Internation at space station. Tonight, mandatory evacuations are happening in florida, in georgia, along the carolinas. Millions of people bracing. Over the past 24 hours the storm has been hovering over the bahamas, though, causing catastrophic damage and officials there confirming five deaths so far. I want to get straight to bill karins, nbc news meteorologist. We were talking before about how it was just sitting and sitting and sitting. Yes. Where is it going . And or though our thoughts w people in the grand bahama island still in the eye of this 24 hours later. The 8 00 east coast advisory. Now were at 140. Still a category 4. Still considered a catastrophic hurricane if it just moves near you, even just for a short period of time, let alone six straight hours. The position, stationary. Still sitting at almost the exact same location it has been for the last six to 12 hours. Just one band after another keeps going through the asame areas and doing more and more damage. Just frightful. The pictures we see out of there will be extraordinary. So what does this all mean for florida . The weaker the storm the better, of course. The Hurricane Center has that already played into its forecast. Down to 130mileperhour winds by 2 00 a. M. And tomorrow morning. You notice it doesnt weaken that much more. It only drops slightly over the next 48 hours. Its safely off the coast. The peak of the winds, the high numbers will be over the water. Thats good. Were on the periphery of the eastern half of the storm. That means gusty winds. That means high surf. It means beach erosion. It also can mean storm surge as the winds will pile the water up in the coastal areas. That right now is our greatest threat that we have to the east coach beaches coast beaches of florida. Charleston, georgeton, myrtle beach, wrightsville beach. Moorhead city. We could get a landfall here. By then it would be around a category 1 or a category 2. They still obviously can get some damage from those. So here is kind of how im looking at it. Florida impacts, moderate storm surge concern. As far as inland flooding and winds go, i dont think were going to see a lot of significant damage not with that offshore track. Our friends in georgia, same thing for you. Storm surge. I dont think the high winds are going to quite get into the georgia coastline. There is a little better chance that the higher winds could get into areas of South Carolina, especially myrtle beach toward the North Carolina border. I have wind possibility impacts in the moderate range along with the storm surge. I dont think the rainfall is going to be too big of an issue there. North carolina, very similar to this. Moderate concerns with storm surge and the winds. Just to show you the areas of greatest concern for that storm surge. Anywhere here with the pink coloring there, thats a storm surge warning. Its a 4 to 7foot range here. Very similar to what you saw in matthew about three years ago. You know, there were some problems. That caused significant damage in a few communities. If we time it toward the high tide and get the water 4 to 7 feet higher than the high tide, we could have some problems. As far as the winds go, i was mentioning im not too concerned, 64, 62. Thats enough to do some minor damage. Maybe scattered power outages. I dont think anything too widespread. This is 9 00 a. M. On wednesday near Daytona Beach and further up the coastline. Thats wednesday night. The closest it will get to the South Carolina coast will be as we go throughout thursday morning. Thats when your highest wins would be. Theres a lot of different elements to this, chris. What they experienced in the bahamas will be, you know, 1,000 times worse than what we deal with in florida. So its not like, you know, we still have concerns. People can die in storm surge. Water kills the most people with hurricanes. Thats why everyone has been told to evacuate. Yeah. That cone is still from Cape Canaveral all the way through the outer banks of North Carolina. From what we just saw, how confident are you of this track now . I would be shocked if it shifts toward the coast. At this point its even further off the coast than matthew was. With matthew, we didnt have a ton of wind problems. We had storm surge issues. The Hurricane Center saying thats their biggest concern right now. I think almost every forecaster would be shocked if we had a big shift towards the coast. It can happen but all the computers are in excellent agreement. Thank you so much, bill karins. Nbcs Morgan Chesky has been covering the story in the bahamas. The water continues to rise. Reporter tonight the bahamas torn apart. Dorian a slowmoving monster swallowing homes and cars, pushing sea on to peoples doorsteps. David mackie gave a chilling playbyplay. His home on stilts no match for a twostory storm surge. Far beyond anything weve ever imagined or ever experienced. Reporter on abaco island prayers for a family as dorian turned deadly. Our son my grandsons dead. Thats it. Reporter the grandmother in tears after she said her grandson drowned seeking shelter. Today conditions remained so bad the u. S. Coast guard couldnt move in until late this afternoon. Rescuing dozens but leaving many fearing the worst. Whats your biggest fear right now as a dad . My biggest fear right now is my sons safety. Reporter robert monroes son part of the bahamian military stationed in abaco. His last message, the weather is picking up. Since then, silence. The storm came and then all communication was lost at this time. Nothing . Nothing. Nothing. Reporter right now flooding is among the biggest concerns. With cars submerged at Police Headquarters at grand bahama as dorian dumps foot after foot of rain. Severe flooding and we fear for the lives of many. Reporter tonight the bahamas Prime Minister tells me that help is on the way, but stresses hes never seen such a powerful storm. Its just saddening. Its as if were fighting a war with the enemy having all of the weapons at its disposal and we have absolutely nothing. Were hopeful. The only thing we have to us is god. So we can pray to god and ask god to bring us through. Reporter and, again, the Prime Minister confirming dorian is now responsible for at least five deaths here in the bahamas. He went on to tell me he plans to visit abaco island tomorrow to witness the devastation firsthand and begin that long plan of recovery. Morgan chesky, thank you for that. Nbcs Mariana Atencio is in cocoa beach about 20 miles south of the Kennedy Space center. I see you have moved indoors. Reporter i have because weve just been getting caught in those rain bands, chris, throughout the day. I can tell you, ive been here for the past 24 hours talking to locals. Most of them telling me that they do not plan to evacuate at this point. And you drive around cocoa beach. It looks like a coaghost town. So clearly we have found where most of the locals are hanging out, here at the local sand bar. This is that ive seen the only establishment that is open on this Barrier Island at the moment. Most people telling me almost with a smile on their face that theyre floridians, that they are experts, theyve ridden most of the storms here, especially Hurricane Matthew whose track they are comparing to dorian at the moment, but also theyre telling me, chris, that theyre monitoring the forecasts, the reports you have been informing us on. Clearly theyre fans of msnbc. But, again, theyre waiting together as a family they tell me to make those lastminute domestic violenc decisions whether to stay or whether to go. The authorities tell me they are purposely leaving the bridges to the mainland open. They wont be closing them, not even when the winds reach 40 or 50 Miles Per Hour because they want to give locals a chance to leave if, indeed, that storm does not turn and these people get into a hairy situation. Chris . Tonight theyre having a good time. Mariana atencio, thank you so much from cocoa beach. On the phone now the mayor from jupiter, florida, about 90 miles west of the bahamas. Good to talk to you, mr. Mayor. Who is most at risk where you are right now . Well, were breathing a big sigh of relief here in jupiter. Weve been watching with bated breath. Weve been the cone of uncertainty probably until around midday today, but now were kind of in the clear and breathing a big sigh of relief. So the mandatory Evacuation Order no longer in effect . Actually, i dont believe that the Palm Beach County has lifted it. Because were still expecting some erosion. Most of our evacuations were in the lowlying areas, mobile home parks, really susceptible folks to flooding, and we still might see some effects from whats called king tide, this larger than normal tide situation. So i dont believe that theyve lifted the evacuation notices yet, but its certainly not as tenuous as we thought it might be a day or so ago. I was looking at some of the local News Coverage and they were describing what they were seeing on the beaches of jupiter today. They were saying some people were on the beaches for the waves and the intercoastal waterways for the calmer water. Whats your recommendation for folks in the coming days . Is it okay to be out on the water . Is it okay to be on the beach . You know, whats been crazy about the storm is its been so slowmoving and so long that people are anxious and got a little stir crazy sitting inside their houses and stuff. So what weve been trying to tell folks is, like, look, stay off the beach and were still going to get some Tropical Stormtype conditions over the next day and a half probably. So were just saying, hey, be smart. Theres no lifeguards out there. You always hear the rogue surfers or folks who go out there and do it and say, hey, thats probably not the wisest decision that you could make. You know, learn to live another day is kind of our message right now. And im assuming you still have all your emergency folks, your emergency plans ready to go just in case . We do. We do. But right now in jupiter at least its feeling like a pretty large drill that we had to go through. And to be honest, most people in jupiter are super concerned about our friends in the bahamas and, you know, the bahamas is such a its so close to where we are. Yeah. That our hearts go out to those poor folks. Were getting watching the in his and seeing the reports coming back of just total devastation. Were breathing a sigh of relief, but, man, its such a shame for those folks. It is. And i think were going to see a lot more when the sun comes up tomorrow. Mayor, good to hear that things are fantastic, at least compare tin glad to hear that everybodys doing well. Thank you so much for talking with us. You bet. Thank you. Ahead, much more of our breaking coverage of Hurricane Dorian. We are on the ground all across the southeast with the latest. Plus, new details of that deadly shooting in odessa, texas, including calls the shooter made to police. And dozens still missing after a boat fire off the coast of santa cruz. We got an update at a press conference just a short time ago. Well have the latest for you. Stay with us. Banjo . man go home. woman banjo sorry, it wont happen again. Come on, lets go home. After 10 years, weve covered a lot of miles. Good thing i got a subaru. avo love is out there. Find it in a subaru crosstrek. avo get 0 during the subaru a lot to love event. 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Joining me now from tallahassee, florida, the former director of floridas division of emergency management. Its great to have you on tonight, somebody who has been through this before probably more times than you care to remember. Were hearing from some people like we just heard from the mayor of jupiter that hes breathing a sigh of relief, but there is still this large cone of uncertainty in a lot of places in your state. What are you looking for . Well, right now, i like everybody else am looking to see the forecast play out in the way that the Hurricane Center hopes it does. I was here during Hurricane Matthew and although that storm never made landfall, it sure did a lot of damage up and down the coast. There was tremendous storm surge from that one. A lot of beach erosion. A lot of damages in parts of the state. So i dont want i dont want floridians to think were out of the woods on this one yet. I want them to Pay Attention over the next 24 to 36 hours as this storm makes its way northward, and the same for the folks in georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina. These storms still have a lot of variability to them. I want them to take every opportunity they can to prepare themselves. Do everything they can at the last moment. Be safe during the storm. Dont be dumb. Dont go out there and try to drive through standing water. Dont go out there in high winds. I dont want anybody to get hurt unnecessarily. Whats the biggest concern . What do you think people underestimate most in a situation like this, especially when the forecast that seems so dire has been backed off on a little bit . What worries you . What kind of decisions would you recommend people not make . My recommendation is to continue to follow the orders of the state and local officials in terms of evacuations. Stay off the roads. If the schools are closed, if your work is closed, the weather is going to be bad outside. Stay home. Let the First Responders who need to be out there do that. There is going to be strong rain, heavy rain, strong wind. That can lead to downed power lines, to downed tree limbs. Were going to have heavy rains that could cause some inland flooding. People try to drive through that and get in trouble on the back side of the storm when you have power outages, people have issues with chainsaws, generators, with grilling indoors. Just be as safe as possible. Dont take any unnecessary actions. Dont put yourself at risk. Keep your loved ones safe and wait until the storm passes and head out and do all the things you want to do. Based on your experience, how much Logistical Movement is going on right now . For example, weve been hearing from the governor over a period of days as theyre getting ready, your successor, the fema director in florida, 4400 members of the national guard, of course a lot of utility crews that are moving in and being staged. At this point would any of that be backed off on . Are they going to keep everything in place and wait maybe another 24 or 48 hours . Yeah, its likely that its probably died down a lot in the southern half of the state. There is probably still some activity going on in the northern part of the peninsula where the weather is still clear. They still have some time to get supplies to those locations. The state and local government, the private sector especially really understands what people are going to need in these kinds of situations and theyre doing everything they can at the Grocery Stores and the Home Improvement stores to keep those supplies on shelves for folks. The governments doing a terrific job of making sure they got as much as they can and prepositioning in the warehouses so if the storm does take a turn for the worst, theyre out there and prepared to get to people as quickly as possible. Like you said, now that its dark and the storms going to start impacted in southern florida, not as much activity. North of orlando, there is probably still time to move those supplies around. Bryan koon, appreciate you coming out on labor day night. Good to talk to you. Youre welcome. On the phone is the mayor lenny curry from jacksonville, florida. Mr. Mayor, what is your level of concern right now and what are you folks doing to prepare . Yeah, well, good evening. So this has been a marathon. We if you go back to late last week we had predictions of a direct hit that would have impacted jacksonville some time this past saturday or yesterday on sunday. Obviously things have slowed. And now my concern is that as this thing is appearing to be off coast based on the models, folks are not going to take it seriously. And i would remind them that if you go back three years ago when we had matthew, when we evacuated folks,