Ian hits South Carolina after leaving devastation and death in Florida

() — Ian, now a post-tropical cyclone, moved inland Friday night after pummeling South Carolina with fierce winds and a destructive storm surge, less than two days after killing at least 45 people in Florida and having left behind a trail of destruction of apocalyptic magnitude.

The storm made its second landfall in the United States near Georgetown, South Carolina, on Friday afternoon as a Category 1 hurricane. As of Friday night, it was still packing 60 mph (96 km/h) winds, but it is expected to weaken overnight and dissipate over North Carolina or Virginia on Saturday night, according to the National Hurricane Center.

Flash flooding was possible in parts of North and South Carolina and southeastern Virginia on Friday night, while the storm also threatened tornadoes in parts of eastern North Carolina and southeastern Virginia through Saturday. the morning, the hurricane center added.

Two days earlier, Ian made landfall along Florida’s southwestern coast as a major Category 4 hurricane, devastating coastal communities, turning roads into creeks and leaving debris and debris behind.

As communities in the Sunshine State began to recover after the powerful storm, authorities in South Carolina on Friday night began assessing the damage in their state. Authorities in Pawleys Island, a coastal South Carolina town about 70 miles (112 kilometers) north of Charleston, were surveying the damage Friday night.

Two piers in the state, Cherry Grove Pier in North Myrtle Beach and Pawleys Island Pier, partially collapsed due to the storm. The water had receded in both lanes, but Pawleys Island police announced that they would not allow anyone to return to the island until security assessments were carried out in the morning.

More than 128,000 customers were in the dark statewide as of 9:30 p.m. Friday, according to poweroutage.us. In North Carolina, more than 330,000 customers lost power and in Florida, more than 1.4 million.

Knee-deep water inside houses

In North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, Kyle Faust waded through knee-deep water inside his home Friday after the storm raged. Throughout Horry County, where the city is located, officials reported Friday night that crews were conducting damage assessments and clearing debris while some roads remained closed.

The Myrtle Beach police urged residents to stay indoors and not drive on flooded roads.

“It’s a pretty scary sight,” Myrtle Beach Mayor Brenda Bethune said of Hurricane Ian. “I’m seeing too many cars go by. And I think people don’t realize how dangerous it is to be out in these kinds of conditions. We’ve seen a lot of people’s cars get stuck and emergency personnel have to come out to rescue.” to the people”.

Shelters in Charleston County will remain open until 4 p.m. Saturday, the county wrote in a news release. Buses will begin taking people from the shelters to the original pick-up locations on Saturday morning.

“Many prayers have been answered,” South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster said. “This storm isn’t as bad as it could have been, but don’t let your guard down just yet. We are not out of the woods, there is water on the roads, there are still strong winds and it is still dangerous in many parts of the state.

The airfield at Charleston International Airport closed Friday due to high winds and extended the closure through Saturday morning, the airport said.

In Florida: at least 45 dead

Meanwhile, Florida grapples with the dizzying destruction Ian wreaked across much of the peninsula on Wednesday and Thursday after it slammed into the southwest coast like a category 4 cyclone and devastate the central and northeastern areas.

At least 45 deaths have been recorded in the state. Coastal homes have been swept out to sea, buildings are destroyed across the state, and floodwaters have blighted homes and businesses and trapped residents, even inland, in places like the Orlando area.

There have been hundreds of rescues by land, air and sea, with residents trapped in homes or stranded on rooftops, and many welfare checks have been conducted by searchers, especially in the Fort Myers and Naples areas, where storm surge flooded streets and houses.

Roger Desjarlais, county manager for Lee County, which includes Fort Myers, told on Friday that it’s not an exaggeration to say that Hurricane Ian decimated parts of the area and “there has to be a lot of fatalities.”

“It looked as if someone had just fallen from the sky, picked up hotels and buildings and carried them away. So much so that in many places there wasn’t even debris,” Desjarlais said. “We also know that not as many people were evacuated from those islands as we expected. We know there have to be a lot of fatalities yet to be accounted for.”

President Joe Biden continued to pledge federal support for Florida as it grapples with the devastation caused by the hurricane, which he said is “probably among the worst … in the nation’s history.”

“We are just beginning to see the scale of that destruction,” Biden said, adding that the largest team of search and rescue experts “in recent history” was currently deployed to the state. “The reconstruction is going to take months, years.”

And now, the aftermath of the hurricane poses new and deadly dangers. Some backwaters are electrified, authorities have warned, while maneuvering through buildings and debris-strewn streets, many without working traffic lights, poses a risk of injury. Lack of air conditioning can lead to heat illnesses, and improper use of generators can cause carbon monoxide poisoning.

In North Port, between Fort Myers and Sarasota, Rosanna Walker stood Thursday at the flood-damaged home where she survived the storm. Part of her drywall ceiling was hanging down.

“And all of a sudden, the water was coming through the doors: upstairs, downstairs, the windows here,” he told ‘s John Berman. “It’s all in my closets; I have to empty my closets.”

“Everything is ruined.”

Many homeless, water, electricity

Claudette Smith, public information officer for the sheriff’s office in Charlotte County, just north of Fort Myers, told the county desperately needs help as emergency services continue to be swamped.

“We need everything, to put it plain and simple. We need all hands on deck,” Smith emphasized. “The people who have come to our aid have been very helpful, but we need everything.”

Many members of the community are homeless, without water or electricity, and there is currently only one operating hospital in the county.

Here’s what you should know about the destruction in Florida:

• Deaths in Florida: at least 45 deaths suspected to be related to Ian have been reported in Florida. Unconfirmed deaths are being processed by local medical examiners, who decide whether they are related to the disaster, said state emergency management director Kevin Guthrie.
• Power outages: Florida had more than 1.7 million power outages as of Friday afternoon, according to PowerOutage.us. Most of the counties with the highest percentage of residents without power are in the Southwest, including Lee, Charlotte, DeSoto and Hardee.
• Historic floods in Florida: Record flooding was reported across central and northern Florida, including at least three rivers that reached flood records. Orlando authorities warned residents of dangerous flooding, which exceeded 12 inches in some areas.
• Hundreds of rescues and thousands of evacuations: More than 700 rescues have been carried out across Florida so far, the governor said Thursday, and thousands of evacuees have been reported. In Lee County, a hospital system had to evacuate more than 1,000 patients after its water supply was cut off, while other widespread evacuations have been reported in prisons and residences for the elderly. In Fort Myers, the fire chief was “pretty calm” Friday morning that everyone who needed help there had been rescued, Mayor Kevin Anderson said.
• Much of Fort Myers Beach was washed away: a helicopter flight over Fort Myers beach shows utter devastation: empty or rubble-strewn lots where homes and businesses used to stand, and boats dumped in mangroves. “We’re talking about no structure left. … We’re talking about homes that were dumped into the bay. This is a long-term fix, and it’s life changing,” Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno said. .

• The Coast Guard continues with rescue flights in Florida this Friday: Coast Guard crews rescued 95 people in Florida on Thursday, including lifting people out of flooded areas by helicopter, and rescue flights will continue Friday, Rear Adm. Brendan McPherson said. “We’re going to find anyone else who needs help,” he said.
• Coastal islands isolated from the mainland: Southwest Florida’s Sanibel and Captiva Islands are cut off from the mainland after parts of a critical elevated highway were swept away by the cyclone. At least two people were killed in the storm on Sanibel, and the bridge may have to be completely rebuilt, local officials said. Chip Farrar, a resident of the small island of Matlacha, told that 50 feet of the road essential to reaching the mainland bridge is also gone and a second nearby bridge has also collapsed.
• The insured losses storms in Florida can be huge: Ian may have caused as much as $47 billion in insured losses in Florida, according to an estimate by property analytics firm CoreLogic, which could make it the second most expensive storm in state history when it hit. adjusted for inflation after Hurricane Andrew in 1992.

— Joe Sutton, Virginia Langmaid, Keith Allen, Amir Vera, Eric Levenson, Allison Chinchar, Brandon Miller, Nick Valencia, Carma Hassan, Amanda Musa, Amy Simonson and Paradise Afshar contributed to this report.