At least 12 dead, and more expected, after Hurricane Ian hits Florida

By Linda Robertson, Joey Flechas, Nicholas Nehamas and David Ovalle, The Miami Herald (TNS)

FORT MYERS, Fla. — On the vacation island resorts of Sanibel and Captiva, rescuers flew in on helicopters because the roads from the mainland of Southwest Florida had collapsed into San Carlos Bay. To the south, Fort Myers Beach, once a lively town center of fish restaurants and bars, was reduced to a debris field of concrete blocks, shredded wood and broken tiles, its pier stripped to a skeleton of pilings.

In Orlando, Hurricane Ian’s winds carried less of a punch, but rain came down with unrelenting fury, flooding popular lakes, submerging streets neck deep, and forcing dramatic rescues for motorists trapped in their cars.

• More: Wet weekend ahead as Hurricane Ian brings rain to central Pa.

The snapshots of devastation emerged as Florida began to assess the damage caused by Ian, which made landfall in Southwest Florida with punishing winds of 155 mph, churning across the state with torrential rains before emerging into the Atlantic Ocean as a tropical storm on Thursday afternoon.

The death toll was at least 12, according to police departments, but was expected to rise, with President Joe Biden fearing Ian “could be the deadliest hurricane in Florida’s history.”

Families took to social media and called police for help finding their loved ones, as rescuers continued searching for the missing. And thousands were displaced from their homes.

More than 2 million customers in Florida were without electricity. Governments and insurance companies were bracing for billions in damage — and years of rebuilding.

A Category 4 storm, Hurricane Ian made landfall on Wednesday afternoon at Cape Cayo, a small island north of Captiva, then again north of Punta Gorda on the mainland. With winds of 155 miles per hour — nearly a Category 5 — the storm battered Southwest Florida, tearing buildings off their foundations, submerging streets and yanking boats from their moors.

Early Thursday morning, once the winds subsided, search-and-rescue teams, firefighters, police officers and public-works crews fanned out into Southwest Florida. Air crews from U.S. Coast Guard and National Guard helicopters scoured neighborhoods, in particular on the cut-off barrier islands, looking for trapped survivors and making “dozens of rescues” before the sun rose on Thursday, according to the governor’s office.

More than 800 urban search-and-rescue team members — including some from Miami-Dade Fire-Rescue — fanned out across the state as National Guard members launched “assessment missions” in the hardest-hit counties: Lee, Collier, Charlotte, De Soto and Sarasota. The Florida Division of Emergency Management was readying food, generators and water pumps, as well as 3.5 million meals and 1.8 million bottles of water.

Even though many roads are open in Southwest Florida, officials urged people to refrain from sightseeing.

“Do not come in and tour the area for damage,” said Kevin Guthrie, the director of Florida’s Division of Emergency Management. “We have 20,000 (or) 30,000 responders coming into (the) area that need access to those roads. Stay at home.”

The road to Pine Island, another barrier island that was wrecked by Ian, was also destroyed.

On Fort Myers Beach, another vacation island community south of Sanibel, video and photos posted on social media emerged showing wrecked remains of the downtown “Times Square,” where tourists usually eat fish, drink rum and buy ice cream. On Thursday, people picked through the piles of wood, concrete blocks and broken tiles.

One restaurant, Junkanoo Beach, appeared to have vanished, save for a large sign, broken in two. A large boat dubbed the Crackerjack was tossed onto a sidewalk like a toy, atop a smashed SUV.

In downtown Fort Myers on the mainland, boats that had been docked in the river sat in a jumble in the parking lot of Joe’s Crab Shack. Their turbulent journey ripped open hulls, snapped masts, severed engines. Scattered on the ground or hung up in the branches of fallen trees were rudders, anchors, railings, sails and seat cushions.

People were searching for their loved ones.

At the Tamiami Village mobile home park, daylight revealed that the storm shredded car ports, porches and in a few cases, front rooms of the homes. Insulation, shards of aluminum and roofs littered the roads. Roofs looked like chewing gum wrappers bent around light poles. The twisted metal frame of one car port was bent around itself like a pretzel.

Helen Louchart, a 75-year-old resident of the senior living community, had watched as winds lifted a Flagstaff Super Lite RV. “It didn’t roll over on the ground,” she said Thursday as she juggled a water bottle, hammer, wrench and a pill bottle in her arms. “The wind picked it up, turned it over and dropped it down,” she said.

In downtown Orlando, some streets remained flooded early Thursday afternoon, with garbage and debris strewn about and traffic lights out. Lake Eola, a popular attraction, completely overflowed its banks as the storm moved through. A neighborhood dog park was also underwater.

“It’s crazy,” said Jake Morris, a downtown Orlando resident who under a light rain surveyed the damage along with groups of other curious locals. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

In Volusia County, between Orlando and the east coast, the sheriff’s office reported that a man died after he was discovered in a canal — he’d ventured out during the storm to drain his pool.

“This storm is having broad impacts across the state. Some of the flooding you are going to see — hundreds of miles from where this made landfall — is going to set records,” DeSantis said.