SAN CARLOS ISLAND, Fla.—The sun is sinking into a bruised plum horizon and eastbound traffic is thickening on the Matanzas Pass Bridge as beachgoers head home from Fort Myers Beach on Estero Island before nightfall.
“When the sun goes down, the beach shuts down,” said Tina Tomasino, who owns Hurricane Tina’s 5-Star Dive Bar on San Carlos Island near the east end of the bridge. “You can’t see any light out there.”
Five months after Category 4 Hurricane Ian made landfall on Sept. 28, 2022, with 155-miles-per-hour winds on nearby Cayo Costa, killing 149 and causing $139 billion in damage across the state, Ft. Myers Beach is a construction site within a massive disaster zone that sprawls north and south along Southwest Florida’s Gulf Coast….