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| Photo Credit: AP. |
PUNTA GORDA, Fla. (AP) — Rescue crews waded through flooded streets and used boats Thursday in a scramble to save people trapped after Hurricane Ian destroyed a cross-section of Florida and brought torrential rains that continued to fall.
The
destruction began to come into focus a day after Ian made landfall in Florida
as one of the strongest hurricanes ever to hit to the U.S. The storm flooded
homes on both of the state’s coasts, cut off the only bridge to a barrier
island, destroyed a historic waterfront pier and knocked out electricity to 2.5
million Florida homes and businesses. At least one man was confirmed dead.
“We’ve never
seen storm surge of this magnitude,” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis told a news
conference. “The amount of water that’s been rising, and will likely continue
to rise today even as the storm is passing, is basically a 500-year flooding
event.”
Though
downgraded to a tropical storm by Thursday morning, the National Hurricane
Center said storm surge and flooding rains remained a threat as Ian crept
across the Florida peninsula and emerged in the Atlantic Ocean. Forecasters
predicted a northward turn toward South Carolina, and a hurricane warning was
issued for the state’s coastline.
Sheriffs in
southwest Florida said 911 centers were inundated by thousands of stranded
callers, some with life-threatening emergencies. The U.S. Coast Guard began
rescue efforts around daybreak on barrier islands near where the Ian struck,
DeSantis said. Fire departments fanned out in flooded areas as well.
In the
Orlando area, Orange County firefighters used boats to reach people in a
flooded neighborhood. A photo the department posted on Twitter showed one
firefighter carrying someone in his arms through knee-deep water. At an area
nursing home surrounded by water, patients were carried on stretchers across
floodwaters to a waiting bus.
In Fort
Myers, a few miles west of the barrier island where Ian came ashore, Valerie
Bartley’s family spent desperate hours Wednesday holding a dining room table
against their patio door, fearing the storm raging outside “was tearing our
house apart.”
“I was
terrified,” Bartley said. “What we heard was the shingles and debris from
everything in the neighborhood hitting our house.”
She said her
4-year-old daughter grabbed her hand and said: “I’m scared too, but it’s going
to be OK.” The girl was right. The storm ripped away patio screens and snapped
a palm tree in the yard, Bartley said, but left the roof intact and her family
unharmed.
Authorities confirmed at least one Florida death — a 72-year-old man in Deltona who fell into a canal while using a hose to drain his pool in the heavy rain, the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office said. Two other storm deaths were reported in Cuba after Ian struck the island nation earlier.
Lee County
Sheriff Carmine Marceno said his office was scrambling to respond to thousands
of 911 calls, but many roads and bridges in Fort Myers and the surrounding area
remain impassable.
“It crushed
us.” Marceno told ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “We still cannot access many of
the people that are in need.”
Emergency
crews sawed through toppled trees to reach stranded people. Many in the
hardest-hit areas were unable to call for help amid widespread electrical and
cellular outages.
“Portable
towers are on the way for cell service. Chances are your loved ones do not have
ability to contact you,” said the sheriff’s office in Collier County, which
includes Naples. “We can tell you as daylight reveals the aftermath, it’s going
to be a hard day.”
A chunk of
the Sanibel Causeway fell into the sea, cutting off access to the barrier
island where 6,300 people normally live. It was unknown how many had heeded
orders to evacuate, but Charlotte County Emergency Management Director Patrick
Fuller expressed cautious optimism that worst-case scenarios might not have
been realized.
No deaths or
injuries have been confirmed in the county, and flyovers of barrier islands
show “the integrity of the homes is far better than we anticipated,” Fuller
said.
South of
Sanibel Island, the historic beachfront pier in Naples got destroyed, with even
the pilings underneath torn out, as towering waves crashed over the structure.
“Right now, there is no pier,” said Penny Taylor, a Collier County
commissioner.
In Port
Charlotte, a hospital’s emergency room flooded and fierce winds ripped away
part of the roof, sending water gushing down into the intensive care unit. The
sickest patients — some on ventilators — were crowded into the middle two
floors as the staff prepared for storm victims to arrive, said Dr. Birgit
Bodine of HCA Florida Fawcett Hospital.
The Florida
Highway Patrol shut down the Florida Turnpike in the Orlando area and said the
main artery in the middle of the state will remain closed until water subsides.
Ian struck
Florida as a monstrous Category 4 storm, with 150 mph (241 kph) winds that tied
it for the fifth-strongest hurricane ever to hit the U.S.
Even after
weakening, Ian’s tropical-storm force winds still reached 415 miles (667
kilometers) from its center. The hurricane center warned storm surge of 6 feet
(1.83 meters) or more was possible from Daytona Beach, Florida, to north of
Charleston, South Carolina. And rainfall of up to 8 inches (20.32 centimeters)
threatened flooding in the Carolinas and Virginia.
“It doesn’t
matter what the intensity of the storm is. We’re still expecting quite a bit of
rainfall,” Robbie Berg, senior hurricane specialist with the National Hurricane
Center, said in an interview with The Associated Press.
The U.S.
Coast Guard initiated a search and rescue mission for 23 people after a boat
carrying Cuban migrants sank Wednesday in stormy weather east of Key West. It
found three survivors, and four others swam to shore, the U.S. Border Patrol
said. Air crews continued to search for possibly 20 remaining migrants.
Associated
Press contributors include Cody Jackson in Tampa, Florida; Freida Frisaro in
Miami; Mike Schneider in Orlando, Florida; Seth Borenstein and Aamer Madhani in
Washington; Bobby Caina Calvan in New York; and Andrew Welsh-Huggins in
Columbus, Ohio.