raphael warnock was just obviously a tremendously and profound person. i spent some time with him on the trail in georgia in the last election and you never lost sight of the fact that he was john lewis s pastor irreverent. he is a force of nature. thanks to you at home for joining us. when hurricane ian came ashore last afternoon, we knew it was one of the strongest storm to ever hit florida, or ever hit the united states period. and after a terrifying night in southwest florida, they like brought harrowing evidence of the destruction in storm like that brings. this is fort myers beach, one of the barrier islands that ian slammed into as a nearly category five storm. before the her again, it was a popular beach destination for resorts and restaurants. as you can see, much of it has been leveled. one local resident told local paper quote fort myers beach is gone. this is the causeway leading to sanibel island just west of the fort myers beach. it s the only road to that isl
our thoughts remain with those impacted by hurricane ian. for those who need help, please ask for it. and if you can give help, please, give it. on that note, i wish you all a very good and safe night. from all of our colleagues across the networks of nbc news, thanks for staying up late with us. i will see you at the end of tomorrow. when hurricane ian came ashore yesterday afternoon and what was one of the stronger storms to ever hit the united states, period, and after a terrifying night in southwest florida daylight today brought harrowing evidence of the destruction of a storm like that brings. this is fort myers beach, one of the barrier ion islands that in slammed into as a near category five storm. for the hurricane it was a popular beach destination full of resorts and restaurants. as you can, see much of it has been leveled. when local resident told his local tape paper, quote, fort myers beach is gone. this is the causeway leading to sandoval island, just west of
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
from southwest florida but the grappling with what it left behind is just beginning. joining us now from fort myers, florida cnbc correspondent perry ross. in perry, we spoke last night just after fort myers was devastated. can you tell us about the last 24 hours and what it is been like? a so, today we went down to fort myers where there was flooding entire neighborhoods that are separated by water. today we heard stories of surviving and stories of saving. on the surviving side, we met an 80-year-old women who was filed by a couple of twentysomethings, she was taking her cell phone, trapped in her house and was just tapping against the window. she was trapped inside of her house and buy some luck, these twentysomethings heard her, dove into the water, and got her. we met a woman called mandy, she was wearing a lifejacket inside of her house with her husband. they were standing on top of a
her out. we met a woman called mandy, she was wearing a lifejacket inside of her house with her husband. they were standing on top of a pool table that flipped over. they were standing there for hours in lifejackets. mandy tells us her water was up to her neck. and the savings i, we met this man name kevin ott, he said he saved 16 people. he was with his three kids, his two sons in his daughter. scary. but we saved a lot of people that day so that s good. people there would never have made it. old people, sad, we had to leave a lot of people to. we spoke to him outside of the house where he saved the family of his ex girlfriend. there were about three or four of them he says that were trapped inside a house in ten feet of water.