Status: 09/29/2022 02:28 am
Tropical Storm Ian has hit Florida’s west coast. Meter-high flooding was observed in several cities. Authorities warned of ongoing power outages and serious infrastructure damage.
Hurricane Ian made landfall on the west coast of the US state of Florida. The center of the four-out-of-five-magnitude hurricane hit the coast near the city of Cape Coral, the US Hurricane Center said. It is therefore an “extremely dangerous hurricane” that is likely to lead to meter-high storm surges, flooding and heavy rainfall.
Some of the storm surges reached a height of around three and a half meters, said Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Weather experts feared that they could grow more than five meters high at the top.
The authorities warned that serious damage to infrastructure, communication lines and widespread and sustained power outages are to be expected. Evacuation instructions applied to 2.5 million people in the region.
More than a million households without electricity
Television pictures showed how rain was whipping through the streets, only the roofs of cars were sticking out of the floodwaters and debris was flying through the air. “Ian” is likely to make the list of the five deadliest hurricanes in Florida, Gov. DeSantis said. Residents were urgently warned not to leave their homes on Thursday morning, for example to assess the damage. Even if the hurricane pulls away, there is still a risk of debris, broken power lines and the like.
Around 1.6 million households were without power, according to the Poweroutage website. The authorities expected serious damage to infrastructure and communication lines. The extent of the destruction should only become clearer with sunrise. Although the hurricane gradually weakened, a strip of land more than a hundred kilometers wide was subject to violent storms along its path.
Wide swath with heavy damage
“Ian” could still have destructive hurricane force on Thursday’s arrival on the state’s east coast, meteorologists warned. The hurricane had increased significantly in strength over the Gulf of Mexico on its way towards Florida and, with wind speeds of around 240 km/h, was just below the threshold for the highest hurricane category.
Experts feared a wide swath of severe damage on the cyclone’s path across the US state. The first photos and videos on social media already showed severe flooding in the cities of Fort Myers Beach, Cape Coral and Naples, some of which were several meters high.
DeSantis said authorities are standing by for salvage and repairs as soon as weather permits. He wrote on Twitter that around 7,000 National Guard soldiers and 179 airplanes or helicopters could be deployed. In addition, more than 40,000 technicians from the utility companies were already on hand to repair power lines.
24 hours of heavy rain
The director of the National Hurricane Center, Ken Graham, emphasized that it will probably take 24 hours after arriving on land for the hurricane to pass over Florida. That means 24 hours of heavy rain. Deanne Criswell of the US Disaster Management Agency FEMA said the region expected to be affected by the storm had not experienced such a hurricane for around 100 years.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres called “Ian” “another example of dramatic climate action we are seeing around the world with increasing frequency and increasing devastation.”
Governor: Will be ‘very ugly days’
Florida’s governor DeSantis had previously prepared the population in his state for severe damage from the approaching hurricane “Ian”. “This is a big, strong storm,” DeSantis said. “He’s going to do a lot of damage,” he warned. The Republican politician predicted that the next day or two would be “very ugly” until the hurricane passed over Florida. “It’s going to be a tough stretch.”
Meanwhile, a boat carrying migrants from Cuba sank off the coast of Florida on Wednesday. The US Coast Guard was looking for 23 people, as announced on Twitter. Four migrants had previously reached American Stock Island off Key West by swimming from the boat in stormy weather conditions.
“Ian” made landfall in Cuba on Tuesday as a category three of five hurricane. In the province of Pinar del Río, which was particularly hard hit, two people died after their houses collapsed, the Cuban government said. In the state with a good eleven million inhabitants, the electricity failed nationwide.