that number could rise even higher as search and rescue crews work to reach cutoff areas, removing debris from destroyed homes and businesses along florida s southwest coastline and we re learning that miami-dade fire rescue crews are conducting helicopter evacuations on sanibel island. boris sanchez is there in fort myers, florida. boris, you just spoke with the lee county sheriff a few moments ago. what was said? reporter: fred, there have been a lot of questions today about the timing of when lee county ordered evacuations. we re in lee county right now in fort myers. what we ve learned is lee county ordered its first evacuations more than a day after forecasts met the county s criteria despite the fact the county has an emergency plan that suggests evacuations should have happened earlier. the county s comprehensive emergency ma or more of water would indicate the need for hurricane evacuations in the most vulnerable areas. a lot of lee county is a vulnerable area. one
rachel: good morning, everybody. we go straight to a fox weather alert. florida is still reeling from the devastation caused by hurricane ian. we watched everything just go flying by. we lost so much at this point so we appreciate everybody. we are very much concerned about the storm. i should have left. i shouldn t have stayed. most of the time, we are all kind of doing our own thing just listening to the winds, which were horrible for hours. reporter: the storm soaking the mid atlantic making way up north and the death toll in florida and the carolinas unfortunately continues to climb. alexandria hoff is live in fort meyers beach this morning with more. good morning, alex. reporter: good morning. we re on san carlos island part of fort meyers beach and this is a challenging rescue and sadly a recovery operation has had to become and look at mangled pieces of metal and boats on top of hopes and look at residences and think, my goodness, i hope they were among
florida. the exact point of landfall is still unclear. the storm is growing stronger and also wider. prompting hurricane warnings across the entire state of florida. bill: ian tore through cuba. it knocked out power to the entire country. left 11 million in the dark. look at the satellite images. it set off a series of lightning strikes, the wind speed intensifies. 155 miles per hour clocked right now knocking on the door of category 5. dana: mandatory evacuations are affect being millions of people. everyone else should be ready to leave at a moment s notice. ron desantis underscoring the extreme threat this storm presents. it is knocking on the door of a category 5 storm. a storm of this magnitude will produce catastrophic flooding and life threatening storm surge. time to hunker down and prepare for this storm. it is a powerful storm that should be treated like you would treat if a tornado was approaching your home. dana: fox news and whether have our resources cov
the devey with us. israel prime minister benjamin netanyahu says the ground operation in gaza is into the second phase winning the war with hamas will be long and difficult a news conference, defence minister war cabinet member, benjamin netanyahu to stop the conflict is israel s second war for independence. the conflict is israel s second war for make every effort to bring hostages home. also on saturday, his comments were pecan and hamas leader on the gaza strip has offered to release hostages being held in gaza for the return of spring of all hamas prisoners and israeli jails. they said israel stepped up its bombardment of gaza and israel says the night time attacks and watch for the targets have to at some key figures within hamas which has been designated as a terror group by western nations. benjamin then yahoo confirmed that israeli troops are inside gaza in the north and south. here s more of what he had to say during the conference. what he had to say during the con
stuart, i didn t realize the shockingly low number of florideans that have federal flood insurance and therefore they may not even qualify. that s what makes the disaster even worse. on the southwest coastline of florida, way under half of the properties have flood insurance. way under half and they ve been decimated. go in land towards orlando and it s below 2% that have flood insurance. these people are now facing financial disaster and you point out those nine counties declared disaster areas, that pays for minor damage and minor cleanup and does not pay for flood insurance. now, just go forward a little bit pete: yeah, that was the question. how does it play out? over a long period of time, there s going to be money districted but it will take a very long time to get florida booming again. in fact, it ll take years. you ve got all these people who have facing financial ruin. i don t think that s too strong