Hurricane Ian delivers blow to South Carolina

FORT MYERS, United States: Hurricane Ian, one of the worst storms ever to hit the United States, made landfall in South Carolina on Friday, delivering a powerful second punch after pummeling Florida.

The National Hurricane Centre (NHC) said the storm struck near Georgetown, South Carolina, at 2:05 pm (1805 GMT) as a Category 1 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 85 miles per hour.

The NHC warned people living along the Carolina coast that Ian could deliver “life-threatening storm surge” of up to seven feet (two meters) and damaging winds. After weakening to a tropical storm as it crossed over Florida, where it caused billions of dollars in damage, Ian regained hurricane strength over the Atlantic.

President Joe Biden urged residents of South and North Carolina to “listen to all the warnings and directions from local officials and follow their instructions.” As for storm-ravaged Florida, where at least 21 deaths have been reported, Biden said: “We’re just beginning to see the scale of the destruction.

“It’s likely to rank among the worst in the nation’s history,” he said of Ian, which barreled into Florida’s southwest coast on Wednesday as a Category 4 storm, a tick shy of the most powerful on the Saffir-Simpson wind scale.

“It’s going to take months, years to rebuild,” Biden said. “It’s not just a crisis for Florida. This is an American crisis.” In Florida, rescue workers were busy assisting survivors on Friday and the Coast Guard said it had made 117 rescues using boats and helicopters.

The storm left hundreds of people in need of help in Florida, many trapped in flooded homes. Governor Ron DeSantis said over 1,000 rescuers were going “up and down the coastline” checking on residents.

“Rescue personnel have gone to more than 3,000 homes in the hardest hit areas, going door to door to check on the occupants,” he said. DeSantis said the coastal town of Fort Myers where the hurricane made landfall, was “ground zero” but “this was such a big storm that there are effects far inland.”

Many people evacuated, but thousands chose to shelter in place and ride out the storm. DeSantis said it was too early to give a death toll. State officials said there had been one confirmed death from Ian and at least 20 others have been reported but have not yet been confirmed as being directly due to the storm.

In addition, 17 migrants were missing from a boat that sank during the hurricane on Wednesday, with one person found dead and nine others rescued, the Coast Guard said. Among them were four Cubans who swam to shore in the Florida Keys.