Most who survived on 6-mile long Estero Island are realizing it’s not feasible to stay in the place Gov. Ron DeSantis referred to as “ground zero.” They have no power, no water, no cell phone service and no idea when those will be restored.
by foot Sunday, four days after a 10-foot storm surge driven by 150 mph winds inundated Southwest Florida’s coastal communities.
Hundreds of houses — mostly older, wood-frame houses and charming cottages — were shoved by the surge 50 to 300 yards from where they had originally stood, plowing into others along the way. They were crushed, reduced to piles of rubble with only an occasional AC duct or washing machine or patch of roof or snarled deck to mark them. One beachfront house still had a second-story closet intact, with clothing still hanging from the rod.
“These vehicles are of no use because they are waterlogged,” Carroll said as he drove past a Fort Myers Beach fire station, pointing to its trucks sitting in the garage. Carroll was driving one of Miami’s specially modified high-water Ford SUVs. “We learned in Miami how to construct vehicles that can maneuver through inundated places.”
“The water came in waves and waves and wouldn’t leave,” Jerry said. “The building shook. Charley buzzed through on an identical path but Charley was nothing compared to Ian.”
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