i m john berman in ft. myers, florida, and the storm has intensified again. 85-mile-per-hour winds, heading towards the carolinas. this after tearing the destructive path across florida. it is expected to make landfall in south carolina around midday, somewhere between charleston and myrtle beach. it could produce life-threatening floods there in the carolinas. this is already liskely the largest natural disaster in florida s history. i m standing in the middle of some of the damage, in a marina where the boats have been washed up on to the shore here. parts of florida have been seriously damaged. as of this morning, 19 storm-related deaths. that number will almost certainly rise. in ft. myers beach, some of the destruction is breathtaking. i had a chance to have an aerial view of it, take a helicopter ride over, and there were sections that were just washed away. the pier, the large pier there, you can see it almost better from air. that s just been completely washed away. a
come in and supply ukraine with so much money, and so many weapons. but this is a significant escalation from vladimir putin. the fact that he s calling up the reservists shows that he has no intention of backing away from this war. in fact, in his comments, he framed the war not against ukraine, he described this as a war against the west. and that the west, he didn t mention the united states, but clearly, that s the main power he s referring to, has been propping up ukraine and intends to bring down russia and bring down the russian federation the same way that the west primarily the united states, toppled the soviet union. so he is framing this very much as an existential fight for russia. and in order to fight this fight, he s calling up the reservists and making nuclear threats to show that he is serious and that he has no intention of backing down. so, richard, is there a sense this could lead to some sort of nuclear standoff? i think that is where this is heading.
to the mainland. and above the shear scale of the wreckage, the storm left some areas completely unrecognizable. one person told the tampa bay times lee koth looks like a bomb has been dropped. momentarily, we ll go live to fort myers beach where this side by side shows the destruction to the popular pier. here s a man from fort myers who had a terrifying experience. i stayed here as long as i could until i got scared for my life and went across the street. the it didn ts last too long. the big bad wolf puffed it away. i watched my house disappear with everything in it. right pfr my eyes. right before his eyes. i want to bring in kat park in south carolina where hurricane ian is expected to make landfall soon. what are the conditions you re seeing? what are you hearing about what you re expecting in the next couple hours or so? reporter: so we have been out here for several hours now. i can can tell you the landscape has changed dramatically. behind me is the ashley riv
states. what is a governor supposed to do? they re trying to send a message to the rest of the country. make sure that no one s homeless, no one s hungry, and make sure that we always continue to treat people like human beings. i m pamela brown in washington. you are live in the cnn newsroom. hurricane fiona, this massive storm, might drop 30 inches of rain on puerto rico before it moves on. and already, we are seeing scenes like this on your screen. flooded rivers tearing away bridges and making matters worse, no power. the island s entire electric grid is offline. it failed and plunged 3 million americans into darkness, hours before fiona made landfall. and puerto rico s main energy supplier says power will most likely be out for days. fema s assistant administrator for response and recovery told me just a short time ago, that more than 300 fema responders were already on the ground before the storm hit. let s bring in cnn meteorologist karen maginnis, monitoring fi
is almost 10% of the population of florida. that means over 90% of people in florida to have electrical power. the number of people without electrical power is expected to rise as these slow-moving storm cuts across florida with hurricane-force winds. a major concern right now and overnight would be flash flooding caused by the heavy rains. more than two feet of rain is predicted in some areas, officials are warning residents to shelter in place if they have not evacuated. as many cities today are suspending rescue efforts until the storm passes. we begin with nbc news meteorologist bill for the latest. bill, what is the situation now? we are watching a storm that is weakening overland, but we still have areas that are losing power at this hour. we know we have people who need rescuing, need help from us. what happened during the day today, that is the situation as we go throughout these overnight hours. the center of the storm is over sebring, florida. it is about halfway