Sandbags — Brevard County, Florida

No: on October 12, 2026, the Brevard County Storm Center reported no threat to the area and said sandbags were not needed, pointing residents of Palm Bay, Melbourne and the rest of the county to stores and substitutes instead.

The status line sits under the Sandbag Operations heading of the county's Storm Center page. On the day this page was checked, it read that there was no threat to the area and that sandbags were not needed at this time (Brevard County Storm Center). The same notice says bags can be bought at local hardware or home improvement stores, and that bags of mulch or dirt can stand in for them. A county video on alternatives and placement is linked from that notice.

Free county sandbags are a storm-week service, not a year-round one. The City of Melbourne describes the pattern from the resident's side: the city and Brevard County typically distribute sandbags when a hurricane is forecast to affect the area (City of Melbourne, Hurricane Preparation). Each Sheriff's Office release cited on this page ties its sites to a specific storm, and the Sandbag Operations notice on the Storm Center carries the county's status between storms.

In each documented storm from 2019 to 2024, Brevard County's free sandbags came from one site per area of the county, and the South Brevard site was always the Eastern Florida State College Palm Bay Campus.

The Brevard County Sheriff's Office announced the sites in news releases, working with the Board of County Commissioners and the county's public safety partners. Four releases between 2019 and 2024 show the same layout: a North Brevard site, a Merritt Island site, a Central Brevard site and a South Brevard site, with a fifth site added in 2020 (Sheriff NR 20-15).

North Brevard moved between two places. For Dorian the northern site was 855 Camp Road in Sharpes (Sheriff NR 19-32); from 2020 on it was Chain of Lakes Park at 2300 Truman Scarborough Way in Titusville (Sheriff NR 22-36). Merritt Island used Mitchell Ellington Park on Hall Road every time. The Central Brevard site moved south, from Calvary Chapel Church at 2852 Fellowship Place in Viera in 2019 and 2020 to Wickham Park at 2500 Parkway Drive in Melbourne in 2022 and 2024, entered from Parkway Drive (Sheriff NR 24-12).

For Palm Bay, Malabar, Grant-Valkaria, Micco and Barefoot Bay, the constant is the college. The Eastern Florida State College Palm Bay Campus, ZIP code 32909, was the South Brevard Area site in all four releases (NR 19-32, NR 24-12). In 2020 the Isaias list added a Cocoa, Port St. John and Canaveral Groves site at 855 Camp Road in Sharpes, bringing that event to five locations (NR 20-15).

A Brevard County sandbag site is a drive-through line: bags are free, each vehicle can get up to 10, and crews working under Sheriff's Office supervision fill them and load them straight into the vehicle.

The ten-bag limit appears in every release from Dorian in 2019 through Milton in 2024 (NR 19-32, NR 24-12). The Sheriff's Office says the crews fill and load the bags to speed up the line, under the direct supervision of its own employees (NR 22-36). Bags go to homes and businesses alike.

Hours are short and end when the sand runs out. For Milton, the four areas opened Monday, October 7, 2024, from 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., and the updated release extended every site through Tuesday, October 8, with the same hours or until supplies ran out (NR 24-12). For Isaias in 2020 the sites opened on a Friday from 5:00 to 10:00 p.m. and again on Saturday, August 1, from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. (NR 20-15). For the September 2022 storm, Mitchell Ellington Park opened a day ahead of the other three sites (NR 22-36).

Notice is short. The Dorian update was posted on Saturday, August 31, 2019, for sites open that same day (NR 19-32), and the Isaias release went out on Friday, July 31, 2020, for a line opening at 5:00 p.m. that evening (NR 20-15). The September 2022 release was dated September 23 for a Merritt Island opening the next morning (NR 22-36), and the Milton update was dated October 6, 2024, for sites opening Monday, October 7 and running through October 8 (NR 24-12). In each of these releases, the Palm Bay campus line opened no more than two days after the release date.

Volume can be large. Before Dorian, the Sheriff's Office reported that more than 70,000 sandbags had been handed out over three days, and by Sunday, September 1, 2019, only the Sharpes site remained open, from 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. (NR 19-32). On that last day, Palm Bay and Melbourne had no open site; the only line was in the North Brevard Area.

When no county site is open, Brevard residents in Palm Bay, Malabar or Micco can buy empty bags at hardware or home improvement stores and fill them at home, or use bags of mulch or dirt, as the Storm Center suggests.

Melbourne's Hurricane Preparation page suggests buying empty bags early and storing them until a storm is forecast; any sand or dirt on the lot can then fill them, and home improvement stores carry fill dirt as well (City of Melbourne). The same page says not to fill sandbags with beach sand. That approach does not depend on the timing of a Sheriff's Office release or a line at the Palm Bay campus.

Not every house needs them. In the Melbourne guidance, sandbags are meant for homes on low ground that tends to flood, stacked at door openings so water stays outside, and an address can be checked first on the Brevard County Flood Zone Map (City of Melbourne). For a Palm Bay or Grant-Valkaria address, the map check comes before the bag line.

The Brevard County Sheriff's Office, with a mailing address at 700 Park Ave. in Titusville, has announced and staffed the county's free sandbag sites, working with the Board of County Commissioners and the county's public safety partners.

Sheriff's Office releases list a public information line, 321-501-7594, for questions about each distribution (NR 24-12). Status between storms is kept on the Storm Center page run by Brevard County Emergency Management, whose office is at 1751 Huntington Lane in Rockledge, phone (321) 637-6670 (Brevard County Storm Center). The Storm Center also lists the Sheriff's non-emergency lines by area, including (321) 952-6371 for the South Area.

Last verified: October 12, 2026, on the Brevard County Storm Center website and the Brevard County Sheriff's Office website.