Story at a glance
- Hurricane Ian has made landfall in Florida.
- Strong winds and storm surges are expected to bring power outages and widespread damage to the state.
- Certain populations, including the homeless and elderly, are particularly vulnerable.
Florida has evacuated nursing homes, closed roads and shuttered airports in response to Category 4 Hurricane Ian, which is bringing wind gusts as high as 155mph and significant storm surges to the state. The hurricane made landfall Wednesday afternoon near Cayo Costa in Southwest Florida.
Extensive power outages have already been reported on the state’s western coast, while Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has tens of thousands of workers on stand-by for power restoration efforts.
Major tourist attractions have also been closed, including Disney World and Universal Studios. The Orlando International Airport, the state’s largest, has suspended flights for the remainder of today and the majority of Florida’s schools are closed, with some extending closures until the end of the week.
Earlier in the week, over 2.5 million residents were ordered to evacuate their homes, but no law mandates residents must flee. As of September 27, mandatory evacuation orders were issued for coastal communities, mobile homes and low-lying areas in 12 counties.
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But some are now being told to shelter in place, as it is too late to safely evacuate regions in Ian’s path, particularly Gulf Coast counties. The Florida Department of Emergency Management has created a map for residents to see where their home falls in evacuation zones.
Additional resources are available to residents through Florida’s Division of Emergency Management, including a toll-free hotline on storm updates. Workers are ready to conduct damage assessments after the storm and the Division deployed shelter support staff to counties in need.
All of the state’s counties are under emergency declarations, shelters have been erected, and tolls were lifted on some main roads.
“As Hurricane Ian moves across the state, with more than 155 mph winds, this is as strong as a large tornado. Expect strong winds, heavy rains and flooding,” DeSantis tweeted this morning. Earlier, he called on residents to brace for a “nasty” couple of days.
The National Guard from Florida and neighboring states, along with search and rescue teams and helicopter evacuation crews, are also on alert.
Incarcerated people in evacuation zones have now been moved to inland regions, and certain health systems plan on stopping visitors later today. At-risk nursing homes and hospitals have also been evacuated.
In addition to all these measures, Florida is also a coastal state and may be better prepared than others to meet the natural disaster given its history of hurricanes.
Research shows that of the seven cities that have adopted strong disaster preparedness plans since Hurricane Katrina, two – Miami and Jacksonville – were in Florida.
“Coastal communities that tend to be more impacted by hurricanes on a regular basis in places like Florida, tend to be a little better prepared, but the further you move inland the less likely that is to be the case,” Aram Dobalian, professor and division chair of health services management and policy at The Ohio State University, told Changing America.
However, Ian is expected to be particularly damaging as winds have already reached 155 mph — two mph short of a Category 5 hurricane. Storm surges could also reach 18 feet in some areas.
Furthermore, the more time that passes in between disasters, and when new regions are impacted, the less prepared communities become, Dobalian added.
Regardless of location, certain vulnerable populations, including those who rely on power for medical purposes and homeless individuals, are at heightened risks when natural disasters strike. Elderly individuals and those with chronic conditions are also vulnerable.
“What we’ve seen with disasters, really forever, is that the people who are socioeconomically disadvantaged in various ways tend to be the ones that are most impacted, because they don’t have the personal resources to help them weather the storms,” Dobalian said.
Recent figures put Florida’s homeless population at over 27,000, while homeless shelters throughout the state are gearing up to help meet demand.
In Orlando, free bus transportation has been offered to emergency and homeless shelters. In Sarasota, a local homeless outreach nonprofit, Streets of Paradise, has employed mobile services to provide information on shelter options and services for the homeless.
Homeless individuals already tend to suffer from physical and mental health conditions, and “when a disaster happens, they have to not only deal with those kinds of health conditions, but also just the greater challenges that everybody’s confronting during a disaster,” Dobalian said.
This increased demand can put strains on already under-resourced organizations.
In times of crisis, shelters have to accommodate both the newly homeless — or those who have lost their homes in the weather event — and the previously homeless.
“All of those people both previously homeless and the new homeless, if you will, end up at a shelter. Shelters are often not as well prepared to handle these individuals who were previously homeless and might be dealing with various other kinds of conditions. They might be dealing with hygiene issues or other things as well. And so unfortunately, there have been instances where individuals… might actually even be turned away.”
Although this is not the policy of emergency organizations, “that has unfortunately happened,” Dobalian explained.
This past year, Dobalian was part of a team that created a toolkit for incorporating homeless populations in disaster plans.
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