i'm ali velshi, one of irene's last stops dealt one of its hardest blows. parts of vermont completely unreachable as rivers start to roar. one official describing the aftermath as awful. >> cut off in carolina. i'm carol costello. thousands who ignored evacuation orders stranded on the outer banks. emergency supplies heading there by ferry today on this "american morning." good morning. it is monday, august 29th. you lose track of it on these type of weekends when so much happens. there is a lot going on for a lot of people who say we missed -- we dodged the bull letsz, a lot of people who didn't dodge any bullets. >> whoever says that is not listening to the chainsaws humming in connecticut, vermont, new jersey, all the way up and down the northeast coast. >> i think people thought it would be worse. we're lucky we dodged the bullet. i expected so much worse. >> nobody in western jersey dodged the bullet when you look at the towns and water still raging. everyone is clear there are still, you know, flood swol len rivers. you might be thinking you're driving like normal but be careful in the northeast. it's dangerous out there. you have lots of bridges closed or out. don't think you dodged it. >> i strongly disagree with that evaluation which i've been seeing from a lot of people. ivory towers for those of us in new york to think we dodged. millions of power outages, record flooding, cutting out communities and some of them are far inland. the storm no longer a hurricane, wasn't as of yesterday midday. not even a tropical storm now. but it rocked boats, flooded streets all the way through new england. and it is being blamed for at least 20 deaths across eight states. tell those families they dodged a bullet. the cost could top $1 billion, but that doesn't begin to include the big one, flood damage or lost business, downed power lines proved deadly and caused a transformer to blow in north carolina. 4 million left in the dark all the way up the east coast. many don't have power yet. as christine said, several towns in new jersey and new hampshire are under water. in vermont, these pictures are dramatic, raging water, washed away bridges, knocked some of their homes off of their foundations. search crews are saying they are afraid of what they could find when the water starts to go down. right now, seven families say they are trapped in upstate new york's catskill mountains after bridges crumbled around them. 23 include two pregnant women, seven toddlers and three infants. no power either. win dam upstate is also in danger, upstate new york, is in danger of breaking. for the latest forecast on the flooding and vermont -- because they didn't order those evacuations, they didn't think anything would happen. let's go to rob marciano. what is happening in vermont? what should they expect? >> not going to get any more rain but their riskers in most cases are still rising, most of them will crest this afternoon or tonight, and that sort of terrain, they rise quickly as we've seen and also fall relatively quickly as well. the rainfall amounts we see here are tremendous for sure, but keep in mind a lot of these totals came in between 12 and 18 hours, that's a lot of rain over saturated ground in a short period of time. monroe, 9.26, newark, almost 8 inches, laguardia seeing over 5 inches as well. new hampshire and vermont, you get just a little further north and west of the coastline and that's where the most rain fell and we're seeing the most damage. elizabeth county, new hampshire, 6.6 inches, platsburg, 6.35, and milds bury and burlington, the biggest and largest cities in vermont, we're seeing over 6 inches of rain. marketville, new york, seeing a tremendous amount of rainfall. these are mountainous areas. these towns will see creeks and rivers rise quickly and barrel through town and take out everything in its path. vermont, the green mountain state, just incredible beauty there, and some of their treasured covered bridge wiped out. that is heartbreaking to see. not the only one that went. this is the kind of thing that -- and there are towns in vermont that got wiped out as well. tremendous amount of rainfall there. the flooding is going to continue today, but no more rain. again, basically from north to south where you'll see the rivers crest in the hillier terrain across vermont and jersey, things crest tomorrow and further down. these are some of the gusts as far as winds go. it was, you know, we did have hurricane strength wind gusts in some spots including new york, laguardia got up to 67 miles an hour. the city itself in manhattan little bit more protect itted, saw less in the way of wind gusts. down the road we are still in the middle of hurricane season about to ramp as we go through the second week of september. this is tropical depression number 12 f that develops into a storm it will be kauds ya. if i had to roll the dice with that one, maybe it's wishful thinking, hopefully a fish storm. >> i was going to say, no, don't tell us about that yet. >> no immediate threat, guys. >> thanks, rob. north carolina's outer banks slammed so hard some areas are only accessible by chopper. the main highway washed out stranding 2500 people who didn't leave. our david mattingly live in colington, north carolina. good morning, david. >> good morning, christine. in north carolina, and virginia, alone, at least 11 people lost their lives because of this storm and authorities here only now beginning to get a fuel view of the damage that was left behind. >> reporter: a stunning view of the power of hurricane irene. north carolina's highway 12 chopped into pieces on hatteras island. the estimated 2500 residents who stayed behind now stranded with no way to drive out. >> we're probably 24 hours away from being able to get there other than by helicopter. >> reporter: hit first, north carolina felt irene's strongest punch. bringing what is described as epic flooding to waterfront communities along alba marl sound. houses and roads that weathered storms in the past, were swamped like never before. hurricane isabel in 2003 was an incredibly destructive storm when it hit here, the winds were such that it actually blew this water in the sound away from here. the water level was much lower. this time when irene hit, the exact opposite happened. entire neighborhoods were inundated in a matter of hours. one resident caught the flood on camera with winds whipping the water onshore. just hours later, the waters receded, leaving a mess behind, and weeks of cleaning up. >> part of living in the slice of power dice. >> reporter: people in virginia cleaning up, 1.2 million without power from a full day of damaging winds and 10 inches of rain. governor bob mcdonald is asking for patience. >> it's going to be a matter of days or perhaps longer before power is fully restored. >> reporter: it is the second worst power outage in virginia history. two states that will remember irene as a hurricane for the record books. >> reporter: and no estimates yet on how long it's going to take to repair that broken highway here on the outer banks. but officials now are not wasting any time. they're getting an emergency ferry under way to reconnect those islands and give access to the people who live there. >> thanks so much, david. millions of people without power right now. >> yeah. >> and some might be for days. you know, that is a whole lot less serious than a loss of life, but is it an inconvenie e inconvenience. >> when you live around trees and have overhead power lines, you expect it but hope it won't happen. this hour mass transit is slowly getting back it to normal. new york city subway system shut down for the first time ever due to a natural disaster. it has shut down before, but for other reasons. it's back up and running with some exceptions this morning. commuters should expect slower service, longer wait times, more crowded times. cnn's jason carroll is at penn station right now. usually one of the busiest places on any monday morning. how is it looking, jason? >> you're right. usually it's very busy where i'm standing right now. doesn't look that way right now. take a look at where we're standing. usually they're lined up here because there are a line of people waiting to hop inside and take the cab to their destination. they've come in on trains, trains that obviously it's in question as to whether or not they will be running today. this is really a transit culture when you think of a place like new york city. 2.6 billion use the transit system every year on an average, 7.5 million each day use the busses and trains. when you have a situation when the system is shts down, you can imagine it causes a lot of complications for a lot of people. let's bring you up to date in terms of what's happening today. we have the subway system that should be up and running as of now, but because the train service will be limited in some particular sections, you should expect some crowded trains and you should expect delays as well. in terms of new jersey transit, the trains are suspended. we were check the long island railroad service. expect some service suspensions there as well. good news for the area airports, ali. as of 6:00 a.m., we are told that you should start seeing some of the airports opening. all of the major airports will be opening today, that includes, of course, laguardia, newark and jfk. all the bridges and tunnels are open and cleared today. remember yesterday the holland tunnel flooded for a certain portion of time. but, obviously, this is a story about commuters. i want to bring in one commuter who stopped and decided to talk with us today. this is ron beau, he came in from long island. your commute went pretty well. >> no trouble daat all. >> what did the train look like? >> it was empty, a little quiet today. >> a lot of people maybe decided to take a three-day weekend. >> i think so. >> yeah. so in terms of talking about the commute, if you weren't able to take the train what would have been your option? >> i would have drove in. >> you're one of the lucky people that have a car. you know being in new york city, so many people depend on the subway system and the train system that a lot of folks don't have cars. a lot of people when we were talking about the service suspensions today were saying they were questioning whether or not the system should have been shut down. what are some of your thoughts? >> it was pretty bad yesterday on long island. i could see why they shut it down. branches flooding, the whole bit. >> and obviously still some spingss on the lirr. thanks for stopping by. hope you can make it to work. >> thank you. >> obviously still going to be suspensions today, people obviously decided not to come out because you know what it looks like right here at this time at 6:00, it's usually packed with people. look at this, not a lot of people around today. new york city's mayor said it's going to be a challenging day. i think that might be an understatement for some folks out here today. >> that -- ron, that is his name? he embodies new york practicalities. he had to come to work. the interesting thing about where you are, it's such a hub, if you take the train from long island you go to penn station. if you come in on amtrak, from new jersey or pennsylvania, you go to penn station. i guess those cabs are looking for those commuters who aren't coming in because we don't have amtrak running properly, we have long island railroad trains coming in but it's a commuter hub. >> absolutely. amtrak says that in terms of their service in the northeast, they are expecting their trains to be up and running, but i spoke to one guy out here trying to get to washington, d.c., on amtrak, he said amtrak told him no way, system not working for those trying to get down to d.c. it's going to take a while for the system to reboot itself. what you should be doing if you're on amtrak trying to get to a place like philadelphia, boston or washington, you need to check before you come down to a place like penn station. >> was that my husband, jason? >> trying to get from washington, d.c. to new york to d.c. >> he should call. >> i will e-mail him now. >> you use amtrak a lot, you know who you call when you get. julie. >> i love julie. julie is helpful, i think. >> i like julie. >> some man passed me the other day, buying loads of bottled water, he said, why is it that women are buying bottled water and men are buying booze. >> that's a good question. >> i thought that was so funny. met a lot of nice people, even though it sort of rained hard here in the heart of new york city. take look at this, this is the life guard headquarters in long beach, new york, on long island. you see it, it floated away. waves slammed it up against the boardwalk as the storm moved through at high tide. >> wow. people in upstate new york are told to head for higher ground after water started pouring over a dam. an empty car caught up in the current, empty we're told, tossed around like a toy in the water. >> storm reporters always look so tough facing against huge waves and strong winds. reporter in this next clip, meets her match when hit by a wave from irene, it's too much to handle. >> let's get out of here. let's get out of here. grab the mike. >> come on. and she left her photographer there. she threw her my crown phone and run. >> you're my size and a wave hits you you're fine. >> cameraman told me first rule in a hurricane, never stand in the water if you're on the beach, don't stand in the water. >> my first rule never leave your photographer behind. he's not going to be happy with you. >> we shad susan candiotti in long island, i was worried, going to end up in the long island sound. >> she didn't run away like a little girl. >> when you're small and waves hit you -- >> no, sarah would not have done that. >> i'd be nice now. coming up on "american morning," hurricane irene 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[♪...] >> male announcer: now, for a limited time, your companion flies free, plus save up to 65%. call 1-800-sandals. conditions apply. welcome back to "american morning." hurricane irene hit cities up and down the east coast. we've been receiving hundreds of your i-report videos, stunning images of the wild weather and widespread damage. jesse stone of white river junction, vermont, documenting massive flooding in his area. he said this river is normally very slow, peaceful, but on sunday the rough waters nearly destroyed this covered bridge. >> check this out, jeff captured a flash flood in woodstock, vermont. propane tanks being carried by the powerful waters. >> and let's move on to jersey city. adam rice sent us this video. he took it at the height of the storm yesterday. that's the hudson spilling on to the walkway along the river. there were evacuations in this area. we'll show you more i-reports throughout the morning. >> new this morning, fled his country after an alleged assassination attempt. the president of yemen says he will return. president ali abdullah saleh is in saudi arabia right now, severely injured in a bombing attack at his palace back in june. saleh says he will not come back to yemen until the investigation is complete. opposition leaders say he's stalling. saleh has agreed to step down from power at the end of the year. irene didn't stop hundreds who trekked to d.c. to visit the newly opened national memorial. the official dedication of the king memorial was postponed sunday because of the hurricane. the memorial features a 30-foot statute of king and an inscription wall with some of his famous quotes. >> the blue skies. sunday afternoon, blue skies. >> that's it. >> beautiful memorial too. now is your chance to talk back on one of the big stories of the day. the question for you this morning, what will dick cheney's legacy be. i ask you that because mr. cheney is starting a legacy building book tour. his book titled "in my time." cheney says heads are going to be exploding all over washington. maybe. in an nbc "today" show interview, vice president cheney was apologizing for nothing. certainly nothing. >> i would strongly support using it again if circumstances arose where we had a high value detainee and that was the only way we could get him to talk. >> according to the "new york time times", then secretary of state condoleezza rice, cheney writes of her, nay eve in dealing with north korea, of colin powell, cheney says powell tried to undermine president bush. that sent powell, as canton would say, to the moon. >> he says i went out of my way not to present my positions to the president, but to take them outside of the administration. that's nonsense. >> of george w. bush he called the president an outstanding leader from dick chaineny. if you think cheney will be bowed by any of his critic in february when ron paul supporters dared to heckle cheney at a conservative gaths eshg, cheney seemed to relish it. >> all right. sit down and shut up. >> war criminal! >> the usual spirited exercise. >> he loved it. our talk back today, what will dick cheney's legacy be? facebook.com/americanmorning. i'll read your comments later this hour. >> i'm looking forward to seeing the comments on that. >> me too. >> still to come, mayors, governors, even president obama went -- made sure they were out in front of this hurricane. how'd they do driving the preparations? we'll get insight into that. ala. i don't always have time to eat like i should. and the more i focus on everything else, the less time i have to take care of me. that's why i like glucerna shakes. they have slowly digestible carbs to help minimize blood sugar spikes, which can help lower a1c. glucerna products help me keep everything balanced. 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