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Millions of Florida residents have evacuated as Hurricane Idalia, an "extremely dangerous" Category 4 storm, approaches the state's Big Bend region. Evacuations have been ordered in 28 counties, and storm warnings are in effect for most of Florida, as well as parts of Georgia and South Carolina.
to hurricanes here in leon county and tallahassee, having faced hermeen and irma and michael in successive years. we've learned a lot. we've put those lessons into our preparations, but frankly preparation time is over. we are advising our citizens to shelter in place, whether you're sheltering at home, or in one of our emergency shelters, and we are in for a lot of -- into dangerous weather for the foreseeable future. and, again, we just as soon as we can we'll be in a disaster assessment and a recovery mode, but not until we experience potentially very dangerous weather. >> reporter: vincent long, i think something that you said bears repeating. at this point the time to evacuate in leon county is over. that needs to be stated again and again for those of folks that are watching that still have electricity that now it is
circumstances. what did they say about what they are seeing, i imagine a contrast going back to ian last year and irma, when water emptied out of the bay. >> nicole: i asked them, they have been here throughout several storms and it was shock on their face. they took out their phones and were taking photos and videos of this, they cannot believe it is to this point and we are early on. not even talking about a storm that made landfall yet tomp see shock and them to tell me several roads are under water as we speak, it is clear even they were stunned by how quickly this happened. for us here, as well, seen several, i was here during ian
rapidly deepening, it tends to make the width of it decrease. it's a more smaller storm overall in terms of where the hurricane conditions will be. given the storm is tracked well over in taylor county and the big bend region, it's far enough away that we'll probably just see tropical storm conditions, mainly tropical storm gusts through the day and heavy downpours as well. interesting concern that we have is northeast florida -- and i don't know how much you talked about this -- is the threat of tornadoes. >> ian: yes. >> similar storm we had a few years ago was irma. that storm was also a monster. that passed well west of jacksonville. it produced multiple tornadoes in northeast florida including an ef2 that damaged an apartment complex south of st. augustine. we'll be watching that closely. where the storm is tracking, all that rain will make it hard for the atmosphere to stabilize to support tornadoes. further east as you get into the eastern counties, florida and
st. johns river. i think that was a big talker with ian as it came through, not only just the flooding rain that happened but the river rise. what do you make out of this storm? are you concerned about any areas especially along, you know, the river that runs in a very unique way? >> you're right! it's very unique that runs north to south. interestingly enough, there is a tidal component to it up near the jacksonville area. we have very strong onshore winds it pushes water into the river. it prevents water from coming back out. the water just builds and builds and then the hurricane comes and then just sloshes it all to one side. again, this storm is going to be far enough away where that impact won't be as significant as we had with irma and probably 1-3 foot surge throughout the st. johns river in our area. >> ian: left side of the screen, you can see a live picture from cedar key. this is one of the places where we could see what could be a catastrophic surge up to about 16 feet. reasonable worst-case scenario there. over on the atlantic side, what about fresh water? what we're talking about rain falling from the sky, what do you expect for actual rain
for a place like st. petersburg, but still clearwater beach coming off land, it's really been an interesting forecast as really i think a lot of the readings could be coming in as the high tide starts to rise. >> nicole mentioned the eerie feeling. that's a lot of folks in tampa bay watching another catastrophe go by. you had ian and irma to the south. now idalia which will be moving off to the north. but we have some problems here. i'm concerned into the high tide cycle early afternoon hours tomorrow, because now you've got this. you saw those wind particles. you were making this point, jane. that's not even a true onshore flow just yet. by the way, those numbers, that's above what would be considered the average high tide from the past 30 years. in this particular case, those numbers would be a little bit above zero anyway, because the high astronomical tide with the full moon. then you've got the surge effects. but these are going to build up through the overnight hours when the wind doesn't allow that water to flow back out of the bay. that's the one that i'm curious
we were on vacation and came home early. i want to be in my district. because i assumed this would be tracked like ian or irma. i don't know what it is with storms first letter i but ian and irma tracked to be in panhandle area and kept moving and was going to hit tampa and coming south and hit sarasota and ended up going through charlotte harbor. anybody in florida when it's coming near your direction needs to be prepared to do the things they need to do to protect their families and their homes. >> ainsley: did a lot of people evacuate from the tampa area and head down to your district? >> we evacuated -- sarasota county evacuated zone 1 i believe. the coast line the barrier islands were evacuated yesterday. so, they didn't -- the best thing to do is to go inland because then you are going to get away from the storm surge, the wind aren't going to be as bad. but then you are just having to deal with the flooding type issues. but the best thing to do is to go inland and not be on the coast line. >> ainsley: think about all those trees in tallahassee.
municipal electric and cooperatives. really appreciate the hard work they have been doing even here in tallahassee as i was coming back in the early wee morning hours. tallahassee electric was out restoring power here in the capital region. so, again, very much appreciate what they're doing. we will continue to respond as we can, as, again, as i said, we have already started to responding to issues in southwest florida. i talked to representative adam bow tana from 40 myers beach this morning at 4:00 a.m. he says it's very irma-like conditions. not a lot of storm surge, not a lot of damage but certainly not ian i have reminiscent that they experienced in hurricane irma. happy to hear that and appreciate him giving me a call and ground truth. we are here and ready we will deploy our response and recovery teams just as quickly as we possibly can you know we like to move very quickly here at the division. we are ready to provide the needed support to our big bend
part of what your broadcast has shown is what happened in the tampa bay area. those areas during hurricane ian and irma, the water was sucked outof tampa bay. there's folks that probably weren't prepared for the type of flooding they experienced because the last two storms did not bring any floodwaters into that part of the state. the up side to it is where the storm is hit it's not as densely populated as other parts of the state. we do have 900 urban search and rescue team members on standby. some are rolling towards that area right now as they assess the damage. you can't put the 18 wheelers on the road until the wind dies down. they will tip over. >> if i'm correct, as you are pointing out, it was not as populated. this is not ft. myers beach,
of concerns, this is when the worst of that storm surge is happening. it looks like cedar key is in the four to six-not range but it's occurring as we speak. >> 16 feet you're getting up into a two-story building and started to answer my question with that image from tampa as we've got daylight there which is the reporters said in the briefing did we dodge a bullet from some major population centers not being directly in the path, but, boy, it doesn't look like if you ask people at tampa general hospital installing the aqua fence, a ten-foot-high barrier to keep the storm surge away from their hospital to stay up and running. what are the likely impacts in tampa? >> tampa is a huge population center within all about ten feet of the gulf. and they have dodged so many storms. irma, ian last year. charlie.