Hurricane Ian has officially left the state of Florida, but the effect of the historic storm will last much longer in throughout the state of Florida. Governor Ron DeSantis (R-FL) has issued critical updates on the status of the storm and efforts to combat its drastic impact on the state.
DeSantis and other Florida officials have been quick to mention Florida's 42,000 linemen, all of which were put to work this week to resolve over 2 million reported power outages. Now the governor's office is reporting that the linemen have already resolved 700,000 cases of power outages in Southwest Florida.
The Florida Disaster Fund has also contributed to recovery efforts with over $10 million donated in just 24 hours of being activated. The Florida Disaster Fund is the State of Florida’s official private fund established to provide financial assistance to our communities as they respond to and recover from times of emergency or disaster. In partnership with public, private, and other non-governmental organizations, the Florida Disaster Fund supports response and recovery activities.
Search and rescue missions have also been paramount for the DeSantis administration. The governor announced that search and rescue units were deployed to barrier islands and other impacted areas as soon as possible, and made dozens of rescues overnight. There are also 8 USAR teams with more than 800 team members performing search and rescue.
Recovery efforts are, however, nowhere near over. The state website for reporting missing persons related to Hurricane Ian is http://missing.fl.gov. If you need to report a missing person, fill out the form on behalf of "Someone Else." You can also fill out the form on behalf of yourself if communications are limited.
