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Hurricane Ian Death Toll Climbs to 83, Officials Defend Response

Police officers guard the Matanzas pass between San Carlos Island and Fort Myers Beach after the pass of the hurricane Ian in Fort Myers Beach, Florida, US, 02 October 2022. (EPA)
Police officers guard the Matanzas pass between San Carlos Island and Fort Myers Beach after the pass of the hurricane Ian in Fort Myers Beach, Florida, US, 02 October 2022. (EPA)
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Hurricane Ian Death Toll Climbs to 83, Officials Defend Response

Police officers guard the Matanzas pass between San Carlos Island and Fort Myers Beach after the pass of the hurricane Ian in Fort Myers Beach, Florida, US, 02 October 2022. (EPA)
Police officers guard the Matanzas pass between San Carlos Island and Fort Myers Beach after the pass of the hurricane Ian in Fort Myers Beach, Florida, US, 02 October 2022. (EPA)

The death toll from Hurricane Ian climbed past 80 on Sunday as embattled residents in Florida and the Carolinas faced a recovery expected to cost tens of billions of dollars, and some officials faced criticism over their response to the storm.

The death toll was expected to keep rising as floodwaters receded and search teams pushed farther into areas initially cut off from the outside world. Hundreds of people have been rescued as emergency workers sifted through homes and buildings inundated with water or completely washed away.

At least 85 storm-related deaths have been confirmed since Ian crashed ashore Florida's Gulf Coast with catastrophic force on Wednesday as a Category 4 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 150 miles per hour (240 km per hour).

Florida accounted for all but four of the fatalities, with 42 tallied by the sheriff's office in coastal Lee County, which bore the brunt of the storm when it made landfall, and 39 other deaths reported by officials in four neighboring counties.

Officials in Lee County, which includes Fort Myers and Cape Coral and is on the Gulf Coast, have faced questions over whether they mandated evacuations in time.

Cecil Pendergrass, chairman of the county's board of commissioners, said on Sunday that once the county was forecast to be in the cone, or the probable track of the hurricane's center, evacuation orders were given. Even then, some people chose to ride the storm out, Pendergrass said.

"I respect their choices," he said at a press conference. "But I'm sure a lot of them regret it now."

President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden will see the devastation in Florida firsthand on Wednesday, the White House said in a statement on Saturday. The Bidens will visit Puerto Rico on Monday, where hundreds of thousands of people were still without power two weeks after Hurricane Fiona hit the island.

Cuba is restoring power after Ian knocked out electricity to the whole country of 11 million people, flattened homes and obliterated agricultural fields.

North Carolina authorities said at least four people had been killed there. No deaths were immediately reported in South Carolina, where Ian made another US landfall on Friday.

Chugging over land since then, Ian has diminished into an ever-weakening post-tropical cyclone.

The National Hurricane Center forecast more heavy rainfall was possible across parts of West Virginia and western Maryland into Sunday morning, and "major to record flooding" in central Florida.

Washed away

As the full scope of devastation became clearer, officials said some of the heaviest damage was inflicted by wind-driven ocean surf that raged into seaside communities and washed buildings away.

Satellite images from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) showed beach cottages and a motel that lined the shores of Florida's Sanibel Island had been demolished by storm surges. Although most homes appeared to still be standing, roof damage to all was evident.

Surveys from the ground showed that the barrier island, a popular tourist getaway that was home to some 6,000, was devastated.

"It's all just completely gone," Sanibel's city manager, Dana Souza, said. "Our electric system is pretty much destroyed, our sewer system has been damaged badly and our public water supply is under assessment."

The island's link to the mainland was severed by breaches to its causeway bridge, further complicating recovery efforts, Souza said.

After waning to a tropical storm by the end of its march across Florida to the Atlantic, Ian regained hurricane strength and pummeled coastal South Carolina on Friday, sweeping ashore near Georgetown, north of the historic port city of Charleston.

Numerous roads were flooded and blocked by fallen trees while a number of piers were damaged in that area.

More than 700,000 businesses and homes remained without power on Sunday afternoon in Florida alone, where more than 2 million customers lost electricity the first night of the storm.

Insurers braced for between $28 billion and $47 billion in claims from what could amount to the costliest Florida storm since Hurricane Andrew in 1992, according to US property data and analytics company CoreLogic.

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Satellite Images Suggest North Korea Expanding Missile Plant, Researchers Say

A satellite image shows a suspected missile assembly building under construction (lower center of photo) at the "February 11 Plant" near Hamhung, North Korea in this handout image obtained by Reuters on November 20, 2024. (Planet Labs PBC/Handout via Reuters)
A satellite image shows a suspected missile assembly building under construction (lower center of photo) at the "February 11 Plant" near Hamhung, North Korea in this handout image obtained by Reuters on November 20, 2024. (Planet Labs PBC/Handout via Reuters)
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Satellite Images Suggest North Korea Expanding Missile Plant, Researchers Say

A satellite image shows a suspected missile assembly building under construction (lower center of photo) at the "February 11 Plant" near Hamhung, North Korea in this handout image obtained by Reuters on November 20, 2024. (Planet Labs PBC/Handout via Reuters)
A satellite image shows a suspected missile assembly building under construction (lower center of photo) at the "February 11 Plant" near Hamhung, North Korea in this handout image obtained by Reuters on November 20, 2024. (Planet Labs PBC/Handout via Reuters)

North Korea is expanding a key weapons manufacturing complex that assembles a type of short-range missile used by Russia in Ukraine, researchers at a US-based think tank have concluded, based on satellite images.

The facility, known as the February 11 plant, is part of the Ryongsong Machine Complex in Hamhung, North Korea's second-largest city, on the country's east coast.

Sam Lair, a research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS), located at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, said the plant was the only one known to produce the Hwasong-11 class of solid-fuel ballistic missiles. Ukrainian officials say these munitions - known as the KN-23 in the West - have been used by Russian forces in their assault on Ukraine.

The expansion of the complex has not been previously reported.

Both Moscow and Pyongyang have denied that North Korea has transferred weapons for Russia to use against Ukraine, which it invaded in February 2022. Russia and North Korea signed a mutual defense treaty at a summit in June and have pledged to boost their military ties.

North Korea's mission to the United Nations did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

The satellite images, taken in early October by the commercial satellite firm Planet Labs, show what appears to be an additional assembly building under construction as well as a new housing facility, likely intended for workers, according to the analysis by researchers at CNS.

It also appears that Pyongyang is improving the entrances for some of the underground facilities at the complex.

A disused bridge crane that was in front of a tunnel entrance, blocking easy access, was removed, suggesting they might be placing an emphasis on that part of the facility, Lair said.

"We see this as a suggestion that they're massively increasing, or they're trying to significantly increase, the throughput of this factory," Lair said.

The new assembly building is about 60 to 70 percent the size of the previous building used to assemble missiles.

In 2023, state media published images, which Reuters has reviewed, showing North Korean leader Kim Jong Un walking through new buildings at the complex in Hamhung, where workers were assembling tail kits and nose cones for what appeared to be the KN-23, according to analysts.

In the past, publicly released videos from North Korean state media show that the complex has produced everything from tank wheels to the casings for rocket motors, Lair said.

LOW-FLYING MISSILES

The KN-23 was first tested in May 2019, and is designed to evade missile defenses by flying on a lower, "depressed" trajectory, experts have told Reuters, making them potentially useful for Russia as it seeks ways to penetrate Ukraine's air defenses.

Russia has fired thousands of missiles since the invasion. Leaning on North Korea for additional supplies could ease the strain on its own production facilities, Lair said.

North Korea's state news agency KCNA has reported that construction is underway at the Ryongsong Machine Complex.

This month, KCNA said the facility "is pushing ahead with the projects for attaining the goal for modernization planned for this year." The work includes rebuilding production facilities as well as assembling and installing equipment at machine workshops and a steel casting workshop, it said.

Researchers at SI Analytics, a South Korean satellite imagery firm that uses AI technology to scour images, also confirmed the new construction at the February 11 plant, saying in a report on Monday that some of the construction near the loading area would likely be used to conceal the future operations of the factory from satellites.

"Considering the presence of numerous construction materials, vehicles, and open-top freight cars loaded with materials around the site, the construction appears to be progressing rapidly," the firm said. The report said the facility was used to produce ballistic missiles, without naming the KN-23.

Michael Duitsman, also a research associate at CNS, said it was possible that the new construction revealed in the satellite images could be a storage facility, but he believed it was more likely a new assembly building.

North Korean missiles account for a fraction of Russia's strikes during its war on Ukraine, but their alleged use has caused alarm in Seoul and Washington because it suggests an end of nearly two-decade consensus among UN Security Council permanent members on preventing Pyongyang from expanding its ballistic missile programs.

SI Analytics said on Monday it had also identified new construction at the nearby February 8 Vinalon Complex, which is believed to produce fuel for ballistic missiles. The construction may be aimed at boosting production of solid propellants or UDMH, an important liquid rocket engine fuel, the report said.

Joseph Dempsey, a military analyst with London's International Institute for Strategic Studies, said that North Korea's expansion of short-range ballistic missile facilities would likely be motivated mainly by a desire to boost the country's own arsenal.

He said it was unclear to what extent Pyongyang may have expanded production capacity to meet the demands of its new cooperation with Moscow.

More than 10,000 North Korean troops have been deployed to the Russian region of Kursk, where Ukraine launched a major cross-border incursion in August, according to Washington, Kyiv and Seoul.

The troops will fight as part of Russia's airborne unit and marines, with some already participating in battles in the Ukraine war, a South Korean lawmaker who sits on the parliamentary intelligence committee said on Wednesday.

Russia has not denied the involvement of North Korean troops in the war, which it has been waging in Ukraine since launching a full-scale invasion in February 2022.