than it would have been yesterday or the day before certainly. a lot of people are coming to this place, asking about food and water. it is still a challenge. authorities have told people off the bat for the first 72 hours, first 3 days, you re supposed to be able to fend for yourselves. as the governor pointed out yesterday, the storm seemed to sneak up on people. you can bet not a lot of people or not everyone was as prepared as they should have been, so getting food, water and supplies is still very much a challenge here in panama city. you drive through the streets and you see the downed trees and power lines. in some cases buildings flattened. you can t help but wonder where do you start to rebuild a place like this. in many cases, it will be months before things are back to normal. places like you saw erica hill in mexico beach, might be talking years before that place looks like it did before. case in point, this is the jinx
sifting through storm debris. the people who were trapped, killed, the death toll right now, is at 17. that includes people across four states. and that number is still expected to rise. fema s chief, along with florida s governor, will tour the affected area of the panhandle tomorrow to assess the damage. for the very latest today, let s go now to cnn s martin savidge in mexico beach, ground zero for this storm. martin, what are you seeing there right now? reporter: you referenced that drone video and every time i see that, it is mesmerizing, it is horrifying but still stunning to see how it goes on and on and on, here is a ground view, another example. a beautiful beachfront home right on the water and as you can see, the only thing left that you can recognize of this home is the staircase here. beyond that, it is just simply a pile of ruins. there was some concern that there was a couple that was staying in this home, there were witnesses who said they rode out the storm here and
landfall. all right, this is pretty dramatic. these images coming into cnn, now showing the force of the hurricane, as it slammed into mexico beach, florida, and the power of that 155 mile-an-hour wind. the death toll now standing at 17 across four states. nearly 900,000 homes and businesses in seven states are still without power. and in parts of the florida panhandle, it might be months before power is back on. for the very latest now, let s go to cnn s martin savidge in mexico beach, florida. martin, what are you seeing from people there? reporter: it is another difficult day of recovery efforts. it is under way, frederica, we can show you right now, by the
nearly 900,000 homes and businesses in seven states are still without power. in parts of the florida panhandle, it might be months before power is back on. for the latest now, let s go to cnn s martin savidge in mexico beach, florida. what are you seeing there? hey, fredricka. it s saturday, of course, so this is the first real nonwork day where residents can begin to return. that s one of the things you re starting to see. the problem is the city, the town, is not ready for them. it is still in a state of devastation. i think if you look at more of these drone images, the devastation is almost beyond comprehension. i ve covered many, many natural disasters. the only thing i can equate what you re seeing here too on such a scale is something along the lines of a tsunami. it is just stunning. almost after a while mind-numbing to try to comprehend. there are, you can probably see in the images coming from the drone search and recovery teams working this particular area right now. this
no, it doesn t look good but this is my first time back to mexico beach in about 2 days and one big difference i ve noticed, there s still tremendous a lot to have debris, a lot of debris is gone from the roadway, i say a lot but not all, if you look down the road there, you see a couple of houses that have been deposited right in the middle of this particular road and that s going to require heavier equipment to get it out of the way, while we have roadways that are open, what that does make things easier for search and and rescue teams, come from all over the nation to work together and try to help victims to have storm and i say from all over the nation, there s a crew that we saw working from tennessee and we are working with some search and rescue teams who were from ohio, so it really is a nationwide effort, but they ve got this long task of going through rubble and not just knocking on houses but pick up rubble because there are many houses particular in mexico beach that were