Hurricane Ian Shuts Down Florida A&M Through End Of Week As Florida Remains In Emergency State
Hurricane Ian forced Florida A&M University to cancel classes from Tuesday (Sept. 27) through Friday (Sept. 30) at several campuses, including Tallahassee, Crestview and its law school in Orlando.
Officials at the HBCU urged students to shelter in place and to prepare a hurricane kit days before the devastating storm made landfall as a near Category 5 storm Wednesday afternoon near Cayo Costa, a barrier island west of Fort Myers, Fla.
Ian, one of the most ferocious hurricanes to hit Florida, caused widespread flooding, destroyed homes and plunged millions of Floridians into darkness from power outages. The storm is also blamed for at least a dozen confirmed deaths across the state, which could rise as search and rescue missions continued on Friday. More than 700 individuals were rescued in Charlotte and Lee Counties, which bore the brunt of the monster storm, Gov. Ron DeSantis said Thursday.
According to Poweroutage.us, nearly 2 million people throughout the state remain without power. Extensive damage to the power infrastructure of several areas was reported to the extent that some of it may need to be reconstructed.
"Hurricane Ian has forever altered the lives of so many of our fellow Floridians and we recognize the road to recovery will be long and challenging," said Eric Silagy, Florida Power & Light chairman and CEO, in a statement. “We understand how difficult it is to be without power and our dedicated men and women will continue to work around the clock until every customer’s electricity is back on. That said, the catastrophic nature of this storm means that we may need to rebuild parts of our system in Southwest Florida, which will take time.”
After devastating Florida, Ian was downgraded to a tropical storm Thursday morning before intensifying into a Category 1 hurricane in the Atlantic Ocean. It’s now headed toward South Carolina with 85 mph winds and “life threatening storm surge” that could reach Charleston by Friday afternoon, the National Hurricane Center said.
Ian is the fourth hurricane of the 2022 Atlantic hurricane season. The first major hurricane of the season, Fiona, is blamed for at least three deaths – one in the Dominican Republic and two in Puerto Rico.
Fiona also caused widespread flooding and power outages across the Caribbean before making landfall Saturday (Sept. 24) in Nova Scotia, Canada, where it swept away homes, toppled trees and left thousands of residents in the dark.
