Kevin Guthrie, director of Florida's Division of Emergency Management, said that by mid-day Friday there had been more than 700 Florida rescues. The effort is just beginning as emergency workers are able to get to areas that have been previously inaccessible.

Florida rescues in early stages

Guthrie said the first responders are initially focusing on “hasty” searches. These are primarily emergency rescues and initial neighborhood assessments. And will be followed up with two additional waves of searches by hundreds of search-and-rescue personnel.

He also said that during the rescue phase his team may “detect deaths without confirming them”. It is imperative that the emergency Florida rescues be completed first.

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Death toll expected to rise

The Volusia Sheriff’s Office released a notice of a second storm-related death in the county. A 72-year-old Deltona man fell into the canal behind his home.

The Governor’s office reports that there have been 42 storm related deaths. 

Officials in Florida fear the death toll from Hurricane Ian will continue to rise. The storm hit on the southwest coast and moved northeasterly across a large part of the state. The coastal areas were especially hard-hit by massive storm surge.

FPL power restoration underway

After the storm raged through Florida over 2 million people lost their electricity. And according to PowerOutage.us currently, about 1.7 million Floridians are still without power.

Peter Robbins, Florida Power & Light spokesperson says a timeline for power restoration should be developed by Friday night.

“Later today, we’re going to be able to provide our customers — in most areas — a more detailed timeline of restoration. We’re still doing damage assessments in the hardest-hit areas where it’s just been difficult to access those locations because of floodwaters and because of debris.” 

“So those hardest-hit areas will take more time and getting that timeline will take us a little longer, but we should have an estimate for most of our customers later this evening,” Robbins added.

He encouraged residents in the hard-hit areas to shelter in place, if they are presently safe. And added that everyone should check with emergency officials or with their local police dept. before exploring areas where they are likely to encounter dangerous downed power lines.

“Sit tight. … Even if you manage to make your way back to your home, you’re probably going to be without power for a little bit.”