ANARCHY AFTER IRMA
Looters roam Florida streets as homes obliterated 6m left without electricity and air force flies in food
MILLIONS of people in Florida were left without power yesterday as Hurricane Irma moved up the state – leaving a trail of flattened homes and flooding in its wake.
Parts of the Sunshine State were unrecognisable after being battered by 140mph winds which tore roofs off buildings and a storm surge that turned streets into rivers.
Criminals took advantage of the chaos, with looters targeting homes and businesses. Meanwhile air relief operations were under way, delivering food and water to cut-off communities.
The hurricane was yesterday downgraded to a tropical storm, but was still considered to be life-threatening. One emergency chief said: ‘This is the cost of living in paradise’.
At least five people have been killed across the state, while two-thirds of residents have been left without power. Some 6.2million people have no electricity with warnings that it could take months for them to get it back.
The US Air Force was last night set to bring essential supplies to up to 10,000 people in the Florida Keys. The low-lying area took a direct hit from Irma and was effectively cut off from the mainland.
Officials said the aid was needed to avoid a ‘humanitarian crisis’. However the planes also carried disaster mortuary teams.
The eye of the hurricane passed over Cudjoe Key in the Lower Keys on Sunday as a Category 4 storm with 130mph winds and a 15ft storm surge. More than 24 hours later some parts were still under 5ft of water and large channels of the sea surrounded homes.
An NBC News crew said that some properties had been ‘completely obliterated’ by tornadoes. Police also blocked the only main road into the Keys and put the area under a dusk-to-dawn curfew to stop looting.
First responders were going door to see if any help was needed among those who defied the evacuation order. They were also looking for bodies.
Monroe County administrator Roman Gastesi said they are ‘prepared for the worst’ adding: ‘This is the cost of living in paradise... now we start rebuilding our community.’
Meanwhile one of the biggest mass evacuations in US history – involving seven million people – and warnings to remaining Floridians to stay at home have left the streets prey to criminals.
There were at least 40 arrests of looters as they descended on nesses and homes, with much of their activity caught on CCTV.
Officers shot a teenager they found apparently ransacking a house in Broward County, south Florida. Police had been alerted by the home’s owners, who had evacuated their home but who were monitoring its surveillance cameras remotely.
In an organised looting operation in central Miami, a dozen criminals were spotted loading boxes of clothes and shoes into cars outside a shop. Police in Fort Lauderdale made nine arrests after a group of men were spotted looting a sportswear store.
Local police chief Rick Maglionesaid: ‘Going to prison over a pair of sneakers is a fairly bad life choice. Stay home and look after your loved ones.’
Irma has so far claimed at least 28 lives, flattening entire islands in the Caribbean. It is now threatening not only Florida, but neighbouring states Georgia and Alabama with flooding – affecting some 40million Americans.
The most sustained Atlantic cyclone on record showed its savage power when a man was found dead in his truck in the Florida
‘Cost of living in paradise’
Keys. The vehicle had been picked up and smashed into a tree. In Miami, which thought it was largely safe, high winds and tornadoes buckled two giant construction cranes, ripping down trees and power lines. The city’s streets were covered in mud yesterday after storm surge flooding.
Inland areas of Florida were not spared. In Orlando, home of Walt Disney World and other theme parks, at least 130 homes were swamped by flash floods and their occupants rescued by boat. Disney World was forced to close. Presicut dent Trump approved a request from Florida governor Rick Scott for a major disaster declaration ‘to help bring important federal resources and aid to Florida’ once Irma passes.
A spokesman for Florida Power and Light, which serves 10million people in the state, forecast that restoring services ‘could be the most challenging restoration in the history of the US’.
However, largely because Miami and Tampa were spared the worst damage, estimates of the cost of Irma to Florida were significantly from $200billion (£150billion) to $50billion. Some Caribbean islands closest to Irma’s path have been almost completely destroyed. In Cuba alone, where 36ft high waves were reported, at least ten people were reported dead.
They included a 71-year-old man who fell on a live power cable as he tried to take down a TV aerial and two women killed when a balcony collapsed on a bus on which they were travelling.
But despite the carnage, a few Floridians insisted on finding a lighter side to the environmental disaster. In Tampa, a city which was spared a storm surge of up to 15ft, around a hundred people ignored police warnings to stay indoors and took photos of themselves standing on what was usually the seabed of Tampa Bay.
This eerie natural anomaly – called a ‘reverse storm surge’ by meteorologists – was caused by the low pressure at the centre of the hurricane sucking the water away from the shore.
It also stranded two manatees, which had to be dragged back out to deep water by rescuers.