Hurricane Ian live coverage: Eyewall comes onshore in Florida as warnings of ‘unsurvivable’ surge in places

Waffle House has closed 21 locations in the state because of Hurricane Ian, the restaurant chain says.

Waffle House spokesperson Njeri Boss told NBC News that most of the impacted locations were in the path of the hurricane, with some in low-lying flood zones.

The restaurant chain is known for staying open in the wildest of weather conditions, with FEMA unofficially using a “Waffle House Index” to help assess damage caused by disasters.

“I have flown storms for the last six years. This flight to Hurricane #Ian on Kermit was the worst I’ve ever been on. I’ve never seen so much lightning in an eye. This was the eye. You can see the curvature. Understand this is at NIGHT. The light is from LIGHTNING,” tweeted Nick Underwood.

Hurricane Ian is expected to bring a storm surge of up to six feet to the Tampa Bay area, putting low-lying areas at extreme risk of flooding.

As the storm approached, the water drained from the bay, creating the eerie sight of an empty basin amid the normally bustling harbour.

Ethan freedman has the details.

Joe Biden will visit the Federal Emergency Management Agency headquarters in Washington DC on Thursday, the White House has announced.

White House press secretary Kaine Jean-Pierre said at a Wednesday briefing that the president will “visit FEMA headquarters to receive a briefing on federal response efforts for hurricane Ian.”

The governor says that the state of Florida has 42,000 linemen, 7,000 National Guardsman, 179 aircraft and highwater vehicles ready to respond to damage caused by Hurricane Ian.

The company backtracked after the message went viral, telling employees the office would be closed on Wednesday and Thursday.

Graig Graziosi has the story.

More than 483,000 customers in Florida are now without power because of Hurricane Ian, according to poweroutage.us.

Lee County, which is where Fort Myers and Cape Coral are located, is the most affected part of the state with more than 166,000 customers reporting they have lost power.

As of 1.30pm ET Duke Energy had reported more than 27,000 customers without power, while Tampa Electric Co said that it had 26,000 customers suffering outages, according to The Tampa Bay Times.

The City of Naples has issued an emergency citywide curfew to protect and safeguard the health, safety, and welfare of City of Naples residents, visitors, and first responders, authorities said on Tuesday.

The curfew is effective immediately until further notice.

The city of Naples is experiencing storm surge of more than five feet of water as the eyewall of monster Hurricane Ian barrelled onshore Wednesday morning.

Kevin Guthrie, head of the Florida Division of Emergency Management, asked people sheltering in place for Hurricane Ian to provide first responders with information on their family members.

Those who had not evacuated were asked to fill out a survey from the state government with information about their families and demographic information on people in the storm as conditions deteriorate.