fox news alert. the outer bands of dangerous hurricane florence starting to slam into the carolinas. wind speeds have weaken but life threatening rainfall and a surge pose a serious threat. we have live team fox coverage with chief meteorologist in the weather center and leland on the front lines in north carolina. let s go to rick who is tracking the monster storm. rick, there was an update at 5:00 o clock? yes. winds came down to about 5 miles an hour. they are still a hundred miles an hour. incredibly stonning winds. hurricane force winds extending across 160 miles from this. wind gusts at hatteras close
but when these things events come on shore they are devastating. they are nasty. it takes us some time to clean up the roadways, get the power lines back up, get the power back up. and i tell people you don t really want to ride one of these things out. the best thing to do is board up your home, get your belongings and move out of the area. you will be able to see once you get back in here after one of these things passes but to ride one of these things out is not a fun thing. so, you know, i think most people have heeded the warnings, have heard what the media has the information that has been sent to them and shared with us, and i think most people have taken this thing very seriously and have left the area and made preparations. the ones will stay here have made the preparations to ride the storm out hopefully in a safe way. bill: thank you, sir. we ll be in touch with you and your office there in wilmington.
landfall. the coast guard will respond. if this thing stalls and causes great flooding, this could be catastrophic and so coast guard will respond and ready to respond. the other challenge that you have is that you ll have a lot of aircraft flying in a very congested area trying to manage that in an area that may not have the ability to manage that. we are dealing with a lot of scenarios. getting a lot of resources is good. trying to manage them is a challenge for the state. we re connected closely with the state and other agencies. i think this could be very catastrophic trying to manage those, having coast guard and other agencies making sure we coordinate that effort will be a challenge. bill: we have a reporter on the beach in north carolina. one last question. richard burr the senator from north carolina was speaking with sandra and me. he said he has seen a lot of hurricanes in north carolina and has property on the shore. he has never seen a better prepared governmental respon
throughout the next couple hours. bill: when the next press conference comes off we ll take you there. let s get a break. jim jordan is up live on the other side. come on back. a man eating free waffles at comfort inn. they taste like victory because he always gets the lowest price on our rooms, guaranteed, when he books direct at choicehotels.com. or just say badda book, badda boom. book now at choicehotels.com. today s senior living communities have never been better, with amazing amenities like movie theaters, exercise rooms and swimming pools, public cafes, bars and bistros even pet care services. and there s never been an easier way to get great advice. a place for mom is a free service that pairs you with a local advisor to help you sort through your options and find a perfect place. a place for mom. you know your family we know senior living. together we ll make the right choice.
what s different this time? look, i think the coordination. as we talk, i talked to the governor, we talked to the governor of north carolina two days ago and talked to the everybody seems to be talk. last year we had the two category 4 hurricanes that made landfall and we continue to learn how to work better. we learn from each one of these storms and i think we get better. i think fema, the federal response agencies, states, we ve been through a few of these. the coordination. we take the lessons learned and apply them to each store and get better prepared each time. sandra: we don t want to take any more of your time. thank you for your time this morning and best to you and all of your teams and all these efforts. thank you very much. appreciate the time. we appreciate the support. sandra: thank you. meanwhile griff jenkins is live in atlantic beach, north carolina where folks have just hours left to get out.