can tell from our vantage point, in these times of situations, we ll be honest with everybody, it s limited. we do not have the ability right now to venture out into the city by any means and get a sense of how the rest of the structures are withstanding the storm. we can tell you what we see here around us. there is outdoor concert venue here and it has a soft tarp over it. i ve been watching that for the last 35 minutes. i m amazed that that has not come peeling apart here with these winds that we ve seen. i thought for sure that that would start unbuckling as it is tied down here but what is simply stunning is how little visibility. we re down to maybe 100 yards of visibility here which makes this even more treacherous and as we ve approached this and endured this for more than the last hour, really makes you wonder in the rest of the area homes that are not as structurally sound as the areas in the buildings that you see
there any longer as the wall in the eye of this hurricane approaches closer to where we are, but this is it. just landing on the ground and you can imagine all the other kind of debris that is flying around out there as this storm makes it way toward us, chris. reporter: wlrt. we got to make it through this phase and then we have to deal with what chad was explaining earlier as the redistribution of the energy, when the wind comes around the other direction and brings that storm surge, then you get another phase of this. and you also get a different dynamic just in terms of the mechanics of what it does to the surrounding structures and foliage. chad, weigh in on this if i get it wrong, i remember it from you, which is everything s that s been fighting to stay up in one way is now going to get hit at its weakest angle the other way when the energy redistributes and the wind starts coming from another way,
i see you re out with the dog again. [ inaudible ]. reporter: you got to get back inside, pal. we got the backside of the storm still to come. the surge isn t here yet. please get back in. i ll come find you after. now most of the people here, chad, there s a lot of media. the good news is, they believe that most of who needed to evacuate did. we saw that local last night. nice guy. three legged dog. he s one of these salty types. been here for a long time. he knows what to worry about. he s probably thinking what i was, chad, which is all right, so here s that surge they were telling us about. it wasn t as bad. you re saying we haven t even seen it yet. that this is just like a little bit this is just a little bit of an vantage. this is a little bit of a runway for this surge. it can just follow this water. isn t that going to make it easier for the surge to penetrate if there s already if it s already liquid all the way up the road? absolutely, no question. this now ground
but that barrier s going to be easily breached and that water will be right there. i was just curious as to how many feet up sea level that road was. i m not able to do that right now standing here at the weather board. i m thinking not ten feet above sea level, not more than that. reporter: give me a little sense of timing, again. i apologize, but again i just feel like so much of it is about duration and tolerance. what are we looking at? as this eye goes by, give me my next time component so that the people who are in parts north get a sense of proportion in terms of, you know, what kinds of waves they can look for? take a look at the palm trees and the palm fronds barely now moving, slowing down and in the eye itself the skies will begin to lighten and brighten and then all of a sudden the bubble of water that has been following along with this storm all the way through the caribbean, we saw pictures that if you didn t
they are amazing in the bahamas where the water was gone from the islands and people were saying, i ve never seen this before, how did this ever happen, where did the water go? the water went with the hurricane. it did have that bubble of water, the surge water that s going to come in now and if you think a fresh water flood is bad, a saltwater flood is even worse for homes and businesses and the people that have to clean up after that saltwater flood and that s what s on its way. the surge flood, a flash flood emergency is still in effect for collier county. that means flash flooding is going to occur or is occurring and it will be life-threatening. that s where we are now. i don t know because the sfloe speed of the storm only 12-miles-per-hour how quickly that water will be five or ten or 15 feet high but it will be less than a half hour, chris, i think. reporter: all right. and that s good to hear because i m just trying to weigh