President Donald Trump got a first-hand look Monday at the “total devastation” that Hurricane Michael brought to Florida, as rescuers searched for scores of missing and as hundreds of thousands of residents remained without electricity.
Trump and first lady Melania Trump passed out bottles of water at an aid center in Lynn Haven, a city of about 18,500 people near Panama City in northwestern Florida, after taking a helicopter flight from Eglin Air Force Base about 100 miles (160 km) to the west.
President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump listen to a briefing about the damage caused by Hurricane Michael in Macon, Ga., on Monday.KEVIN LAMARQUE/Reuters
“To see this personally is very tough - total devastation,” said Trump, who later traveled to neighboring Georgia to see storm damage there.
At least 18 deaths in four states have been blamed on Michael, which crashed into the Panhandle last Wednesday as one of the most powerful storms on record to hit the continental United States.
Thousands of rescuers, including volunteers, are still combing remote areas of the Florida Panhandle for those reported missing. They include 46 missing in Mexico Beach, according to ABC News. The town took a direct hit from the hurricane,
About 200,000 people remained without power in the U.S. Southeast, with residents cooking with fires and barbecue grills during daylight in hard-hit coastal towns such as Port St. Joe, Florida.
In Lynn Haven, Trump chatted with residents and praised the crews that had cleared roads on his route. Trump, who traveled to North and South Carolina after they were hit by Hurricane Florence last month, said previous storm sites he had visited seemed to have been hit hardest by water but that Florida’s damage was more wind-related.
“Look behind you at these massive trees ripped out of the earth,” Trump said to reporters, likening the storm to an “extremely wide tornado.”
On his arrival at Eglin from Washington, Trump said the day’s biggest objective was “just making sure everyone is safe, that they’re fed.”
“You know many of these people, they have no homes,” he said. “Some of them have no trace of a home ... so our big thing is feeding, water and safety.”
Trump was accompanied by Florida Governor Rick Scott, a fellow Republican who is running for the U.S. Senate against incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson in the Nov. 6 congressional elections in which control of Congress is at stake.
After visiting Florida for a few hours, the Trumps flew to Robins Air Force Base in Georgia to look at a part of that state hit by Michael and get a briefing from state and local officials. They surveyed damage to cotton crops and pecan trees. The Trumps planned to return to Washington on Monday evening, the White House said.
Insured losses for wind and storm surge from Hurricane Michael will run between an estimated US$6-billion to US$10-billion, risk modeler AIR Worldwide said. Those figures do not include losses paid out by the National Flood Insurance Program or uninsured property, AIR Worldwide said.
With top sustained winds of 155 miles per hour (250 kph), Michael hit the Florida Panhandle as a Category 4 hurricane on the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale.
Rescuers said they expected the death toll to rise and they were using cadaver dogs and heavy equipment to search collapsed homes in towns such as Mexico Beach and Panama City for more victims.
Rescue efforts have been hampered by blocked roads and huge piles of rubble in many communities such as Mexico Beach, a town of about 1,000 people where the hurricane killed at least one person.
“If we lose only one life, to me that’s going to be a miracle,” Al Cathey, mayor of Mexico Beach, told Florida media.
Cathey said 46 people who had not evacuated remained unaccounted for on Sunday.
Water service was restored to some in Panama City on Monday but Bay County officials said it was not yet safe to drink. Homeowners were advised to keep toilet flushes to a minimum because the sewer system was operating only at half capacity.
The Florida Division of Emergency Management said that while power was returning in most areas, at least 85 percent of customers in four mainly rural Panhandle counties were without electricity on Monday. Officials said it could be weeks before power returns to the most-damaged areas.
“We’re living in the daylight, and living in the dark once night gets here,” said Port St. Joe Mayor Bo Patterson, whose town of 3,500 was without power.
Trump is fully committed to helping state and local agencies with the recovery, the White House said. It was announced late on Sunday that he declared a state of emergency in Georgia, freeing up federal resources for the state. A similar declaration had already been made for Florida.