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
wow. you got the video? i got it. here it is. oh, man. that s our pool. that s our deck. that was my house. my house is gone. jesse: a fox news alert, one of the largest search and rescue missions in american history is underway after hurricane ian decimated moving up the east coast. governor ron desantis says the situation is really bad. the amount of water that s been rising, will likely continue to rise today, even as the storm is passing, is basically a 500-year flood event. jesse: first responders are working around the clock. hundreds have been rescued since the storm hit. here s nassau county deputies saving two people stranded on a sailboat in the storm. hold on, hold on! hold! jesse: on the other side of the state, naples firefighters rescued a woman trapped in floodwaters. watch. jesse: it s all hands on deck. we re seeing the best side of people come out in the face of tragedy. a good samaritan used his jet ski to help firefighters with rescue
we start in florida, where the state is being battered by hurricane ian. this is the scene live in tampa bay, showing the sunshine skyway bridge, which is getting battered by the heavy wind and rain. there are warnings of catastrophic damage, both from the high winds, which are gusting at up to 235 kilometres per hour, that s around 145 miles per hour, and from the heavy rain. combine that with what experts are saying could be the highest storm surge on record, and there are fears for the safety of thousands of people. azadeh moshiri is in tampa for us. a life threatening hurricane is now barrelling towards america s sunshine state. and put millions under evacuation orders across the west coast. ian is unpredictable. it s already caused widespread damage in cuba, wiping out power to the country s entire grid, with some residents killed. but now its hurricane force winds are leaving the gulf of mexico and taking aim at florida s coast. this satellite image shows the eye of the
i was on the police department for almost 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 stay for another storm ever again here. however, i am one of the lucky ones. recovery efforts begin after utter devastation in parts of florida. while millions more people are now at risk as ian moves north. also tonight, he isn t tossing paper towels but governor ron desantis is handling this hurricane in a weirdly trumpy way. what we re learning about ginni thomas meeting with the january 6th committee when she wasn t texting the white house in the days leading up to the insurrection, she was encouraging states to reverse trump s embarrassing defeat. ian is one of the most powerful storms to ever hit the u.s. now, the state begins the colossal task of picking up the pieces. we get a first glimpse at the destruction. from what we have seen so far, it is staggering. this is ft. myers, homes completely des
the storm barreling through the northeast. governor desantis spoke to us on the massive search and rescue operation that continues at this hour and will for some time. we ve had coast guard rescues, urban search and rescue teams from the state of florida, we ve had the national guard down in southwest florida. people have been being rescued on a minute by minute basis and it will continue to go. dana: we have live fox news team coverage. jonathan serrie, robert ray and janice dean are standing by. want to go to janice dean in the fox weather center for an update. hi. good morning. we ll get the official 11:00 a.m. advisory coming out shortly but we do know this was historic, it is the top four storms, strongest storms to make landfall in florida. 150 mile-per-hour sustained winds. pressure was 9.40 close to a category 5. still the chance they might upgrade it. there were winds indicated at 158 miles-per-hour from hurricane hunters yesterday. the current wind gusts over