as it pounded the Bahamas, with US officials ordering evacuations that included former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club.

It is a rare November hurricane for storm-weary Florida, where only two such hurricanes have made landfall since recordkeeping began in 1853 — the 1935 Yankee Hurricane and Hurricane Kate in 1985.