CHARLESTON, S.C. -- A revived Hurricane Ian pounded coastal South Carolina, ripping apart piers and flooding streets Friday after the ferocious storm caused catastrophic damage in Florida, trapping thousands in their homes and leaving at least 27 people dead.
The storm, estimated to be one of the costliest hurricanes ever to hit the United States, has terrorized people for much of the week -- pummeling western Cuba and raking across Florida before gathering strength in the warm waters of the Atlantic Ocean to curve back and strike South Carolina.
In Washington, President Joe Biden said he was directing "every possible action be taken to save lives and get help to survivors."
"It's going to take months, years to rebuild," Biden said.
"I just want the people of Florida to know, we see what you're going through and we're with you."
Many of the deaths were drownings, including that of a 68-year-old woman swept into the ocean by a wave. A 67-year-old man who was waiting to be rescued died after falling into rising water inside his home, authorities said.
Other storm-related fatalities included a 22-year-old woman who died after an ATV rollover from a road washout and a 71-year-old man who fell off a roof while putting up rain shutters. An 80-year-old woman and a 94-year-old man who relied on oxygen machines also died after the equipment stopped working during power outages.
Another three people died in Cuba earlier this week as the storm churned northward. The death toll was expected to increase substantially once emergency officials have an opportunity to search many of the hardest-hit areas.
While Ian's center came ashore Friday near Georgetown, S.C., with much weaker winds than when it crossed Florida's Gulf Coast earlier in the week, the storm left many areas of Charleston's downtown peninsula underwater. It also washed away parts of four piers along the coast, including two at Myrtle Beach.
Online cameras showed seawater filling neighborhoods in Garden City to calf-level.
Hours after weakening to a tropical storm while crossing the Florida Peninsula, Ian regained strength Thursday evening over the Atlantic. Ian made landfall in South Carolina with maximum sustained winds of 85 mph.
Police in Pawleys Island said the end of its pier had washed into the Atlantic. Gov. Henry McMaster said Friday morning that Biden approved a federal emergency declaration for the state.
The president is "fully aware of our situation" and vowed "whatever help" is needed, McMaster said.
McMaster declared a state of emergency Thursday, allowing for the flow of cash and resources into the hardest-hit portions of South Carolina.
In the Lowcountry, conditions began improving Friday morning after forecasters dialed back threats of coastal flooding as Ian jagged eastward closer to the Santee River.
"While any part of a hurricane can be life-threatening -- we typically see the potential for higher storm surge on the right-front side of the storm with respect to its motion," said Steven Pfaff, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.
That quadrant was expected to hit Georgetown, Horry and North Carolina's Brunswick County hardest.
The Midlands also took action as Ian bore down on the Palmetto State. At 11:40 a.m. Friday, the last flight of the day left Columbia Metropolitan Airport. In the Columbia suburb of Irmo, a woman was cut out of her vehicle after Ian's winds toppled a tree onto its roof.
Even when Ian departs, weather conditions will remain dangerous. Horry County had flash flooding, rip current and tornado watches in place from late afternoon into the evening.
Officials won't know the scope of Ian-related damages for several days. Conway Fire Chief Lee Hendrick said authorities there will begin assessments today.
As Ian moved Friday evening across South Carolina on its way to North Carolina, it dropped from a hurricane to a post-tropical cyclone with heavy rains and winds.
North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper warned residents to be vigilant, given that up to 8 inches of rain could fall in some areas.
"Hurricane Ian is at our door. Expect drenching rain and sustained heavy winds over most of our state," Cooper said. "Our message today is simple: Be smart and be safe."
DEVASTATING STORM
Ian left a broad swath of destruction in Florida, flooding areas on both of its coasts, tearing homes from their slabs, demolishing beachfront businesses and leaving more than 2 million people without power. When it hit Florida's Gulf Coast on Wednesday it was a Category 4 hurricane with 150 mph winds.
Rescue crews piloted boats and waded through streets that looked like rivers in Florida after the storm to save thousands of people trapped amid flooded homes and shattered buildings.
On Friday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said crews had gone door-to-door to more than 3,000 homes in the hardest-hit areas.
Hurricane Ian has likely caused "well over $100 billion" in damage, including $63 billion in privately insured losses, according to Karen Clark & Company, which regularly issues flash catastrophe estimates.
Florida Division of Emergency Management Director Kevin Guthrie said first responders have focused so far on "hasty" searches, aimed at emergency rescues and initial assessments, which will be followed by two additional waves of searches. Initial responders who come across possible remains are leaving them without confirming, he said Friday, describing as an example the case of a submerged home.
"The water was up over the rooftop ... but we had a Coast Guard rescue swimmer swim down into it and he could identify that it appeared to be human remains. We do not know exactly how many," Guthrie said.
Desperate to locate and rescue their loved ones, social media users shared phone numbers, addresses and photos of their family members and friends online for anyone who can check on them.
Municipal rescuers, private teams and the Coast Guard used boats and helicopters Friday to evacuate residents who stayed through the storm and then were cut off from the mainland when a causeway collapsed. Volunteers who went to the island on personal watercraft helped escort an elderly couple to an area where Coast Guard rescuers took them aboard a helicopter.
Orlando residents returned Friday to flooded homes, rolling up their pants to wade through muddy, knee-high water.
The storm surge destroyed many older homes on the barrier island of Sanibel, Fla., and gouged crevices into its sand dunes. Taller condominium buildings were intact but with the bottom floor blown out. Trees and utility poles were strewn everywhere.
"We will get through this," Sanibel Vice Mayor Richard Johnson said. "We'll come out on the other side better than we were going in."
Around the region -- Naples, Fort Myers, Sanibel -- the magnitude of the damage is impossible to ignore.
Along U.S. 41, the main road in the region, countless signs outside businesses are damaged, torn or gone. Many of the steel posts holding street signs in the ground are bent backward.
The majority of traffic lights are out, wires dangling to the road below in some cases.
Fort Myers Beach is destroyed. The cleanup will take weeks and will likely have to precede any rebuilding efforts.
Much of the damage was just cosmetic.
Other damage was far worse. At an RV park in Fort Myers, downed power lines and the destroyed poles they were attached to blocked the entrance. Down the street was a barn-style building that had been under construction. Its walls collapsed, the roof pinning the shredded lumber on the ground.
The damage assessments are just beginning.
"We have to be patient," Sanibel Councilman John Henshaw said. "We have to start looking at where are we going to stay and live for a significant period of time. ... We'll learn more as we go through this process."
MORE TROUBLE
Floridians are reeling from facing another problem after Hurricane Ian: raw sewage swirling into the floodwaters.
Untold gallons of raw and poorly treated sewage have flowed into streets and rivers as floodwaters inundate infrastructure, power failures knock pumps offline and manholes overflow.
Such discharges can carry bacteria like E. coli, parasites and viruses that can make humans sick. Nutrients contained in human waste such as phosphorous and nitrogen can also lead to red tides -- concentrations of toxic algae -- and blue-green cyanobacteria blooms in ocean waters, which can kill fish and other wildlife. Recent years have seen severe red tides off Florida's Gulf Coast.
Exposure to contaminants in floodwaters may cause skin rashes, gastrointestinal illness and other health problems, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
"Unlike in other parts of the U.S. where sewer systems can use gravity, Florida's flat topography means a series of lifts and other infrastructure is needed to get wastewater where it needs to go. If those pumps fail or lose power, they overflow," said Nathan Gardner-Andrews, chief advocacy officer for the National Association of Clean Water Agencies.
Officials in Bradenton were expecting millions of gallons of wastewater to be released into the Manatee River, city superintendent William Waitt said. In Casselberry, overflowing tanks at a plant after heavy rains resulted in the discharge of tens of thousands of gallons of partially treated waste, said Dawn Swailes, the city's water reclamation superintendent.
Ian caused thousands of gallons of sewage to be discharged into a storm drain from an overflowing manhole in Miami, according to a filing with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.
In addition to sewer overflows, the contents of some of Florida's hundreds of thousands of septic tanks will contribute to the human waste flowing into the state's Caloosahatchee River and eventually into the Gulf of Mexico, said Brian LaPointe, a research professor at Florida Atlantic University's Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute.
Information for this article was contributed by Meg Kinnard, Adriana Gomez Licon, Anthony Izaguirre, Terry Spencer, Tim Reynolds, Cody Jackson, Freida Frisaro, Mike Schneider, Seth Borenstein, Bobby Caina Calvan and Jeffrey Collins of The Associated Press, by Adam Benson of The State of Columbia, S.C. (TNS) and by Ari Natter of Bloomberg News (WPNS).
In this photo taken with a drone, displaced and damage homes are seen two days after the passage of Hurricane Ian, in Fort Myers Beach, Fla., Friday, Sept. 30, 2022. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
John Quigley carries a piece of artwork made by his daughter, the only thing he found to salvage from his collapsed home, as he pulls his girlfriend's son Sebastian in a cart while walking off the island, two days after the passage of Hurricane Ian, in Fort Myers Beach, Fla., Friday, Sept. 30, 2022. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
In this photo taken with a drone, debris and damaged buildings are seen two days after the passage of Hurricane Ian, in Fort Myers Beach, Fla., Friday, Sept. 30, 2022. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
Debbie and Lou Evans push their dog Brody on a hotel luggage cart they found amidst the wreckage, as they come to check on their home, two days after the passage of Hurricane Ian, in Fort Myers Beach, Fla., Friday, Sept. 30, 2022. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
A massive tree split during the winds and rains of Hurricane Ian bends over power lines and spills out into the street, Friday, Sept. 30, 2022, in North Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/Meg Kinnard)
A boat displaced by Hurricane Ian rests atop a car in Fort Myers Beach, Fla., Thursday, Sept. 29, 2022. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
Family members work together to repair a home after a tree branch fell, damaging the roof, in Fort Myers, Fla., Thursday, Sept. 29, 2022. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
In this photo taken by a drone, the two-story Getaway Marina building, front, lies reduced to rubble as displaced boats rest along the roadside and a trailer park, at top, lies nearly devoid of homes, following the passage of Hurricane Ian, on San Carlos Boulevard in Fort Myers Beach, Fla., Thursday, Sept. 29, 2022. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
A massive tree split during the winds and rains of Hurricane Ian bends over power lines and spills out into the street on Friday, Sept. 30, 2022, in North Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/Meg Kinnard)
A worker moves a sandbag Friday after a pump was placed to remove water from the Battery as the effects from Hurricane Ian are felt in Charleston, S.C. (AP/Alex Brandon)
In aerial photos made in a flight provided by mediccorps.org, damage from Hurricane Ian is seen on Estero Island in Fort Myers Beach, Fla. (shown) and on the causeway leading to Sanibel Island in St. James City, Fla., on Pine Island. (AP/Gerald Herbert)
In aerial photos made in a flight provided by mediccorps.org, damage from Hurricane Ian is seen on Estero Island in Fort Myers Beach, Fla. and on the causeway leading to Sanibel Island (shown) in St. James City, Fla., on Pine Island. (AP/Gerald Herbert)
Ana Kapel walks through what is left of the Times Square area near the Lynn Hall Pier on the island of Fort Myers Beach, Fla., on Friday. (AP/South Florida Sun-Sentinel/Amy Beth Bennett)Gallery: Ian hits South Carolina
