At least seven people died after Hurricane Ian pummeled Florida’s western coast with record storm surge flooding as high as 12 feet in some areas and intense winds, according to AP.
The big picture: More than 1.9 million customers were without power in Florida on Friday morning as the state began search and rescue and recovery efforts to deal with severe damage in the hurricane’s aftermath.
- Two people died in a car crash on Thursday afternoon in Putnam County, which was inundated with rain as the storm passed over the state.
- At least two people were confirmed dead on Sanibel, an island in southwest Florida that experienced major surge-related flooding during the storm.
- A person in Lake County died on Wednesday after his vehicle hydroplaned, while another person was found dead in the city of Deltona in central Florida, according to AP.
The latest: The storm regained hurricane status on Thursday night on its way to a damaging encounter with the Carolinas and a portion of southern Georgia.
- As of 11am ET, the storm was located 60 miles east-southeast of Charleston, South Carolina, and 120 miles south-southwest of Cape Fear, North Carolina, though it was moving north at 14 mph with maximum sustained winds of 85 mph, the NHC said.
- It is expected to make a second official landfall Friday afternoon in South Carolina, bringing with it heavy winds and “life-threatening” storm surge along the coasts of northeast Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas.
What they’re saying: The hurricane “is likely to rank among the worst in the nation’s history,” Biden said Friday at a press briefing. “You have all seen on television homes and property wiped out. It’s gonna take months, years to rebuild.”
- Biden had said Thursday “this could be the deadliest hurricane in Florida’s history.”
- “We absolutely expect to have mortality from this hurricane,” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said in a news briefing Thursday.
- DeSantis said there were more than 700 confirmed rescues as of Thursday evening.
- Some of the deadliest hurricanes in Florida tracked by the National Hurricane Center during the first half of the 20th century saw between around 350 and 1,800 deaths.
NHC officials warned Thursday night that many hurricane-related deaths occur days after the storm has passed while people are recovering.
- These deaths, also called “indirect deaths,” primarily arise from excessive heat and over-exertion and carbon monoxide poisoning from running generators indoors.
Ian made landfall as an “extremely dangerous” hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 150 miles per hour on Florida’s southwestern coast on Wednesday near Cayo Costa, an island to the west of Cape Coral, according to the National Hurricane Center.
- It then shifted north-northeast and made landfall with maximum sustained winds of 145 mph on mainland Florida just south of the city of Punta Gorda before barreling northeast across the state and weakening into a tropical storm.
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This story has been updated with additional reporting.
Source Article from https://www.axios.com/2022/09/30/hurricane-ian-florida-death-toll
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