Hurricane Ian survival stories: Narrow escapes, harrowing rescues, floodwater

“It was just like a river out of nowhere,” said Sharp, 74, describing the apocalyptic storm surge. “There was nothing there, and then all the sudden there was like a foot of water in the house.”

Frightened, Sharp and her husband, Lonny Henry, frantically called 911. Even before a dispatcher picked up, however, the couple knew no one would be coming to their rescue.

Harrowing stories of survival surfaced across southwest Florida on Thursday as first responders rescued hundreds of people from homes turned into islands surrounded by still-deep floodwater. One elderly woman recounted how the water rose so high she had just six inches of space in which to breathe. A couple described looking out a window and seeing several large fish swimming by.

Many described being caught off guard — settling in as Ian approached with supplies of nonperishable food, water and generators on hand, only to find out that their homes were no match for the storm.

In communities near Fort Myers Beach, the water was so forceful it collapsed buildings, tumbled concrete walls, and pushed sailboats and dumpsters hundreds of feet. At one gas station, a large boat ended up parked next to a gas pump, as if ready to fill up. Scores were still waiting to be rescued from trailer parks, residential subdivisions and luxury waterfront apartment complexes in a part of the state that is home to a large senior citizen population.

Everett Bailey, 56, said he was asleep on a couch and woke up to see water starting to spill into his one-story home. He immediately waded through the flood to get his car.

“The water was in the car, too,” he said. “But my car started, and I drove it to the church.”

He returned home when the water receded to find his waterlogged belongings ruined.

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A few doors away, Anne Dalton, 70, considers herself lucky that the flood stopped inches short from reaching the interior of the house her family has owned since the 1980s. But as she watched the murky water swirl around her house Thursday, Dalton said she nonetheless experienced the scariest night of her life.

“The weird thing is it was like a river of currents, and it was not calm water at all,” she said. “It was pulsating, and it was pulsating under the water, too. It was very frightening, because we couldn’t go anywhere. We would have just fallen down.”

At one point, Dalton’s husband, Oliver Martin, looked outside and saw a…