Georgia Baptist Disaster Relief crews watching, preparing as Hurricane Ian turns north

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DULUTH, Ga. – Hurricane Ian, one of the most powerful storms ever recorded in the U.S., destroyed a cross-section of Florida, trapping people in flooded homes, forcing patients from nursing homes and hospitals, cutting off a popular barrier island and obliterating a historic waterfront pier. Nearly 2.7 million people lost power as rain fell and waters rose.

Downgraded to a tropical storm over night, Ian now is is shifting north  toward the Georgia.

“We’re expecting heavy damage,” said Georgia Baptist Disaster Relief Director Dwain Carter. “We’re expecting loss of electricity, downed trees, widespread flooding all the way from St. Mary’s Island to Savannah.”

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp preemptively declared an emergency, ordering 500 National Guard troops onto standby to respond as needed.

Carter said he expects all of the Georgia Baptist Mission Board’s Disaster Relief units to be deployed along the Georgia coast, including chainsaw crews to help in the cleanup and mobile kitchens to provide food for residents in the event of widespread power outages.

Georgia’s Disaster Relief volunteers had been placed on alert earlier this week. They are now on standby, awaiting orders to deploy.

Authorities confirmed at least one storm death in Florida — a 72-year-old man in Deltona who fell into a canal while using a hose to drain his pool in the heavy rain, the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office said. Two people died in Cuba after Ian struck there.

Deanne Criswell, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said the agency is supporting search and rescue efforts. The U.S. Coast Guard also began rescues on southwest Florida’s barrier islands early Thursday, as soon as winds died down.

Emergency crews sawed through toppled trees to reach flooded homes, but with no electricity and virtually no cell service, it was impossible for many people to call for help when the surge filled their living rooms.

“Portable towers are on the way for cell service. Chances are your loved ones do not have ability to contact you,” said the sheriff's office in Collier County, which includes Naples. “We can tell you as daylight reveals the aftermath, it’s going to be a hard day.”

Ian made landfall Wednesday near Cayo Costa, a barrier island just west of heavily populated Fort Myers, as a Category 4 hurricane with 150 mph winds, tying it for the fifth-strongest hurricane, when measured by wind speed, ever to strike the U.S.

Ian’s center came ashore more than 100 miles south of Tampa and St. Petersburg, sparing them their first direct hit by a major hurricane since 1921.

The National Hurricane Center said Ian was expected to regain near-hurricane strength after emerging over Atlantic waters near Cape Canaveral, with South Carolina in its sights for a second U.S. landfall on Friday.

Ocean waters were receding after a storm surge brought destructive waves to downtown areas from Englewood to Bonita Beach, including Charlotte Harbor and Fort Myers. Cities from Orlando to Daytona Beach in northwest Florida got their turn for severe flooding before Ian moved out to sea.

Paramedics rolled residents out of the Avante Orlando nursing home on stretchers and wheelchairs through floodwaters to ambulances and waiting buses Thursday morning. A hospital system in southwest Florida was evacuating at least 1,200 patients for lack of safe drinking water. And in Port Charlotte, staff crowded patients into the middle two floors after the emergency room flooded and winds tore off the roof over the intensive care unit.

The Florida Highway Patrol shut down the Florida Turnpike in the Orlando area due to significant flooding and said the main artery in the middle of the state will remain closed until water subsides.

Calls from people trapped in flooded homes or from worried relatives flooded 911 lines. Pleas were also posted on social media sites, some with video showing debris-covered water sloshing toward the eaves of their homes.

Up to a foot of rainis forecast for parts of Northeast Florida, coastal Georgia and the Lowcountry of South Carolina. As much as 6 inches  could fall in southern Virginia as the storm moves inland over the Carolinas, and the center said landslides were possible in the southern Appalachian mountains.

The governors of Virginia, South Carolina and North Carolina joined Georgia’s in preemptively declaring states of emergency. Forecasters predicted Ian will turn toward those states as a tropical storm, likely dumping more flooding rains into the weekend, after crossing Florida.