by Michael Snyder, End Of The American Dream:

Hurricane Ian will go down as one of the worst natural disasters in the history of the United States.  The utter devastation that we are witnessing in southwest Florida is difficult to comprehend, and it will literally take years for the region to recover.  When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in 2006, it was just a Category 3 storm.  Hurricane Ian was a very strong Category 4 storm when it finally made landfall, and it very nearly hit Category 5.  Some media outlets were reporting that Ian had maximum sustained winds of 150 mph, while others were reporting that Ian had maximum sustained winds of 155 mph.  In either case, it came really close to becoming a Category 5 storm.