ashore yesterday afternoon, we were knew it was one of the strongest storms to hit the united states. day tligt day brought harrowing evidence of the destruction a storm like that brings. this is ft. myers beach, one of the barrier u lands that ian slammed into as a category five storm. before the hurricane, it was a popular beach defendant naugs destination. much of it is leveled. one local resident told the local paper, ft. myers beach is gone. this is the causeway leading to sanibel island to the west of for the murz beach. it s the only road to that island. it impassable. all the bridges to pine island also failed. this evening nbc nightly news anchor spoke with the mayor of sanibel for her concern about the people that didn t evacuate before the storm and maybe trapped there. we have significant numbers of people contact us, people they knew that were on the island. we ve been logging those meticulously and getting those out to our first responders. we had about 200
i was on the police department for 25 years, saw a lot of storms here. this is by far the worst storm i have ever witnessed. i promise you, i m never going to sit through another storm ever again here. i am one of the lucky ones. just some of the survivors of hurricane ian after the storm decimated wide sections of florida, and now the storm is on track to make a second u.s. landfall threatening the carolinas and georgia. good morning, and welcome to morning joe, it is friday, september 30th. joe is off this morning, but we ll get right to the latest with ian. intensing into a hurricane again, heading to south carolina after leaving a trail of devastation in florida. it is expected to make landfall near charleston around noon today as a category 1 storm. the national hurricane center is warning it could unleash life threatening storm surge, floods and strong winds. a state of emergency is in place for the carolinas, georgia and virginia. the damage from hurricane ian is
disastrous holiday weekend continues to come at the expense of their customers. also this hour we ll check on the next storm system as buffalo residents begin to dig out and get back on the road and hopefully avoid tlooding in their communities. and an update from officials as doctors continue around the clock supervision of pope benedict from his bedside in a vatican city monastery. some new developments in the southwest airlines debacle just in the last few minutes. southwest is now announcing plans to, quote, return to normal operations with minimal disruptions by tomorrow. but still today thousands more flights have been cancelled. thousands of fliers still struggling to figure out how they are going to make it to their final destinations. other airlines like american, delta, united have offered to try to help putting a cap on flight prices between certain cities to give customers more options. it s unclear whether that s work ing. let s bring in nala charles. what
good day, everyone. i m andrea mitchell in washington. president biden will speak this afternoon about the federal government s coordination with leaders in georgia, south carolina and, of course, hurricane ravaged florida. we expect to hear from ron desantis later this hour. let s begin with nbc s kathy park in charleston, south carolina. residents are used to flooding in that historic district. this looks like it s going to be an unprecedented event. reporter: yeah. good afternoon. that s absolutely right. hurricane ian is still barrelling this way. we are getting slammed with these heavy bands of rain and wind. every so often we get slammed with wind gusts you see right now. this is the pattern that we have been experiencing all morning long. i want to show you what s happening behind me. that s the ashley river you are seeing behind me. there s sawgrass, and it s almost covered by the water. it s high tide. that s the big concern throughout the day. the combination of
of the florida coast of that this is sanibel island, an island decimated by hurricane ian. right now there s no way to get help in to sanibel. the only bridge that connected the island to the mainland, it s a long causeway, it s caved in. so there s no way to get on or off the island unless you travel by boat. and that s been incredibly difficult for anyone to do. and that loss right now spans the florida coast. i ll show you cape coral. our bill weir was here today. this is a picture he took. you can see home after home totally destroyed and flooded. the ones that are still standing, you can see siding ripped off. at one point ian s winds were 155 miles an hour. we re going to have much more from bill weir in a moment. not far from where he took those images, ft. myers beach, striking images of what is left. not much. the beach community 48 hours ago looked like that. now, take a look at this. estero boulevard, 24 hours later. a restaurant called the whale surrounded by debr