Burke EM director deployed to Florida for Hurricane Ian cleanup

Mike Willis, Burke County emergency administration director, began the trek to Fort Myers Beach, Florida, early Wednesday morning, becoming a member of one other emergency administration director for the drive south, he informed The News Herald. Willis expects to be assigned to Sanibel Island, simply north of Fort Myers Beach, until one thing adjustments upon his arrival.

His position in Florida will probably be coordinating logistics for the realm, which suffered catastrophic injury when Ian made landfall as a Category 4 hurricane within the seaside metropolis.

Lee County, the place Fort Myers is, nonetheless had three folks lacking associated to the hurricane, and 61 folks have died in that county, the Lee County Sheriff’s Office introduced in a Facebook submit Tuesday afternoon. The hurricane precipitated at the very least 127 deaths throughout the state, ABC News reported.

“The reports I’m reading are showing about 13-15 feet of storm surge through there,” Willis mentioned. “It’s pretty much devastated everything.”

So far, North Carolina has despatched about 22 folks to assist Florida by way of its response and restoration from the storm, mentioned Keith Acree, N.C. emergency administration communications officer.

Acree returned Tuesday from Fort Myers Beach and mentioned a variety of the properties there have been fully destroyed.

“There are hundreds of homes there that are just permanently gone, I mean, nothing left but maybe some pilings in the ground or homes that weren’t elevated at all were just broken up pieces of wood,” Acree mentioned. “Their water, sewer, power, everything, all their infrastructure systems were out.”

It was simply Saturday that properties in town began to see their energy restored for the primary time because the hurricane tore by way of city Sept. 28.

“It was comparable to what I saw in south Mississippi after Hurricane Katrina,” Acree mentioned. “A really devastating storm for Florida.”

Officials heading to the storm from North Carolina are being despatched as a part of the Emergency Management Assistance Compact, which permits states to assist one another throughout disasters, Acree and Willis mentioned. Lee County will foot the invoice for North Carolina’s help and later be reimbursed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

“North Carolina received a lot of help from other states after hurricanes Matthew and Florence particularly, so we like to pay that back when we can and help out other states in return,” Acree mentioned. “I’m sure we’ll be leaning on other states in the future when we have other disasters.”

Willis mentioned he expects to be in Florida for a number of days the place he’ll be serving to coordinate restoration efforts till native authorities can take over.

“Say a prayer for these people,” Willis mentioned. “A lot of them are retirees, and a lot of them are working-class people, too, who worked at all of these places. Pretty much everything’s gone. They were hit pretty hard.”