The 1928 San Felipe-Okeechobee hurricane was the deadliest hurricane recorded in Florida history, killing more than 1,800 in the state.
The death toll from Hurricane Ian reached at least 12 on Friday and is expected to climb, according to reports from local officials, making the storm one of the state’s deadliest in recent history, but far from the worst.
Ian made landfall on Wednesday as a Category 4 major hurricane, packing 150 mph maximum sustained winds and causing flooding and 12-foot storm surges. On Thursday, Florida’s Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno said on ABC’s Good Morning America the major storm likely killed “hundreds of people” in the Gulf Coast county where the storm made landfall.
Hurricane Katrina in 2005 killed a total of 1,200 people, including roughly 1,000 in Louisiana and 200 in Mississippi, according to the NHC.
