Good deal.
Everglades City under almost four feet of water
By Daily News Staff
Monday, October 24, 2005
Everglades City, Chokoloskee and Plantation Island emerged from Wilma under almost 4 feet of water early Monday.
Fire officials called in back-up emergency teams to help them locate the estimated 500 to 600 residents who stayed to ride out the storm.
The task at hand was overwhelming for Ochopee Fire District Control Chief Paul Wilson.
"Hopefully they get here because I can't do this by myself," Wilson said.
Wilson said he hadn't found any loss of life yet, but he was particularly concerned about Plantation Island and Chokoloskee because of the amount of mobile homes on those islands.
The latest population estimates put Everglades City at just more than 500 people.
"We haven't been in there deep enough to know about casualties, Wilson said.
Officials blocked reporters from entering the area until they could get more emergency assistance from an incident management team.
http://stormedition.naplesnews.com/news/2005/oct/24/everglades_city_under_four_feet_water/
Naples airport sustains damage in storm
By Daily News staff
Monday, October 24, 2005
Naples Municipal Airport sustained considerable structural damage in the storm.
"All major buildings sustained some type of damage," said Ted Soliday, executive director of the Naples Airport Authority, which manages the airport.
Soliday was unable to assign a dollar estimate to the damage Monday afternoon, but he said the figure will easily reach into the millions.
Most of the visible damage is contained to the hangars, Soliday said.
Of the 350 hangars on the property, 100 or more have sustained some type of damage, he said. One hangar building blew away into a retention pond on the property, but the plane it was sheltering never
budged, he said.
Soliday said anywhere from two to five planes were destroyed and possibly that many were damaged. Four hundred planes are based at the airport yearround, he said.
The commercial terminal building sustained roof damage, a sliding glass door was blown off and there was some damage to the security fencing.
Naples Air Centre, a flight school, had two windows that were blown out and glass was on the floor. Four cats that were inside the building survived.
http://stormedition.naplesnews.com/news/2005/oct/24/naples_airport_sustains_damage_storm/
Hurricane Wilma largely spares Lee County
By By Anne Marie Apollo and Jonathan Foerster, Daily News staff
Monday, October 24, 2005
In Lee County there's Charley and then there's Wilma.
The former left a swath of destruction. The latter swooped through causing largely superficial damages.
While Collier County is reeling from the effects of storm surge and Category 3 strength winds, Lee was mostly spared.
Emergency managers said this morning that the worst-case scenario was avoided. A drive along some of the areas hardest hit by Charley, shows how much more timid Wilma was along Lee's coast.
In the hot August days after Charley, police and National Guard stood patrol on the outskirts of Fort Myers Beach keeping residents out while inspectors gave the island a thorough look. Today, cops barely
glanced as dozens of motorists crossed bridges onto Estero Island.
Still Lee wasn't without trouble.
-- Electricity was out throughout much of the county, as millions of Florida Power and Light customers reported outages.
-- Many mobile home parks took the brunt of hurricane force winds which ripped away metal roofs, lanais, porches and carports.
-- Metal structures collapsed under the pressure. The canopy of a BP gas station on Fort Myers Beach collapsed onto the pumps underneath. An awning fell off the Shell station on Bonita Beach Road and
Old 41 Road injuring bystanders.
-- Roadways were littered with debris from signs to organic waste. A large oak tree fell on Corkscrew Road blocking traffic in both
directions.
http://stormedition.naplesnews.com/news/2005/oct/24/hurricane_wilma_largely_spares_lee_county/
Immokalee woman killed by flying roof
By JOEL MORONEY
JMORONEY@NEWS-PRESS.COM
Published by news-press.com on October 24, 2005
An unidentified woman was killed early this morning,
reportedly when a rooming house collapsed and a piece
of the roof struck her in the head.
A tarp covered what appeared to be the woman’s body
near the collapsed ruins of the building at Esquina
Santos Corner, a collection of rooming house buildings
in downtown Immokalee.
There is heavy damage in the area: pooled water, downed power lines and street signs
and peeled away roofs.
Beatrice Gonzalez, 23, said she roomed with the dead woman. She said everything they
owned was destroyed with the building's collapse.
“I don’t have anything left. It blew away,” she said.
Bystanders said the rooming house rented room for prices that ranged from $7 per day to
$285 per month.
Gonzalez was trying to make it to a next door rooming house where about 85 people
were huddled against the storm.
Lynn Milam, 34, said: “From what I understand, a big chunk of the roof flew off and hit
her in the head.”
http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051024/WEATHER01/51024030/1075
Clewiston takes a huge hit
By THE NEWS-PRESS
Published by news-press.com on October 24, 2005
Clewiston took a major hit from Hurricane Wilma.
Officials report severe structural damage, mainly in the
eastern section of Clewiston, especially in the Hooker’s
Point area.
Hendry Regional Medical Center was evacuated after
the storm.
Hendry County Sheriff’s Office officials have requested
help from neighboring counties such as Highlands and
Lee. Emergency managers have asked for the state
National Guard. A curfew is in effect in Clewiston
beginning at noon today, with no expiration time.
The rest of Hendry County is under a 6 p.m. to 6 a.m.
curfew.
A search and rescue team from Jacksonville searched
for residents who may have been trapped or injured at
Clewiston Trailer Park, where mobile homes were
stripped from their chases, leaving piles of debris
without walls.
Hilario Velasquez, 44, had evacuated from his home
Sunday night. He returned today to find his trailer
wrecked, his possessions destroyed.
“I’ve got to call my brother’s family or something.”
Velasquez tried to help a neighbor who wandered the park aimlessly, hands in pockets.
“He’s, like, lost,” Velasquez said.
Another resident, Silvia Simon, 65, rode out the storm huddled in her bathtub with her
husband.
“It started at 5 a.m. The worst was between 11 and 12, while the wind was coming over
this trailer,” she said. “It has been terrible, completely out of this world.”
She said the trailer was pelted with roof parts and other trailer parts throughout the storm.
Asked what she needed, Simon said, “We need electricity. Most people are poor and
need some food.”
http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051024/WEATHER01/51024032/1075