significantly evacuated. and that s a good thing. but it s also low lying. and it is spongy, and there s a lot of it that could get really damaged. that s why ed laven dareo wept down to predict what we re going to see with storm surge. ed, can you hear us? hey, chris, i can hear you. we are driving along the western edge of naples. this is an area that is under mandatory evacuation. you can see the scene here. we re about a block off the water here, and, you know, we probably won t be able to do this for much longer here as the conditions have continued to deteariator. but as we drive along this street here, you can see even on the initial stages ask the early bands of this hurricane, as they start approaching southwest florida, you look out onto the
pushing this way on the other side. we have a 4 foot inverse surge in naples. the water is down 4 feet from being sea level. and that will rush back in as the eye goes by, and then the water will rush out of miami. for now we have at least five or six more hours of miami with the water rushing onshore, pushing in the same direction with more water trying to drain out. that s never going to drain because the rain is blowing from this direction so hard. and then we get up toward tampa, sarasota, this is where we re going to see the significant wind damage, too. wind 125. what we re showing you on tv is like 70, 75. i know burma was still in the wind, but he was kind of sheltered. i know there s a building to protect him a little bit. but still all that debris that was blowing around berman, we
we have been watching the water being sucked out on hillsborough river. the water has lowered while we have been standing here over the last several hours. and of course that water, once the storm surge starts to come in, all that water is going to come back. and it s going to come back hard. and the potential flooding here in tampa is major concern. i just talked to the mayor a short time ago. a year ago he had warned of the effects of a cat 3 storm hitting tampa, something they hadn t seen since 1921. he had warned of a potential 15 feet of water by tampa around city hall. chad myers, the weather center, that storm surge we can expect here in tampa, that people here in naples can expect and here in fort myers, it s going to be
counterclockwise. i want to bring in randi kaye. because as the storm gives storm surge on one side it s sucking energy from the other side. we re seeing the water move away from places like naples and tampa bay, but that water s coming back and when it does it s going to multiply and have power behind it, that s where the fear of storm surge comes in. randi, what are you seeing up there? reporter: chris, hello to you. we are on bay shore boulevard here in tampa where the rain is coming down. let me pan off me and take a look. the situation, where a lot of folks have been playing in the mud, because the water has receded. you could probably hear police trying to keep people out of here all day as the storm starts to make its way in, but you re looking at 700 miles of beautiful shoreline here in tampa. and now with such a low tide and the water is being pulled out to sea before the storm actually hits, people have sort of been going out there in the mud and
streets, this is exactly how things are quickly falling apart here on this particular street that we re on. you can see the trees that have already started to come down. there s one up ahead here on our right that we re going to have to manage our way to get around here. and this is already starting to be seen all through the city of naples here. so this is a situation we won t be out here much longer. so this is a downed tree here. we ve seen several along this stretch. you can see another one off to your right as well. so, again, this is just the initial bands of this hurricane as it is several hours away from making landfall here in southwest florida. and it gives you a pretty good sense of how quickly things are going to deteriorate and how dangerous the situation out doors will be even here probably in the next seven or eight hours, chris. please get somewhere safe. chris cuomo, we thank you as well. we re going to squeeze in a