hello and welcome to our viewers joining us here in the united states and, of course, all around the world. i'm rosemary church. this is "cnn newsroom." hurricane dorian is getting stronger. it's once again a major category 3 storm with winds of 115 miles or 185 kilometers per hour. and as the u.s. feels the effects of the storm, we are getting a better idea of the devastation dorian left behind in the bahamas. in the past few hours the death toll there went up to 20. but that number is expect to go much higher. and right now georgia and south carolina are feeling the brunt of the storm.

more than 34,000 people on the coast of south carolina are without power right now. there is flooding in downtown charleston. a county official who we just spoke to feels the worst is yet to come. >> we're seeing some flooding downtown in the city itself. and then in some of the outlying areas that normally flood. we, again, we're surrounded by several bodies of water down here, so it's not unusual to have flooding. we're hoping that this thing will hurry up and get out of here, but the next high tide is what we're really worried about at 1:00 p.m. when the storm could be right near us. >> emergency officials are warning against traveling on the bridges and the national hurricane center warns of a life-threatening storm surge, dangerous winds and flash floods. and we have full coverage of this. cnn's patrick oppmann has an exclusive report from freeport

coming up. our paula newton is on the island of abaco and our derek van dam is standing by in charleston, south carolina. but first we want to go to our meteorologist pedram javaheri, who is tracking the storm. he joins us now from the international weather center. so, of course, we're hearing about this flooding in charleston and we're worried about this 1:00 p.m. high tide that is a few hours away now. >> that's right. yeah, we had a 1:00 a.m. high tide and a 1:00 p.m. one going to be coming here in the next few hours, of course. the storm system is going to be on its closest approach to charleston around that time. once we get into late mortgage early afternoon, it will come into say 40, 50 miles of charleston. take a look. the western periphery of this storm has really. sheered apart here by the land. interacting with land for the last 24 or so hours from portions of eastern florida to now portions of eastern georgia and the carolinas. even with all of these variables

in the past couple of hours, able to strengthen to a category 3. these are the areas within say 50 to 70 miles, not only are we sees tropical storm winds, but even hurricane force winds expected within the next few hours. heavy rainfall on northwestern side of the storm right now. we expect this heavy rainfall to continue for much of thursday morning and much of the afternoon and evening hours. charleston could pick up as much as 6 to 10 inches of rainfall by the time we get into this time tomorrow as the storm begins to gradually pull away. here is the hour by hour breakdown. by 8:00 in the morning, we think the storm will be near its closest approach to charleston, again, 30 to 50 miles offshore. the storm surge at its highest across the region, potentially up to 7 feet. really important to note, when it comes to storm surge in a city like charleston where you're surrounded by two rivers and of course the ocean right in your doorstep here, you're going to have a tremendous amount of water funnel through the low-lying city. charleston built on reclaimed

land and was just once a marshy landscape sitting right at sea level. so you're going to bring in a lot of water to the city when you're talking about 5, 6, 7 feet of storm surge will cause significant damage. beyond that the storm skirts up the north carolina coastline and we think landfall will happen between, say, thursday night into friday morning. on the outer banks of the carolinas. that's the highest likelihood for the storm to cross over lapped. beyond that, it quickly skirts away from the eastern united states after some 13 days of threatening the caribbean and the united states before making landfall on thursday overnight. rosemary? >> we are looking forward to it removing itself from the coastline there. our pedram javaheri bringing us the very latest on the forecast. we appreciate that. >> thank you. well, so far the united states has only seen glancing blows from hurricane dorian but that could change in the coming hours and once place on high alert is charleston in south carolina. now, derek van dam is standing

by for us there right now. and derek, i know you've moved location there in charleston, and the big worry here is the flooding. we can see some water there. and of course they're counting down the hours until the 1:00 p.m. high tide which is going to bring some more problems with it. >> yeah, that's right. this city is on high alert tonight. as you mentioned, rosemary, a trio of threats. we have hurricane force winds in the forecast. we have storm surge and the potential for flash flooding. all exist tonight and into the day tomorrow with high tide, again, occurring between 1:00 and 2:00 p.m. tomorrow afternoon in charleston, south carolina. this is a city on edge tonight because they know just how vulnerable of a coastal city they are. now, since we've been in this location, we have seen green flashes illuminate the sky every few minutes as transformers continue to blow around the

area. i am, quite frankly, still surprised that we have electricity at the hotel we're hunkered down in at the moment. i think that will probably change. good thing we do have generator power available to us. the police are reporting floodi flooding streets, downtown charleston, and that all has to do with the susceptible nature of this city. all the topographical things coming together to put this city at risk for storm surge and flash flooding. >> yeah, and let's talk about the risk of this city because it has added vulnerabilities because of its topography surrounded in water. it sits very low. talk to us about that. >> yeah, i think all we need to do really is look at a map. if you look closely, there is nothing between the city of charleston and the open waters of the atlantic ocean, rosemary. it's similar for our international viewers to the city of hong kong. nothing between them and the pacific ocean. if we have an approaching storm system like a hurricane dorian,

a major hurricane dorian with winds of 115 miles per hour, there's a lot of time for that to push up the ocean water right into the charleston harbor. on top of that, you factor in the combination of extremely heavy rainfall. we've had rainfall rates between 2 and 3 inches an hour. you can see the gusts that come and go with the rain bands that are moving in. 2 to 3 inch hour rains at the moment. that's 70 milammeters of rainfall in an hour's time. that's a lot of rain for any city, let alone charleston, south carolina, that's so vulnerable to flooding. so there's going to be competing water sources. fresh water coming from the tributaries and the rivers finding its own level, moving down towards the ocean, and then the oncoming tidal surge from the approach of the hurricane. both of those are going to compete. and water seeks its own level. so the water is only going to go up in the downtown locations. and we've had reports of that, confirming just that already this morning. >> yeah, indeed. we're getting word, 34,000

people without power in south carolina. that is a lot of people. and we don't know how long that will go for. >> yeah. >> and how long it will take for them to fix everything. our derek van dam bringing us that live report. derek, get into the shelter, get warm and get dry and we'll talk to you again very soon. well, for two days, dorian's category 5 winds of relentless rains devastated grand bahama island. the airport in freeport is usually one of the busiest in the country. and one of the main entry points for tourists headed to the island paradise. our cnn team made it there on wednesday and describes the damage as breathtaking. our patrick oppmann filed this exclusive report. >> reporter: we saw airplanes coming over this island with

helicopters, the first sign of any organized rescue effort to bring in help from outside this island. we thought perhaps that meant the airport here was functional or had re-opened. so we went to the airport and what we found was total devastation. we are on the runway at the freeport airport. it has been inaccessible for days. there was a river between. it looked like waves were crashing on this airport. look how destroyed it is right now. just about every side, 8 feet to 10 feet up has been levelled, ripped in, torn in. look at it now. i don't recognize it. there's not a wall standing. you think about the need this island has right now for a functioning airport to get injured people out, to get

supplies in, and this airport right now is completely destroyed. i've never seen anything like it in my life. this is complete and utter devastation like i've never seen. jose's going to point the camera over here. look at this. that's a wheel. this is the underside of a plane. this is what's left of the wing. you think of the force required to throw a plane from the runway into a terminal, if anybody was here, i don't know how they would have survived. i've seen a lot of damage on this island. this is the absolute most devastated area i've seen so far. it will be impossible for anybody who was injured or just wants to get off the island to leave from here. aid will not be able to come in to this part of the airport, into this airport at all because it's just a debris field now. so if help is going to come, it's going to have to come through some other way.

boats, another airfield, but this is really the only -- this is the only airfield for this island and it is in utter ruins. so that terminal that we gained access to was one of the domestic terminals. we tried to visit two other terminals that were still standing but had been in floodwaters for days and at one of the term signals which is for flights to and from the united states, we were told that it was simply too dangerous to enter, that nobody has been in there to do a damage assessment just yet. we looked inside and we could see tremendous damage from the days of flooding. no one has begun work so far to clear the runway, and that debris will keep flights from landing at this airport, flights that could be carrying vital aid. patrick oppmann, cnn, freeport, the bahamas. >> an incredible account there of the damage in freeport from cnn's patrick oppmann.

and my next guest is the director of communications for mercy corps and joins me now from nassau. thank you so much for talking with us. >> thank you. >> now, we just saw there in patrick oppmann's report the total devastation at freeport's airport in the bahamas. clearly unable to receive planes at this time. although the international tourism sign terminal is apparently still standing though damaged from flooding. what's your organization's plans right now for getting aid deliveries in for those most in need? >> well, you've put your finger on just the biggest challenge that we're facing right now. these are two islands that were incredibly hard hit. there's widespread flooding and there's almost no way to get supplies in. there was a flyover done yesterday in which we saw basically freeport sort of standing and then flattened ground on either side of it to

the north and south of the island. so at this point all responders are standing by while we allow the authorities to prioritize search and rescue efforts because that medevac is so important and just can't wait, that lifesaving aid, and we're using this time to mobilize, to assemble ourselves and to coordinate supply chains so that we know we're prioritizing the aid that's needed most urgently and that we're going to be ready the second that we're able to get on the islands. >> right. and what about perhaps some other alternatives like receiving aid from boats and distributing those deliveries to people across the islands? is that possible? how would that work? >> at this point it's not because, as i said, there are some limited access points and the look at authorities are really trying to prioritize those lifesaving elements, search and rescue, getting

people medevaced, and kind of making sure that that gets first priority. as a very important and very urgent next step, we're looking at getting clean water supplies to people. what we're seeing in particular on abaco is that all of the groundwater supplies are likely contaminated. so this means that salt water and flooding has made it so that those wells are just undrinkable. so we're going to be needing to look at getting desalination supplies in. we're going to need to look at getting jerry cans and other containers so people can transport clean water. this, as you know, is a huge health risk because water born illness can creep in some quickly in a disaster like this. >> it is the highest priority. what about air drops from above with water, food and medical aid of some sort? has that been considered and how viable is that? >> so, the challenge with an air

drop -- and i haven't heard it raised in a coordination meeting. that doesn't mean that it hasn't been considered. but the challenge is then having organization on the ground to ensure that supplies get distributed fairly, evenly to those people who need to most. so you really need that ground game in place so that you can ensure that once supplies get there they get to the people that need it. but, look, we need to -- we need to be considering everything that we can, everything that we can do safely, everything that we can do efficiently because these are people who are in desperate need at this point. >> mercy corps is a great organization. it does so much for people in need and after devastation like this and disasters across the globe. the task ahead is immense for sure. christy, thank you so much for all you do and your organization. >> thank you for having me. and stay with us as we continue to track the path of hurricane dorian. ahead, our paula newton has

just arrived in abaco and takes a look at the devastation there. plus, britain's parliament hands the prime minister major setbacks on brexit. a live report from brussels just ahead. ♪ unstopables in-wash scent booster ♪ downy unstopables you don't live in one corner fragrance shouldn't either air wick's new technology releases fragrance upwards and outwards. so now you can fill every corner with fragrance. upgrade to air wick.

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the british prime minister's brexit plan has been scuttled. the house of commons voted to prevent boris johnson from leaving the eu without a deal. he's lost 21 members of his own party and the opposition dismissed his demand for an election. >> 48 hours ago he was leading the chants of stop the coup, let the people vote. now he's saying stop the election and stop the people from voting. i think there's -- i think there's only one solution, i think he has become the first, to my knowledge, the first leader of the opposition in the democratic history of our country to refuse the invitation to an election. >> cnn's neysa dos santos is in brussels at this hour. she joins us now live. good to see you. so how's the european union reacting to boris johnson's troubles with brexit and parliament? >> reporter: well, you can

imagine it's been a long night here in brussels as well as for lawmakers in westminster because here members of the european commission who draft the eu's laws and are spear heading negotiations with the uk have been watching and waiting on every single word said there to find out whether or not boris johnson, "a," will be locked into a position to come back to the eu and ask for an extension, and, "b," whether he will call for an election when it appears mps on the other side of the aisle called his bluff on that. there is a real sense talking to diplomats that the eu on one hand is very conscious of being played here as part of a political game by boris johnson as part of his election campaign. one eu diplomat we were speaking to yesterday evening said we're very acquire, quote, unquote, that we could be used as a backdrop to an election campaign. also, eu officials saying that they're concerned they're they're being played off against the potential for a trade deal

with donald trump in the united states. you'll remember that yesterday evening donald trump also decided to comment on how he thought boris johnson was steering these negotiations with the house of commons. when it comes to the negotiations, well, let's call them technical talks at this stage, rosemary, to give them their full diplomatic terminology, they have been taking place yesterday for about five hours in the european commission building behind me. after that we saw the head of the european commissioners came out and said three terse things, one, that the eu remains calm, vigilant and also united. vigilant obviously because eu diplomats will tell you here in the belgian capital that there appears to be a real concern of trust when it comes to dealing with boris johnson's government and the negotiating team that he has here in terms of how emboldened they are to offer something new and concrete and then, of course, the eu has to present a united front.

now, already is a sign that the uk is starting to withdraw itself from some of these eu day-to-day matters. as promised a couple of weeks ago when we saw michael gove say that the uk's teams would not be taking place in -- taking part in standard meetings with the eu. we've now heard from two eu sources that the uk has on the first step started to do that. in fact, just yesterday they were planning on nominating judges -- a dutch judge to one of their european courts. the uk stepped back and allowed another country that holds a redating presidency of the eu. a very vigilant and alert brussels these days, rosemary. >> just incredible. reporting there from brussels. just cup coming up to 9:30 in the morning there. many thanks. earlier i spoke with cnn european affairs commentator dominic thomas and i began by

asking with boris johnson looking weak and isolated right now, where is all this going. >> yes, rosemary, he's looking v weak. remember when he won the conservative party election just a few weeks ago, he came out with the acronym d.u.d.e. his goal, first of all, was to deliver brexit by october 31st. that's not going to happen. he promised to unite his party. his party is perhaps historically never been more fractured. he has members being booted out of the party. members voting against him. he's been talking about prorogation, which means that the action of defeating jeremy corbyn or energizing the country has completely backfired because in fact now you see a coordinated response from the opposition who have taken control of the legislative agenda. you have a prime minister that can no longer legislate because he's lost his majority and he now essentially has to sit and wait and have the future of the outcome here dictated by the opposition that are now in complete control. >> so what do you see as the

next step forward? i mean, what can we expect in the next few days? i mean, it's been difficult to predict all of this, but just give us an idea of possible scenarios here going forward. >> what we can certainly expect is the unexpected, as we've seen with brexit throughout. what's interesting now is that the house of lords have said that they will support this parliamentary bill to prevent a no-deal. so the big question then comes, at what point do we trigger or does a general election get triggered by the opposition providing their ascent? we know on monday at queen can provide ascent. that would be the earliest point she could approve a legislation blocking a no deal. there is a lot of suspicion amongst the general ranks that if an election date is called by boris johnson, mid-october, should the conservative party win and should he have a new parliamentary majority that he would then endeavor to repeal this particular action. so there's a lot of pressure

here to try to gather guarantee that will not happen, and that seems difficult to do legislatively, or to wait until after the 31st of october to ask boris johnson to go to the european union and ask for an extension, which, of course, strategically works very well for the opposition because it will further weaken his attempt to bring the brexit party into the fold and to support the conservatives going into a general election. so we end up with a very fractured political landscape in which ultimately the outcome of a general election remains highly unpredictable. >> although boris johnson was fairly right when he mentioned the opposition is trying to avoid an election because when they look at the numbers, so far it doesn't look like they would do well. >> well, this is the big question. for them the number one concern right now is the question of the no deal. so they want to try to make sure that if a general election is triggered and the power is with them now, the government cannot just simply call a snap election

and boris johnson was unable to get the 2/3 majority. yes, you're absolutely right. the polling points to the fact that the conservative party is ahead. they're not ahead sufficiently to garner a total majority. for them to do that, they'd need the brexit party and the brexit party is not going to be happy with the way in which this is unfolding, and certainly in the kind of leadership that boris johnson is providing. when one looks then to the opposition, there is no way in which the liberal dems end up with an ultimate majority, and there's a big question as to whether jeremy corbyn can lead the labor party to a majority. but there is a possibility then of a coalition that could do very well in the election. certainly things have not been going well for the conservative party over the last few days. >> dominic thomas, always a pleasure to get your analysis. many thanks. >> thank you, rosemary. and back here in the united states, a federal judge has ruled that the government's list

of people on its terrorist screening database violates american citizens' constitutional rights. being on that database can restrict people from traveling in and out of the country. and exposes them to greater scrutiny. the judge wants the plaintiffs and the government in the case to file more briefings before deciding what legal steps to take next. well, hurricane dorian is making its way up the southern u.s. coast. several areas will soon be facing a triple threat of wind, rain and storm surge. and the results could be devastating. a look at the forecast when we come back. and what's wrong with this picture? president trump stands his ground on the hurricane with a map and a sharpie. there's so much scent in new gain scent blast detergent... ...you'll either love it or... mmm... i guess not. new gain scent blast. love it or hate it. it's intense.

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. welcome back, everyone. i'm rosemary church. hurricane dorian is growing more powerful. it is back up to a category 3 as it batters the southeastern coast of the united states. parts of georgia, south carolina and -- they're all feeling dorian's wrath. and it didn't cause significant damage as it moved up the coast of florida over the last day. unlike in the bahamas where it left behind unprecedented destruction. at least 20 people have died. that toll is likely to go up as search and rescue efforts continue. how dorian has -- now dorian has its sights on the carolinas where it is already flooding charleston in south carolina. and in the bahamas, picking up the pieces from hurricane dorian could take years. our paula newton is on the ground in abaco and describes

the devastation there. >> reporter: right now i have to say the one thing that's stark is i'm looking at stars and that is good news. this is the first time they've seen clear stars. and what is it showing us? the light of day and it's even quite eerie in the nighttime. it's absolute destruction because you see all the debris strewn everywhere. the extent of the damage. the buildings that were supposed to withstand hurricane force winds just completely crumpled and torn apart. that's the kind of devastation. you're seeing appliances strewn everywhere that would just go flying. a boat was turned upside down, flying through the air. you see people's furniture from one house end up in another person's backyard meters away. it is indescribable. air conditioners pulled out from their homes, tossed upside down. it is just an absolute mess. an absolute mess. and when they see that -- when

you see the debris and you witness that for yourself, you realize how lucky people felt to come out of this storm alive. when you look at the devastation and you see the amount of people that are missing, it was traumatizing just listening to people talk about all of the people they could not account for, and that is the terrifying thing for everyone here right now. and in the middle of all of that they're trying to put together their lives. they're doing the best they can. today was a good day at least in terms of trying to get out to the people that needed medical help. there was a lot of traffic in the air medevacing people out and that was a good thing, but it is going to be a struggle each and every hour out here for several months if not years. >> all right. our paula newton reporting there. so let's get the latest on hurricane dorian's track. we turn again to our meteorologist pedram javaheri who joins us from the international weather center. so pedram, what are you seeing? >> you know, it's getting uncomfortably close to some of the regions across the coastal area of the carolinas. wind gusts expected to push

towards hurricane strength within the next 30 minutes to an hour across places like charleston, places like around savannah as well. you'll notice as the storm really closes towards land, 6:00, 7:00, 5/8 a.m., we think these gusts could exceed 80 miles an hour in charleston. that's ushering in a significant amount of water. storm surge right toward these communities. the storm real closes in on its approach to landfall here we think some time into the overnight hours of thursday and friday. places such as moorhead city, cape hatteras, 70 up to 115 miles per hour once the storm cruises out of here. with it we're going to have significant coastal erosion and storm surge damage as well. notice very broad reaching feature here, spanning some 500 miles from end to end. it is a category 3, as you mentioned. it is been very organized in the last couple of hours. it's been really kind of riding up the coast here, producing a

tremendous amount of rainfall in the past several hours. we're beginning to see really heavier bands to push toward this region in the next few hours. some of the models indicating potentially 15-plus inches of rainfall in charleston and places like isle of palms. all of this could be a catastrophic sort of scenario for places such as charleston with a storm such as this, category 3 parked just offshore. landfall potential here going to be most likely thursday overnight and into early friday morning. at this point it looks anywhere from wilmington to the outer banks around north carolina there are going to be the most likely scenario for landfall, potentially at that point, rosemary, a strong category 2 when it makes landfall early friday morning. >> all right. thanks for keeping an eye on that track. appreciate it, pedram javaheri. of course we all know the u.s. president is not one to

admit when he is wrong. in a barrage of tweets over the weekend, donald trump warned hurricane dorian would hit alabama. almost immediately the national weather service in alabama corrected him in no uncertain terms saying the state would not see any impact from the storm. president trump took his insistence that alabama was in the forecast to a new level on wednesday. >> that was the original chart, and you see it was going to hit not only florida but georgia and could have -- was going toward the gulf. that was what we -- what was originally projected. and it took a right turn. and ultimately hopefully we're going to be lucky. >> okay. so a closer look at that national hurricane center map shows it was apparently altered by a black marker or black sharpie to include alabama. a note here. it is against federal law to

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more now on our top stories, dorian has strengthened into a category 3 hurricane again. it is battering the southeastern coast of the united states. and is now flooding downtown charleston in south carolina. forecasters say dorian's destructive winds, heavy rain and life-threatening storm surge will impact the coast of the carolinas for many hours to come.

more than 1 million people in north and south carolina are under mandatory evacuation orders. well, the frequency and severity of storms like hurricane dorian is one result of climate change, and while president trump rejects climate science as a hoax, his democratic challengers take the opposite view. in a cnn town hall, the candidates stressed the urgency of the climate crisis and outlined how they would address it. >> so i think that donald trump is dangerously, dangerously wrong. i may be old fashioned, but i believe in science. and -- and, richard, as i'm sure you know, what the scientists have told us, climate change is real. >> the fact of the matter is that we make up 15% of the problem. the rest of the world makes up 80% -- 85% of the problem. if we did everything perfectly, everything, and we must and should in order to get other countries to move, we still have

to get the rest of the world to come along. and the fact of the matter is we have to up the ante considerably. and i have great experience in leading coalitions, both at home and internationally. and i think i can do that better than anybody who -- no matter what their plan. >> don't sit around and tell me what's not possible. sit around and look what happens if we don't make change. you know, we've got, what, 11 years maybe to reach a point where we've cut our emissions in half, and that's not just america. we're only 20% of the problem. now, that's a big hunk of the problem, but there is another world out there that is 80% of this problem. so you bet that this is a moment where we better dream big and fight hard. >> and natasha lindstaedt joins us now from colchester in england. good to see you. >> thanks for having me. >> so you watched the whole lineup. who came out on top as the

strongest performer? was there one big winner and. >> actually, i didn't think that there was one big winner, but i also didn't think that there was one big loser either. in the past debate it was a little bit more clear, you know, which democrats did the best and which democrats really faltered. and in the past we also saw democrats really digging at each other. this is what happened with this debate. everybody was on the same page with the exception of klobuchar, who was trying to present a little bit more of a moderate view, and i think you could probably put joe biden in that category. a lot of attention is on joe biden and how he handles these debates and town halls. i think in this instance he came out okay. he was able to present himself as a leader. one of his weaknesses is his record hasn't been that great. there are questions about his connections with these big industries and with big donors and he was able to sidestep the question okay, and actually say, well, he's going to look into what donors are giving him a little bit more, instead of not

really acknowledging the issue at all. and he tried to present himself as someone who could lead the world on this because of his past experience. but all of the candidates came out looking pretty good in terms of their knowledge of climate change, what their plans were. probably the most extreme example would have been sanders, who proposed a $16 trillion plan. you also had warren with a ton of huge plans as well. they all seem very energetic and positive and interested in combatting climate change. so we'll have to see how that resonates with democratic voters. >> all right. that's all very encouraging for anyone looking for an alternative, right? so bernie sanders made this very pointed remark. let's just listen. >> we are fighting for the survival of the planet earth. our only planet. how is this not a major priority? it must be a major priority. >> now, he is specifically talking about president trump not making climate change a

major priority. and he calls him dangerous for doing this. why is it such a low priority for the president and why does he deny the science behind this? >> well, i just think it's inconvenient and he also feels that his base isn't behind the climate change, doesn't believe in climate science. we see the way he was dealing with hurricanes. he doesn't thing it has to do with global warming and he didn't really seem to know where the hurricane was even going to hit, pointing to it maybe hitting alabama. he just doesn't understand climate science at all. his base, it's hard to know how much of them actually believe in it, but we do know of the american public, 70% think we need to be doing more about the environment, but the issue is in this same poll, there wasn't a majority that supported spending an extra $100, being taxed on this to support environmental issues. i think that the american public is hoping that they can use the environment to create more jobs,

but they don't want it to actually affect him. >> right. >> affect themselves. for trump himself, he double thi -- doesn't think this is a way to win 2020, by focuses on the environment. >> all right. let's listen to what joe biden said on the same topic. >> we got to start choosing science over fantasy here. the fact of the matter is that what we did by boris johns-- the countries are saying, whoa, wait a minute, why are we engaged in this if the united states is stepping down? >> so, natasha, did the removal of the united states by president trump from the paris climate accord give other nations reasons to say why should we be doing anything if the u.s. isn't? is biden right on that? all the candidates, of course, said they would get back into that accord on day one as president. >> i think it's possible that it could affect the leadership of

other countries, seeing that the u.s. isn't taking the lead on climate change and isn't putting climate change at the top of the agenda and is instead saying we're going to back out of these climate change accords. it was very, very significant. but it's also significant because the u.s. is supposed to lead on issues. and climate change is probably going to be the biggest challenge that the world will be facing. if we believe the science on it. and the u.s. is basically saying we are not going to be the leaders about this. then that then leaves from for other leadership, like in germany, like in france to take the -- to steer things forward because the u.s. has basically dropped out and said, you know, we don't really believe in it under trump. >> natasha lindstaedt, thank you so much for your analysis and perspective on this. appreciate it. >> thanks for having me. we'll take a short break here. still to come, rescuers in the bahamas are looking for survivors after hurricane

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hurricane dorian is moving toward the coast of south carolina with renewed strength. the storm is expected to run

along the coast of the carolinas from thursday into friday. and is already flooding downtown charleston in south carolina. more than 1 million people in parts of both north and south carolina are under evacuation orders at this time. hurricane dorian has left behind epic devastation in the abacos. as cnn's victor blackwell reports, urgent rescue efforts are now under way. >> reporter: wednesday, we saw a steady flow, not a mass everyone amount, but a steady flow of evacuees transported from abaco to nassau. the stories they are telling, they really are searing, but we're also hearing emotional stories from people waiting, waiting to hear from friends and relatives who they haven't heard from since the storm hit. megan and raven arrived at nassau's airport early wednesday morning to wait for three evacuees from the bahamas abaco. >> we haven't had any direct contact with either our mother,

aunt our grandmother since the hurricane hit abaco on sunday, so we're hoping that they'll be evacuated soon and we can see them when they arrive here. >> reporter: u.s. coast guard and royal british navy teams have plucked scores of people from the southern island. stephen rushed to a clinic in marsh harbor for shelter after his roof started to tear away at the height of the storm three days before he was rescued. >> we were trapped inside our apartment. the wind came, blew every window out. this couldn't have been a cat 5. if they had a category for this, this had to have been like an 8. >> reporter: 10-year-old alex ran from a chopper to his aunt after dying without power or clean water. by sundown, raven and megan got word through a relative that their mother and grandmother and aunt are fine and they say they will wait at the edge of the tarmac until their flight lands. well, megan and raven are so dissatisfied with the information that they're getting from the bahamian government

that they work with another family member to set up a social media chain to share information and whereabouts of people on abaco. there is a facebook page with more than 11,000 members doing a similar thing. i even watched a television host spend a significant amount of time on her show locally just to read names and whereabouts and conditions of people. for the government's part, they have set up a hotline that people can call to get information about evacuees. victor blackwell, cnn, nassau, bahamas. >> and here's an encouraging story, a farmer in florida is doing his part to help those in the bahamas. the man who wants to remain anonymous walked into a supermarket in jacksonville, florida and walked out with 100 generators and some food essentials. all of that is now on its way to the bahamas by boat. his mega purchase cost nearly $50,000. getting the goods to the bahamas, though, could prove challenging. the ocean is rough and there is

still debris from the storm. but, wow, what an effort there. and if you would like to help those affected by hurricane dorian, just go to cnn.com/impact. there you will find a list of organizations working to help bahamians with medical supplies, food and water. and stay with cnn as we continue to follow hurricane dorian. we are getting reports that more than 34,000 customers are without power along the south carolina coast. most of those are in charleston county. thank you so much for joining us. i'm rosemary church. remember to connect with me any time on twitter and "early start" is next. have a great day. so nice to meet you june, jay, ji, kay, raj, and...

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hurricane dorian regaining strength battering the south carolina coast, flooding streets and cutting power. rescue and cleanup efforts getting underway in the battered bahamas. a doctor, phony map in the oval office. the president pushing a fake narrative that dorian was a threat to alabama. new hampshire my name was