2010, oil from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill landed on Pensacola Beach and Navarre Beach, damaging the fishing and tourism industries, and prompting a massive clean-up effort. On October 10, 2018, the Panhandle suffered a direct hit from Hurricane Michael, with winds as high as 160 MPH. Michael was one of only four category 5 hurricanes to ever hit the US mainland. Thousands of homes were destroyed, and apartment rents in Panama City increased, with a $500 apartment renting for $1000 in 2019. Recovery from Hurricane Michael was not complete in June 2019, and disaster relief for the Panhandle remained stalled in Congress. Economy Historically, the economy of the Panhandle depended mainly on farming, forestry and lumbering, paper mills, import/export shipping at Pensacola and to a lesser extent at Panama City, shipbuilding, and commercial fishing. After World War II, the economy was boosted by the numerous military bases established in the region, as well as the growth of tourism and the hospitality industry. In addition to military bases, state and local governments, hospitals, schools, and colleges, major private employers in the second half of the twentieth century included Monsanto and Westinghouse plants at Pensacola, the St. Joe Paper Company in Port St. Joe, and Gulf Power, a major electric utility company. Unlike central and southern Florida, the Panhandle has never been a producer of citrus crops because the area is subject to regular frosts and freezes in wintertime, which destroy citrus fruits. Transportation Road Interstate 10 is the only interstate highway in the Panhandle, connecting the extreme west with North Florida and Jacksonville. Other older east–west routes include U.S. Highway 90 and U.S. Highway 98. Important north–south routes west of the Apalachicola River include U.S. Highway 29, U.S. Highway 331, and U.S. Highway 231, all linking to Alabama and Interstate 65. State Road 20 stretches from Niceville to Tallahassee. Rail Freight service is provided by the Class III Florida Gulf & Atlantic Railroad, which acquired most of the CSX main line from Pensacola to Jacksonville on June 1, 2019. (For the history of this line, see Pensacola and Atlantic Railroad.) Passenger service ended with the creation of Amtrak in 1971, but was revived with the extension of the Sunset Limited to Orlando beginning in 1993; however, passenger service was discontinued after Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast in 2005. Other regional short-line railroads serving the Panhandle are the Alabama and