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Ian Intensifies Back into Hurricane, Moves Closer to Carolinas. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired September 30, 2022 - 06:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Ian is not done yet. It has regained hurricane strength, and it's taking aim at the Carolinas, where people now are bracing for the worst.

[05:59:55]

I'm John Berman in Fort Myers, Florida.

The storm now barreling towards South Carolina with 85-mile-per-hour winds. It is expected to make its third landfall in the coming hours near Myrtle Beach.

After seeing the damage in Florida, the governor of South Carolina says, We know what's coming. So this storm might be the largest natural disaster in Florida's history. The destruction here in Fort Myers, I'm standing in the middle of it, it is hard to comprehend.

Fort Myers Beach, I had a chance to fly over it in a helicopter, much of it flattened. One official there describes the damage as, there's really nothing to come back to.

At least 19 people have died from this storm. That number very well might rise. More than 2 million people are without power this morning across the state.

There have been hundreds of rescues. The Coast Guard has been out in force, airlifting people from flooded homes and neighborhoods.

Sanibel Island hit very hard. The storm destroyed a major section of the causeway, which cuts off that island's access to the mainland.

Let's now go back to where the storm is headed this morning. As we said, it's back to hurricane strength, headed towards South Carolina. Miguel Marquez standing by there.

Miguel, I can see it's already coming down hard.

MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It is. And officials here in Charleston say that we are at the highest level. They're starting to shut down streets, because the rain is coming down.

This is an area that often floods in Charleston. I want to show you what it looks like here. This is the estuary here. It is very low, because we're just past low

tide. Here's the problem. You have all this rain coming from the sky. You're also going to have a very big storm surge. And that's what they are most concerned with.

Around noon, which is when the storm is going to be closest to land and probably make landfall, it is also going to coincide with the tide here. They're expecting it not -- (AUDIO GAP) the tide here. And this sea wall and many areas of Charleston flood on a day. They are bracing for very big floods here, asking -- (AUDIO GAP) they are doing everything they can to sandbag homes, to open shelters for those who may need them, and anybody in low-lying areas here, saying stay away from the ocean right now. Seek higher ground -- John.

BERMAN: I can see how hard it's raining there already, Miguel. But the water coming from the sky. The water just gets everywhere, all over you, all over the equipment.

And this is just the beginning. It's going to be several hours of that. You and your team, stay safe there. We'll check back in with you in a bit.

I want to bring in CNN chief meteorologist, Chad Myers. You know, Miguel standing in Charleston -- oh, is Chad there? OK. Chad, what are you seeing? What is the forecast now?

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: The forecast is somewhere around 2 p.m. landfall, likely North of Charleston. And that might be some good news for Charleston, but bad news for like, Horry County and places up there along the Grand Strand, because that's where the biggest surge may be.

But we have this Charleston issue, which honestly, I heard what he said. He kind of broke up. Charleston can flood on a sunny day with a king tide.

But all of a sudden, if you get up to high tide and you push a hurricane into Charleston, you get significant flooding. And we're going to have the rain. The rain is all the way up even into Virginia right now.

Tropical storm over the Gulf Stream, the very warm water of the Gulf Stream. And I said this last hour, the same Gulf Stream that kept Fiona so strong all the way up into Atlantic Canada and up into Newfoundland and Nova Scotia.

Right now, we have Hilton Head gusting to 43 miles per hour. For now, the wind is not right onshore. It's down along the shore. So not piling the water in just yet. But that's going to change.

This whole storm will eventually move in to the left and onshore, likely somewhere around Georgetown. North or South of Georgetown, which is Litchfield Beach, which is Pawleys Island area, but then you look to the North, where the big onshore flow will be, and that's where the highest tides and the highest floods will be. Four to six inches of rainfall, and it will be raining even in New

York on Saturday. Here's your wind. Charleston, 51 miles per hour. Notice the direction here into Myrtle Beach, significantly flooding there possible, especially like Garden City.

Again, Garden City and Surfside and Murrells Inlet, which is South of Myrtle. You can get sunny day flooding with a king tide. And if you push this much water back into the Waccamaw River, you'll get flooding all the way back up that Waccamaw River.

And the winds could be 35 in Roanoke. That could also be also a big problem as you work your way into trees falling down. Could be power outages from this in Virginia.

But it's the tide. It's the surge we're worried about today, 4 to 7 feet there along the coast. Why are we worried about this? This is Charleston harbor tide gauge. See, in the Gulf of Mexico, the tides were only up and down about a foot, foot and a half.

[06:05:03]

But here along the East Coast at this point, we are up and down 6 feet twice a day. And if we put this all the way up, the forecast is for 9 feet. That's only just a couple inches, three inches short of Matthew, about a foot short of Irma. And the record with Hugo, which was the biggest storm ever, was over 12 inches. And we're only 3 feet from Hugo.

A lot of water in the streets of Charleston. A lot of downtown going to be flooded, John.

BERMAN: Yes. A lot of potential for problems there. Chad Myers, thank you very much. We'll check back in with you shortly.

So back here in Florida, I want to bring in CNN's Carlos Suarez, who is in Englewood, not that far from where I am. Carlos, what are you seeing there?

CARLOS SUAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, good morning.

Parts of Englewood this morning are drying out, and it seems like there is access to some of the barrier islands out here. It is quite dark in our drive in from I-75. Understandably, because the power is out.

Debris litters the roadway out here. You can't get too far without running into some sort of law enforcement officer. There was a curfew for a part of Englewood. And that's because the city is between two counties. That includes Charlotte County.

Charlotte County does have a curfew in effect since about Tuesday. And that is going to continue on in the next couple of days, probably in the next week or so.

There are some signs of folks trying to get some sort of routine back together here. There are some signs of trying to get back to somewhat of a normal life, if you will. Right here at this gas station, there's a delivery that's being made.

And just a few minutes ago, a Florida Highway Patrol trooper also pulled into this gas station. There is a Walmart just to the East of where we are. And the lights there did seem to be on, though the location itself did seem to still be closed.

Folks here are trying to get back to their homes, if they made it out here yesterday, and were able to get to them because of the receding floodwaters. They were able to get a look at some of the damage.

But the further East you go, the higher likelihood is that your power might be back on, and there might be one or two gas stations that might be back open. There was one our way out yesterday back to Tampa. That's where we were staying.

The line was quite long. On the drive in this morning, though, it did look like they had run out of gas. But John and Brianna, this morning, at least here in Englewood, there are some signs of folks out and about, which is something that law enforcement has probably tried to discourage, because again, you can't get too far around town here without running into some pretty sizable damage, whether it's downed trees or just trash that litters the roadway.

But access to the barrier islands down to the South of where we are seems to be a possibility. This time yesterday, folks were not able to get into that part of Englewood, just because the flooding was that bad.

BERMAN: Yes, Carlos, you're at the gas station right there. A few days into this, people have been without gas for a long time. This is when it starts to really be a problem.

People start to be running low on their tanks, going from station to station. The way you can tell a station has gas, if there's a long line. That's the sign that they've got something.

Carlos Suarez, thank you for all the work you've been doing. Appreciate it.

So as the storm moves North, rescue efforts are still underway in some of the areas hardest hit. These are just a few of the dramatic moments caught on video.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All together.

(MUSIC)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: You know, some of these images, tragic, some uplifting. Just seeing all the people out there, the first responders, helping, putting themselves in harm's way to find those people in need.

So the damage and the flooding on a scale that has never been seen before here around Fort Myers. It is one of the hardest-hit areas in the state.

We have a a report from CNN's Bill Weir, who witnessed the devastation in the community of Cape Coral. What he learned about getting home insurance in Florida, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Lost everything last night.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm sorry.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everything.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Family's OK, dogs are OK, parents are OK. Lost everything we had. Been in the house since 1987. Pictures, memories.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: All right. That was a man in Fort Myers. The roof of his home blown completely off.

Thousands of Floridians experiencing the same across the state this morning.

I want to show you video from Cape Coral. Really, an entire neighborhood underwater. CNN chief climate correspondent Bill Weir was there as the full extent of the storm's destruction was coming to light. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BILL WEIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We know the Coast Guard has been doing some airlifts off of rooftops of people they had rescued this morning, I think a couple dozen.

And we've been seeing the big choppers with the back door open with the winch, ready to go.

But this is just unbelievable. The amount of damage in this one neighborhood. We're between the river and San Carlos Bay and Ian just raked this thing.

I've been talking to the locals who tell me have been telling me that the water came up so fast, chin high. A lot of retirees, elderly folks, families in here, working class. Some manufactured housing here, more expensive condos near the river.

So you've got a mix here, a socioeconomic mix. And ultimately, it comes down to, where do you have to go from here?

This is not savable. These people have lost everything. And because there's a law now in Florida that you can't get real good flood insurance or storm insurance unless your roof is less than ten years old. And for a lot of these homes, maybe built in the late '80s or early '90s, they don't qualify.

So I'm talking to a lot of folks who just have no insurance.

Oh, my goodness. I'm just feeling with my feet. Hazards that you can't see. And that's what so worrying for officials now, concerned about folks who are eager to get back and see what's left of their lives and may accidentally electrocute themselves.

There have been fires that have started because of natural gas leaks. You've got to worry about snakes. You've got to worry about sewage and maybe oil spills. This is just the beginning of such a painful stretch for so many folks.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: It's hard to imagine. That's a neighborhood. Bill Weir walking around a neighborhood in Cape Coral, just covered by water.

So some of the worst storm surge damage was not too far from where I'm standing right now in Fort Myers Beach. I had a chance to look at it from the air. I took a helicopter ride with the Lee County sheriff.

You can see, there's a home in a canal. A home was simply pushed into one of the canals there. Some of the homes closer to the water wiped away. You could just see foundations.

Joining me now is Fort Myers Beach town councilman, Dan Allers. And Dan, you shared some pictures that you took as you had a chance to go back to Fort Myers Beach yesterday. Just describe to me what you saw.

DAN ALLERS, FORT MYERS BEACH TOWN COUNCILMAN (via phone): Yes, thanks for having me.

My wife and I actually rode out this storm in a friend's house. We were in a, you know, fairly newer home that was -- I felt was safe for us to be able to do that.

So we were able to get out first thing yesterday morning and do what we can, take pictures along the way. But total devastation, catastrophic.

Those are words that come to mind when you see what you see. I know in some of the pictures that I was able to take, it shows -- it just does not show the magnitude of exactly what it is.

You mentioned homes that were in the -- when you took the helicopter ride, you could clearly see the devastation of not just one home, but several homes that were in the back bay. Search and rescue spent most of the entire day just combing that, rescuing people out. You could see people being lifted out.

And that's just in the water park. That doesn't include the people that have been pulled out from building, people that are still hanging out of buildings. It's quite devastation.

BERMAN: And you bring up a good point. Sometimes it's hard to tell. It's hard to even tell from the air, because you look down and you see what looks like a beach, just clear sand.

But what you can't realize is that there were all kinds of buildings there that are just gone now. And instead, there's nothing but sand.

You were involved in rescuing someone who was trapped. Tell us what happened.

[06:20:0]

ALLERS: Yes, I had received a call from a homeowner on the island that had said that they had no contact with one of their residents for about 24 hours, and if I could make my way down there, which is about 4 miles or so from where I'm at, to see if I could see anything or check on him.

By the time I was able to make it down there, there were already two gentlemen there that had found him or heard him, buried in the rubble. I was able to help him out, and we were able to get him to the beach where he was rescued and taken for his injuries. But I believe he's doing OK, that he'll make it. But that's just one -- one instance.

I just received another message this morning from another resident that said there's a body hanging out of one of the windows down towards the Southland (ph).

So as soon as we get off the phone, I'll reaching out to the sheriff's department to convey that information, and we'll be back out on the streets as soon as we can see to help as best we can.

BERMAN: Yes, that's what's so hard now, Dan, is the discoveries that are still being made, as people realize who they haven't heard from. We were -- we were in Fort Myers, not far from the bridge out of Fort Myers Beach in a mobile home park, and four homes down from where we were yesterday.

It turned out that a neighbor realized that their friend had been in that home and had passed during the storm. And we saw the first responders come and take the body away. And that's what's happening now across the state. What are your plans on Fort Myers Beach and what do you think's going to happen?

ALLERS: Well, you know, our local sheriff's department, our fire department, USAR is here, doing the best they can. As you said, if you look from above, it looks like just a big sandy beach. If you were to put side by side what it looks like yesterday and what it will be like today, versus what it was like a week ago, you would be simply amazed.

It's quite -- it's almost like you went back to the 1930s when you look at the two pictures. Where we're going, we're going to keep continuing to clear the road.

Yesterday, they were out plowing the road, almost like you would in the Midwest from a big snowstorm, to try to be able to get vehicles down to our Southern end of the island, where most of our seniors live in the condos, and are struggling to be able to get supplies.

They're running very low on supplies. And definitely not from a lack of effort.

In my opinion, I believe, it's just a lack of help. And it's not because we -- we're not trying or we don't have the local help, but I don't know if anyone in Washington can hear this. If you can send help, we need it.

BERMAN: Yes, it's hard. I know everyone's trying to get as much help to as many places as they possibly can. As I was flying over Fort Myers Beach yesterday, I saw a few military helicopters on the ground, distributing aide, and also taking people out.

Dan Allers, thank you for joining us this morning. I hope you're getting some rest.

The people at Fort Myers Beach, they're going to need you in the days and weeks and months ahead.

ALLERS: I appreciate it. We're doing the best we can, and if anybody needs anything, please reach out. I'll do the best I can to get you help.

BERMAN: We appreciate you, Dan. Thank you.

So we have some new video of Coast Guard rescues here in Florida.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I.D.'s, cell phones, wallets? All right. We're going to get -- there's a whole bunch of people just like y'all. Thousands of them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: This is CNN's special live coverage as Hurricane Ian now moves towards South Carolina. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:28:12]

BERMAN: The Coast Guard has been hard at work, trying to reach people in some of the hardest-hit areas. Sanibel Island was one of them, as Hurricane Ian pretty much left the island cut off from the mainland. It washed away a section of the Sanibel Causeway.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How many are there with (ph) you?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Me and my wife.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have a bag or something?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. What's your name? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you guys can make it out the window, you can come this way. Whatever's easier for you all. Make sure you have a bag with a dry pair of clothes, with I.D.s, cell phones, wallets. All right?

We're going to get -- there's a whole bunch of people just like y'all. Thousands of them. Take you to a shelter where you'll be all right. You'll have food and water and everything.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're not going to go, are they?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everybody else is staying. They don't want to go, so we're going to go keep on going.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's going to be loud and you'll be a little cold in the water, but we'll take you to the chopper. It's about ten minutes in the chopper. You'll be OK.

(END VIDEO CLIP)