FLORIDA: A weakened but still formidable Hurricane Ian chugged across Florida toward the Atlantic seaboard on Thursday after thrashing the state’s Gulf Coast with fierce winds, torrential downpours and raging surf that flooded oceanside communities.
Ian blasted ashore with catastrophic force on Wednesday afternoon as a Category 4 hurricane, packing maximum sustained winds of 150 miles per hour (241 kph), and quickly plunged the region’s flat, low-lying landscape into a scene of devastation.
Ian’s winds, making it one of the most intense storms to strike the U.S. mainland in recent years, diminished significantly after nightfall. Within eight hours of its arrival, Ian was downgraded to Category 1 on the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale, with top sustained winds of 90 mph (150 kmh), the National Hurricane Center (NHC) reported.
However, the sprawling, slow-moving hurricane continued to unleash drenching rains as it crept farther inland, threatening to trigger extensive additional flooding.
“This storm is doing a number on the state of Florida,” said Governor Ron DeSantis, who asked U.S. President Joe Biden to approve a major federal disaster declaration providing a wide range of U.S. emergency aid to the entire state.
There were no official reports of storm-related fatalities or serious injuries. An unspecified number of people were known to be stranded and in need of help in “high-risk” areas after choosing to ride out the storm at home rather than heed evacuation orders, but they were beyond the immediate reach of rescue crews, DeSantis said.
Separately, U.S. border authorities said 20 Cuban migrants were missing after their boat sank off the Florida coast as Ian neared the coast on Wednesday.
At 10 p.m. EDT on Wednesday, strong gusts and horizontal rains were still lashing Venice, Florida, a city of about 25,000 residents some 32 miles northwest of where Ian first came ashore at the barrier island of Cayo Costa seven hours earlier.
Larger structures remained mostly intact, but small, residential areas off of Highway 41, a major artery through the area, were left in a shambles. –Agencies
