Hurricane Ian: The storm has passed but water keeps rising in central Florida

Residents in central Florida donned fishing waders, boots and bug spray and canoed or kayaked to their homes on streets where floodwaters continued rising Sunday.

Residents in central Florida donned fishing waders, boots and bug spray and canoed or kayaked to their homes on streets where floodwaters continued rising Sunday despite it being four days since Hurricane Ian tore through the state.

The waters flooded homes and streets that had been passable just a day or two earlier.

Ben Bertat found 4 inches (10 centimeters) of water in his house by Lake Harney off North Jungle Street in a rural part of Seminole County, north of Orlando, after kayaking to it Sunday morning. Only a day earlier, there had been no water.

“I think it’s going to get worse because all of this water has to get to the lake” said Bertat, pointing to the water flooding the road. “With ground saturation, all this swamp is full and it just can’t take any more water. It doesn’t look like it’s getting any lower.”

Gabriel Madling kayaked through 3 feet (1 meter) of water on his street, delivering sandbags to stave off water that was 2 inches (5 centimeters) from entering his home.

“My home is close to underwater,” Madling said Sunday morning before paddling to his house. “Right now, I’m just going to sandbag as much as I can and hope and pray.”

Two hours later, his house still was not flooded, and he was retrieving more sandbags to cover the back side of the house.

“We will see what happens,” he said.