Hurricane Irma is not only affecting homeowners but business owners. Losing thousands of dollars a day, Dakin Dairy Farms in Myakka City says due to power outages they can’t get there product out.
- Dakin Dairy Farms wasting gallons of milk as stores remain without power
- RELATED: IRMA: Bay area power outage maps
"The milk that is produced now there's just no stores open all of our milk usually goes south of us," said Dakin Dairy Farm owner Jerry Dakin
In the 16 years Jerry Dakin has owned Dakin Dairy farms he's never seen this much milk go to waste -- pouring out thousands of useless gallons a day.
Most of the milk produced at this farm is transported to South Florida but with power out stores aren’t taking the supply.
"We've watched 60,000 gallons of milk go down the drain in the form of skim and that's just an unbelievable amount of money and there's just so much that milk could do to feed people and help people. Just a huge financial loss," said Plant Manager Tony Wahl.
The financial loss is almost $30,000 a day. On top of the thousands of dollars of structural damage as a result of the storm, but not everything is a total loss.
"We're fortunate we have a separator where we’re separating the milk and taking the fat off so that cream can go to ice cream or butter," said Dakin.
Storm or not, the dairy cows are so used to pumping on a daily schedule it is not healthy to shut the entire operation down. Which means more milk going down the drain until more stores are back up and running.