Shocked Florida communities counted their dead on Saturday as the full scale of the devastation came into focus, two days after Hurricane Ian tore into the coastline as one of the most powerful storms ever to hit the United States.
Rescuers were still searching for survivors in flooded neighborhoods and along the state’s southwest coast, where homes, restaurants and businesses were ripped apart as Ian roared ashore as a powerful Category 4 hurricane on Wednesday.
The death toll climbed to 24 on Saturday, according to the Florida Medical Examiners Commission, with some US media reporting it could be three times that.
Sixteen migrants also remain missing from a boat that sank during the hurricane on Wednesday, according to the US Coast Guard. Two people were found dead and nine others rescued, including four Cubans who swam to shore in the Florida Keys.
More than 1.2 million customers remained without power in Florida Saturday, hampering efforts by those who evacuated to return to their homes to take stock of what they lost.
“It’s just flipped upside down, soaking wet, full of mud,” resident Pete Belinda said of the home he and his wife share on the lower floor of their daughter’s house in Fort Myers Beach, a town on the Gulf of Mexico coast which took the brunt of the storm.
Source: eNCA
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