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we re just helping some people through the water here. that s our camera operator. reporter: in orlando that piggy back of a lifetime for a local reporter for a nurse whose car became stuck on the way to work. and it s not just people who are in need to have assistance. a shivering cat rescued from rising waters and this good boy was carried out of the waves and wind, help is coming from far and wide. i ve come down here to check the area. reporter: deputy jason patch is from york town, virginia, he came across a man stranded on the roof of his truck. hi called for help and an airboat was dispatched and while we are just scratching the surface of the heart ache and damage that ian inflicted, time and time again, we are seeing humanity at its best. lester holt reporting. we always marvel at the heroism shown by first responders and regular people helping out after these storms. when we come back, we will take a turn to politics before we ....
Now are in the process of moving patients, according to the ceo of the hospital association. nine hospitals are without water. several hospitals were forced to move patients to other floors as wind and rain flooded wards. the ceo of lee health one of the largest hospital systems in the country gave an update on the dire situation the florida health system is facing. two of our hospitals do not have running water, and as you can imagine, we cannot take care of patients without running water. not only do we have four adult hospitals, we have a children s hospital in one of our hospitals. we re going to have to transfer also. joining us now, emergency room physician at tampa general hospital, dr. jason wilson. thank you for being on with us. first of all, how did tampa general fare for hurricane ian. we were very prepared and fortunate compared to our neighbors down south. our team members are all down ....
make their way down the thoroughfares. some people who chose not to evacuate were pretty much stranded inside their homes. we witnessed delivery of water and food to those cut off by waters. as far as where they begin here, that s a question officials are still discussing right now. regarding sanibel island that we just discussed, i asked the sheriff yesterday, what s the time line to get a bridge back up and going to individuals here, there isn t one. they are trying to come up with a game plan from day-to-day at this point in time because the dang is widespread, not just here in fort myers but every community up and down this coastline where ian struck. we were in tampa when it made landfall and as we drove farther south, it was so incredibly telling to see damage worsening just about every mile from a tree or two down to roofs ripped up to what you see now behind me ....
we have two major medical groups here, i have been in contact with our naples community hospital ceo and they did a great job preparing. first responders and medical teams they don t under estimate anything. we re no stranger to these storms. this one was at a different level. the level of preparation, exercise, the emergency operations center we have. you have people in there thatch double digit amount of experience, so even well before the storm when i was taking briefings from a medical team and from our emergency director, dan summers, these are folks that were readying a very serious storm, but it s hard to sort of prepare for water. you can always batten down the hatches and if you lose your roof, that s one thing. when you get that type of storm surge, we have a high amount of elderly population. ....
Structures held even in almost a category five storm. that s a good sign because then we can concentrate on getting into those communities that are water logged right now, where we ve seen the flood damage and after we do that, we ll be able to assess how long it s going to take to get those customers power back on. and so in those areas as you describe water logged, are the grids destroyed or what do we know? you know, some certainly have serious water damage. that s what the assessments were doing right now are telling us. we have had our drone teams out over the last day, and we ll do so today as well to start to get into some of those areas. the reality is we haven t even been able to get to certain areas on the west coast because of the level of destruction. and how many areas, how wide an area are there where the level of destruction is significant, where you might be making people wait for quite some time? ....