Death toll expected to rise in US storm

RESCUE TEAMS IN THE EARLY STAGES OF COMBING A REGION RAZED BY A CATEGORY 4 HURRICANE THAT FLATTENED BLOCKS, COLLAPSED BUILDINGS AND LEFT INFRASTRUCTURE CRIPPLED

Hurricane Michael’s death toll rose to 11 yesterday and was expected to climb higher as emergency workers searched rubble and the storm’s grim consequences stretched from the Florida Panhandle into Virginia.

Rescue teams were in the early stages of combing a region razed by a Category 4 hurricane that flattened blocks, collapsed buildings and left infrastructure crippled. Some of the hardesthit communities have yet to report any fatalities, and although officials said they hoped they would find survivors, a resigned gloom was setting in throughout the disaster zone.

“I expect the fatality count to come up today. I expect it to come up tomorrow, as well, as we get through the debris,” Brock Long, chief of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said in an interview with CNN yesterday. “Hopefully it doesn’t rise dramatically, but it is a possibility.”

The Virginia Department of Emergency Management said yesterday morning that five people in the state had died from the storm, including four who had drowned and a firefighter who was responding to an emergency call.

Four deaths occurred in Gadsden County, west of Tallahassee, according to Lt. Anglie Hightower, a spokeswoman for the sheriff’s office. The victims included a man who died when a tree crashed down on his home in Greensboro.

An 11-year-old girl, Sarah Radney, was killed Wednesday when a carport was torn away and was sent hurtling into a modular home in Seminole County, Georgia.

It has been a tough few weeks for the Carolinas. After thrashing the Florida Panhandle, Michael slogged through states still reeling from the effects of Hurricane Florence last month.

Much of the coast of the Florida Panhandle, including Mexico Beach and Panama City, was left in ruins. The area is dotted with small, rural communities, some of them among the poorest in the state.

Earlier Thursday, James King Jr., 45, was swept away in his car in floodwaters in Pittsylvania County in southern Virginia around 3:30pm and could not be rescued despite the efforts of sheriff’s deputies, state police said.

Mexico Beach in ruins

The seaside community of Mexico Beach, where the storm made landfall, was a flattened wreck. Across the small sportfishing town, piers and docks were destroyed, fishing boats were piled crazily on shore and townspeople wandered the streets in horror and wonder.

“These were all block and stucco houses — gone,” the former mayor, Tom Bailey, said. “The mother of all bombs doesn’t do any more damage than this.”

$4.5b estimated losses

Hurricane Michael could inflict wind and storm-surge losses of up to $4.5 billion (Dh16.53 billion), according to CoreLogic, a data-analytics company in Irvine, California, that bases its estimates on the replacement cost of houses and other structures in the paths of major storms before they hit.

Sharper estimates are expected in the coming weeks, as homeowners report their actual losses to insurers.

AFP A train is seen tipped over from storm winds in the aftermath of Hurricane Michael in Panama City, Florida Thursday. The death toll from the hurricane, which slammed into the Florida coast as a Category 4 storm, has risen to at least 11,

Reuters Left: First responders and residents walk along a main street following the hurricane Michael in Mexico Beach, Florida.

AFP Cars are piled on top of each other after Michael passed through the area on Thursday in Mexico Beach, Florida. Losses from the hurricane could reach $4.5 billion.

AFP The interior of a store that had the storefront ripped off in Millville, Florida. Some of the hardest-hit communities have yet to report any fatalities.