todd: as we approach 6:00 in the east, 5:00 in texas. a fox news alert. hurricane harvey ravaging parts of texas right now. the storm downgraded to a category 2 hurricane. it's still very serious. it made landfall last night around 10:00 p.m. local time as a category 4 hurricane bringing winds up to 160 miles per hour. clayton: this is the strongest storm to hit the united states in more than a decade. could drop more than 60 inches of rain in parts of texas before it's over. it's going to hang out four or five days. thousands of people evacuated. more than 200,000 are without power this morning. abby: emergency crews putting their lives on the line. firefighters battling abrasion in the middle of a storm in corpus christi overnight. harvey is expected to leave behind about $40 billion in damage. but president trump has signed a disaster declaration in texas. todd: we have live team coverage all morning long all over the coast this

morning. first we're going to go to rob schmitt live in corpus christi. rob, how is it looking where you are? rob: well, i can tell you guys corpus christi didn't get nearly what some of these coastal communities, smaller towns that took the eye got. here is one example of some of the damage. and hopefully this is about as bad as it gets here in corpus christi. we just simply don't know yet. this is a big bring. check out the side of this wall right behind me here. this entire wall came crashing down somehow during this storm. let me get rid of that. you can see the mess behind me. this entire wall -- this is about 6 or 8 units behind me. look up at the roof behind me here. can you see the roof going up and down in the wind? it's incredible. i don't think the roof is going to give but it wouldn't have taken much more for this entire. look at that that is something else. so something brought this wall down. i guess you have to assume it was the wind.

look at that roof go up. that is just amazing. just an indication of just how rough it was here in corpus christi. we saw, like i just said on the phone a little bit ago. we have seen a couple roofs come off due to the intensity of this storm and just a whole big pile of bricks here and all these people are going to come back to homes that are just uninhabitable. this clearly took place during -- probably the peak of the storm which was sometime around mid i think, if i recall right, where we had about 100 mile-per-hour wind gusts and sustained winds 60, 70 miles per hour in corpus christi. those coastal communities like rockport and port lavaca seeing gusts of 150 miles per hour. some of the damage under covered when the sun comes up and we turn the lights on on this whole mess is going to be incredible. of course that's just going to be the first part of this story because now we have to watch as this storm at least right now appears it's going

to go up a little bit inland. it's going to sit and start backing up and back up and back out into the gulf. look at that just go up there for a second and look at that roof go up about 3 or 4 feet and come back down. this building goes back, it's like a tooth. it goes back probably 75 yards that way. this is a massive building. we are seeing the end of it just everyone credible. when the water starts to dump and we start seeing the rain, we haven't seen the flooding yet. that's what's going to come in the next three or four days. if it does dump 50 inches of rain it's going to be incredible what we see when? is alwhen it is all said and done. clayton: rick, what's the latest? rick: winds have died down it's a category 1 hurricane. good news when the winds go down. always expected when the storm makes landfall. where rob is n corpus christi won't be that bad. the heaviest rainfall totals are going to be to the

little bit north of him. 17 inches total from the storm corpus christi. that's a lot of rain, don't get me wrong. worse as you go farther toward the knot. corpus christi you saw that damage where rob is and that was on the good side of the storm. the wind were not as bad. they got none of the storm surge. because you are on the other side of the storm the winds are going offshore. it's the onshore side of this up around places like rockport and any place to the east of it. all on the inside of this barrier island the seashore. that's where all that water is piled into. it turns around and goes out fairly quickly. this is not going to be the case. that may be 10 to 12 feet of water likely going to stay there for days and then have you the rainfall on top of it. latest output here. i'm not going to say 58 inches. in fact when i see a model run 58 inches, it's hard for me to say yeah, that's going to happen. the official version from the national weather service saying around 35 inches in this spot this is a computer model we like and been

showing these numbers for days. i'm not going to discount 58 inches falling in some spots as well. going to the north amounts in houston,maybe to the you were teens toward 20. go to the best along i-35. that's going to be break off point from really heavy rain to not as much as it goes towards the weather service that san antonio and austin those places getting 10 inches of rain that will cause flooding as well. clayton: we have been talking about the history of galveston they built a 17-foot storm wall after that city was destroyed because of the storm surge. do other cities have similar walls? what are you worried about with the storm surge? i can. rick: there are places that are built storm walls. port lavaca built the town up in higher location because of this thing. whether you have a history of a storm they do some stuff to brexit it what does happen have you more population in this area. last time they had a storm like this 1961 that there was a storm like this.

50, 60 years since a cat 4 hit texas. abby: that is down to category 1. that does not mean it is not dangerous. matt finn has been live for us all night long in place placios, texas. >> we have been here for about 8 hours. it has gotten progressively worse. violent winds and rain. when we first arrived here last night, the water line was probably 5 to 10 feet past the shore and now as you can see it is just engulfing this walkway here. now creeping up towards the grass here. so, between high tide and the surge, we have seen this water line move about 10 to 20 feet closer to the shore. we talked to emergency officials. they say they worried about, this about erosion and destruction here. along the shoreline.

we're in matagora county of 36,000 people. there was mandatory evacuation issued here. for anyone who chose to stay behind or is here now, emergency officials say you are on your own there ♪ much they can do for you. power has been going in and out all night long. there is a large area behind me where the power has been kicking out on and off. there is a community just to my left with a lot of homes and the power has been going in and out. total blackouts. one of the mayors here in matagora county is a big concern for the people who chose to stay, they could be without power for days. that could spell for disaster. there is a curfew here right now. we have not seen obviously a lot of people out in these type of elements. there has been a few emergency officials and authorities driving by. checking in on us. otherwise, this is a ghost town like many of the small coastal towns. we have been here in this area. back to you guys. abby: matt, give us a sense of the area.

you have been there covering the storm for the past 8 hours. have you been in that particular area for a while now, has it been completely evacuated? was it your sense that people were told to leave and they followed direction directions? >> >> this is a fishing town of about 5,000 people. and we drove up and down through some of the neighborhoods. we didn't see anybody walking around. we didn't see anybody driving around. it really looked like a ghost town. but we were in some small communities up and down this shoreline in this area, and there were a lot of people who told us, we spoke to them before things got really bad and they said we are going to stick this out. you know, so they are here. they are hopefully safe. there were people who told us they were going to hunker down and try to stay safe. we wish them well. we spoke to the emergency management official here, the coordinator who is the county judge, he told us he believes that most of the 36,000 people in this county, matagora county heeded the evacuation warnings and left.

we spoke to people who gid decided to stick this out. todd: rick reichmuth said it is downgraded to 1 can it looks worse. >> i have heard from rob schmitt and people in the corpus christi area that perhaps the storm there started to fade, but where we have been hour by hour has gotten worse, leading to where we are right now. you know, we have cars and some a little bit of shelter. but for anybody who does not, or is in these elements, it would not look good. clayton: matt finn live for us there in that spot. abby: matt finn, take care of yourself. be safe there. clayton: go to houston metropolitan area where flooding is now starting. that's where hurricane harvey is roaring through. griff jenkins starting to see some of the first signs of streets beginning to flood there. griff, what can you tell us?

>> some of the first flooding as we were on the highway on that underpass where they had high water gathering. but, you know, this is a major metropolitan area. the nation's fourth largest city. and i'm glad you brought that up. that's why we are here. this is on the west side of downtown. this road, westheimer a year ago in april was flooding, cars washing down this road. it only takes for context one inch for houston to flood. this city is under a flash flood warning. already through tuesday. in 2001. tropical storm alisyn did hit this area. 22 dead. 10 billion in damage. that was 20 inches. if harvey bricks anything close to that, it is going to be as they predicted a major catastrophic flood event. that is why the office of emergency management, the mayor, and any of the overnight radio news people as we ride in our vehicle and on twitter are saying if you don't need to be in your

car go not get in your car and drive around chtsd it's too dangerous. this is one of the overpasses. when you get in a car and are stranded there is nothing you can do. i mention tropical storm alisyn. the reason why i talk about that more than half of the deaths were attributed to folks in their automobiles in incidents involved in flooding, so we are standing by with the high level of anxiety of folks here for those floods. todd: we say it all during these storms don't drown turn around. it sounds like a joke but it is absolutely not. you need to heed that advice. clayton: griff, i'm sorry you said one inch of rain is all it takes for it to flood there? >> that is what the local folks are saying that it only take as inch, barely more for houston to flood. here in the downtown area there is the b bayous. that is what is the major flood zone of this city, major metropolitan area. it's not evacuated. it was voluntary thud things

they may may issue different guidelines. they have had a tornado touch down here the metropolitan area. that's a little part of the story as well. abby: very much the calm before the storm there in houston, texas. griff jenkins live for us. we will check in with you momentarily. thank you so much. abby: take a look at this video coming in to our newsroom. it is quite a scary situation in gravelsston as fires breaking out during the storm. casey stegall joins us live as our coverage of hurricane harvey continues. he will be with us after the break. stick with us.

oscar mayer deli fresh ham has no added nitrates, nitrites or artificial preservatives. now it's good for us all. like those who like... sweet. those who prefer heat. (blows a breath of air) and those who just love meat. for those in school. out of school. and old school. those who like their sandwich with pop. and those who like it with soda. for the star of the scene. cut! and the guys behind it. all the taste you want, nothing you don't. oscar mayer deli fresh. sweet! afi sure had a lot on my mind. my 30-year marriage... ...my 3-month old business... plus...what if this happened again? i was given warfarin in the hospital, but wondered, was this the best treatment for me? so i made a point to talk to my doctor.

he told me about eliquis. eliquis treats dvt and pe blood clots and reduces the risk of them happening again. not only does eliquis treat dvt and pe blood clots. eliquis also had significantly less major bleeding than the standard treatment. eliquis had both... ...and that turned around my thinking. don't stop eliquis unless your doctor tells you to. eliquis can cause serious and in rare cases fatal bleeding. don't take eliquis if you have an artificial heart valve or abnormal bleeding. if you had a spinal injection while on eliquis call your doctor right away if you have tingling, numbness, or muscle weakness. while taking eliquis, you may bruise more easily... and it may take longer than usual for bleeding to stop. seek immediate medical care for sudden signs of bleeding, like unusual bruising. eliquis may increase your bleeding risk if you take certain medicines. tell your doctor about all planned medical or dental procedures. eliquis treats dvt and pe blood clots. plus had less major bleeding. both made eliquis right for me. ask your doctor if switching to eliquis is right for you.

tap one little bumper and up go your rates. what good is having insurance if you get punished for using it? for drivers with accident forgiveness, liberty mutual won't raise your rates due to your first accident. liberty mutual insurance. abby: 15 manipulates after 6:00 a.m. 5:15 in the morning in texas

where the storm is now still barreling up the coast of texas where thousands are left in the dark this morning. casey stegall joins us lye. casey, you have been there for a while. give us a sense of what you are seeing at the moment. >> you talk about the power outages and they are going up. in fact, the latest number from the energy company here in galveston alone 7,000 people now without power. we are also currently under a tornado watch here at the moment. as until a few minutes ago my producer counted 7 tornado warnings active in communities around us. that is another threat that people are dealing with this morning. here in calves stolen, it appears for now this place is has weathered the storm pretty well. but we don't want to put the cart before the horse because we know we are certainly not out of the woods just yet. we have gusty winds, a

little bit of rain falling. not too much of a storm surge to speak of. we do want to show you brand new video coming in to fox news that is north of us in bolivar peninsula. it is a little peninsula that juts out into the gulf of mexico directly north of us i have video of a house on fire there reports of multiple properties that are damaged. the folks were under investigation orders in that community. so hopefully everybody got out safely. we can also tell that you there are about 700 troops with the national guard that have been deployed and they are all over this impacted region. if needed, they can help carry out high water rescues. they were in place well ahead of this storm making landfall. assisting people with things like sandbagging and the evacuations. so, really, we are going to be approaching daylight pretty soon here in texas. and that is when we are going to start getting our first real sense of what

harvey has done to texas because it made landfall as you know when it was dark out. and so when that sun comes up this morning, we are going to get a real sense of the devastation that has been left behind. back to you guys. abby: on a lighter note, casey, you have been making some friends there, some residents in that part of texas. someone brought you beer during a live shot; is that right? >> who knew i got notes yesterday that we were trending on twitter we were so hunkered down reporting the news, the very serious storm threat that was approaching. right in the middle of one of my live shots, a woman comes running up to me. didn't know how it was going to go. you guys know that live feed. we have all been photo bombed, whatever, she was super sweet. she handed me a six pack of local beer that's brewed right here in galveston and gave me a hug. live tv and then moments later we found out we were under a tornado warning. so, bit of levity in a very

dangerous situation. yeah, been getting a lot of messages about that. i think people can use a laugh in am time like. this. abby: need each other. i love that story, casey. take care. we will check in soon. clayton: thanks, casey. how is the trump administration responding as the president faces his first true natural disaster. we have a live report from washington that is next when we come right back. keep it here ♪ ♪ ♪ ditching the cover-up for good? that's cool. showing off my arms? that's cool. being comfortable without a shirt? that's cool. getting the body you want without surgery, needles, or downtime? that's coolsculpting. coolsculpting is the only fda-cleared non-invasive treatment that targets and freezes away stubborn fat cells. visit coolsculpting.com today and register for a chance to

win a free treatment.

track your pack. set a curfew, or two. make dinner-time device free. [ music stops ] [ music plays again ] a smarter way to wifi is awesome. introducing xfinity xfi. amazing speed, coverage and control. change the way you wifi. xfinity. the future of awesome. todd: welcome back. fox news alert now. hurricane harvey, the strongest storm to hit the united states in a decade.

bringing likely billions of damages in damages along the coast. abby: also president trump's first major disaster test in his young administration. todd: how the white house is responding this morning. ellison, good morning. >> good morning to all of you. that's right, a major storm and a major test for a young administration. the first potential test of how they will respond to a natural disaster. one republican is already warning president trump telling him not to make this same mistake president george w. bush made with hurricane katrina. the president is at camp david. his team says he is closely watching the hurricane. yesterday he signed a declaration providing federal aid to texas before the brunt of the storage hit the state. president trump tweeting at texas governor greg abbott that his administration will, quote, remain fully engaged with open lines of communication as hurricane harvey makes landfall. adding, quote: america is with you. he also posted a photo from the oval office.

it shows the president receiving a briefing from fema administrator rock long, chief of staff general john kelly and counter terrorism advisor tom bossert. bossert says the president and his team are coordinating with local officials and people really need to listen to those local officials in order to stay safe. >> you what the president will do as we move forward is talk directly with them and governors. if they have any needs that's a problem. the president won't tolerate that the secretary and now chief of staff kelly. >> white house press secretary sarah huckabee sanders says president trump is planning to visit texas early next week. abby, todd, clayton? clayton: thank you, ellison. 200,000 people without power. infrastructure and targeting of forces. early your father's governor of a state. that's where a state they

need that coordination federal government. abby: they see what's happening there on the ground. they also need the help from the federal government. that is where. clayton: like what? abby: that's where the test comes in for president trump. you think about hurricane katrina. they have been giving, at least the local authorities, if there is anything you need we are willing and able to step up. that's where fema can play a huge role. you think about general john kelly, for example, who is now the chief of staff in the white house with president trump. someone head of dhs who has been in many disaster zones leading them throughout his life. the people the president has around him is almost just as important as the president himself in terms of handling a situation like that. coordinating on the phone constantly, clayton with the local authority on the ground there, clayton, getting a sense from them of what is going on. what do you need to locate from us. we will get you whatever you need. that's a great role. todd: when you think of the department of homeland security, a lot of people think of the airports. it's much more than that. it is in response to situations like this.

oftentimes preparation where fema gets a lot more of the response of it then have you john kelly at this point the president's right-hand man previously of department of homeland security now running the show. you would have to think, at least you would have to hope but you would have to think that that's going to help get us through this very, very difficult time. and potentially $40 billion in damage, 200,000 power outages at this point. that's expected to go higher. you know, you have to assume that somebody like john kelly is going to get us through. clayton: it was absolute disaster to chuck grassley's point. it seemed like total disconnect between the federal government. state and local officials. flint firefighters union had the local officials asking the state for resources. the state asking government for resources. no one could get on the same page. abby: i think we all learned a lesson from that if anything be on the same page and also assuming that the worst could possibly happen in any of these hurricanes that hit the united states. so it seems like they have been given everything they

need. now it's a matter of just continuing to monitor this storm to make sure they are given everything they are needed. after this is all over as you said it's the aftermath that's th the big story often in these cases and getting on the ground and showing you are there for them as the natural leader. this is the first big test weful see how it continues to play out. todd: hurricane harvey, go to a commercial now. but more when we come back ♪ ♪

it's ok that everybody ignores me when i drive. it's fine. because i get a safe driving bonus check every six months i'm accident free. because i don't use my cellphone when i'm driving. even though my family does, and leaves me all alone. here's something else... i don't share it with mom. i don't. right, mom? i have a brand new putter you don't even know about! it's awesome. safe driving bonus checks, only from allstate. sometimes i leave the seat up on purpose. switching to allstate is worth it.

we danced in a german dance group. i wore lederhosen.man. when i first got on ancestry i was really surprised that i wasn't finding all of these germans in my tree. i decided to have my dna tested through ancestry dna. the big surprise was we're not german at all. 52% of my dna comes from scotland and ireland. so, i traded in my lederhosen for a kilt. ancestry has many paths to discovering your story. get started for free at ancestry.com. (keybdear freshpet, i was in the air force and got seriously hurt. it was the worst time in my life... until i met tank. you really could say hes a rescue dog. so when he got heavy and his energy slumped, it was my turn to be there for him. thats when i found freshpet. he seemed to love it! and sure enough he

got down to his ideal weight. freshpet put the puppy back in my dog and gave me back my best friend.

abby: we are back with breaking coverage of hurricane harvey. a fox news alert now with the hurricane slamming into the coast of texas this morning. the storm now downgraded to a category 1 hurricane. it made landfall last night at about 10:00 p.m. local time at category 4 hurricane at that point. bringing winds of up to 160 miles per hour. todd: this is the strongest storm to hit the u.s. in more than a decade and could drop close to 50 inches of rain in texas before all is said and done. thousands of people evacuated right now more than 200,000 are without power this morning. again, expecting that number to rise. clayton: take a look at this

destruction. store fronts caved in by high winds. walls falling off apartment complexes. firefighters battling a blaze in the middle of this while the storm is ragingment take a look at this video. harvey is expected to lee behind $40 billion word of damage. president trump has signed a disaster declaration in texas. todd: we will be with you all morning long. live team coverage all along the coast this morning. first we go to matt finn. every time we go to matt his shots are definitely some of the most dramatic. wind is pounding that general area. matt, we will check back in with you one more time. how is it looking how you are? >> this storm might have been downgraded but here where we are in matagorda county has been getting broively worst leading with violent winds. the water behind me extremely violent. it's been inching closer and closer to land. now the waves are crashing up against us. this area has been experiencing blackouts. this dock behind me goes in

and out of blackness every couple of minutes. the communities behind us as well. the power is going in and out. you know, the high tide is coming up in just a couple hours. when we first got here about 10 hours ago now, the water was 10 to 20 feet back compared to where it was right now. if you guys can see, another blackout here. and the communities and the homes that we were able to see now go entirely black as well. we spoke to a mayor in a neighboring city here and he said that that is going to be one of the worst effects is the people who chose to stay here and ride this thing out could have no electricity for days. and we also spoke to the emergency communications manager here for the county. he says there was a mandatory evacuation issued and the last buses left yesterday afternoon. anybody who is here and needs elements right now, have you seen this is what they are experiencing. back to you guys. clayton: talking about the

sturgeon storm surge, rick reichmuth talking about where the water will stay surged in these locations. you are in a small fishing village there. have you seen evidence so far of that and the sea wall that can protect that town? >> definitely. when we first got here, you were able to see a large portion of the concrete barriers. now the daughter has completely engulfed them. it is now up against some of the grassy areas and some of the park areas. if we can pan over here, we can show you guys it's also bringing up a lot of debris. a lot of substantial sized debris with it when we first got here, you were able to look all the way out here. the water line was way past here. and now you can see it's creeping up by the minute. we spoke to the chief of police there. he has been roaming around. he said one of the big concerns here was the erosion and destruction of this coastal area. so, there will definitely be

son-in-law damage here. we can't see it now. when the sun comes up, i'm certain it's there. clayton: we are about 1 hour and 20 minutes there. we will check back in with matt. stay safe. abby: matt, please stay safe. you can only imagine the forms of winds. he just left us. but you can imagine the force of winds is he feeling. i would have been blown away two seconds of that lye shot. that is not easy. you just hope they all stay safe out there. todd: you saw that forecast earlier. that area where matt finn is expected to get 50 to 58 inches of rain. massive number. when you see that shot you understand how we are going to get that number. clayton: where do we want to go next? we have a lot of different reporters up and down the coast line there. take a look at some video just coming into the newsroom as well of some of that devastation here. these are fryer crews in the middle of all of this destruction last night, in the middle of all of the storm hitting land in corpus christi out there battling

blazes right in corpus christi. unbelievable bravery. abby: it is a house fire. as you said outside of corpus christi. that's where our own rob schmitt is he was on his way earlier to rockport. zero cell service where you were headed, rob. you then headed back out to corpus christi. there you find a horrific house fire that's right behind you. rob: yeah. that's right. we are here right now. i don't know if you will have a hard time seeing me. we will trying to work on the light getting on. look behind me, it might be easier to see without it incredible intense fire. look on the left side here. these are melted jeep wranglers two of them right there and a pickup truck in between them. you can see this was a town home according to the police chief we just talked to corpus christi fire completely gone. and then over here on the right can you see this huge, looks like either chevy or dodge duly. the front of that truck is completely melted as well. just a horrific fire. we're not sure exactly how it started. the police chief doesn't know it could have been a

power line down. it certainly had a lot of fuel. something really amongst all this rain and storm surge, talk about the last thing you expect to see is it s. not only a fire but very intense fire melting cars out here. it's just unbelievable. we came here. we weren't sure exactly what to expect and all of a sudden we came across all these firefighters. this is actually technically still corpus christi. we are on padre island. so we are actually very close to the gulf right here. i asked, was this under mandatory evacuation and the chief said actually no. this was not. this is still under voluntary evacuation. these people didn't have to leave but he says from what they see right now, it appears that there was nobody at this home that they got out of here which is thankful because that is completely devastating fire. we have four melted cars and boat over there that looks like it might have survived. up against quite nice houses out here on padre island. this is a vacation spot for a lot of people. that's the story here as we watch as the rain has really

subsided quite a bit. the winds are really coming down. i think you guys were saying and it's hard for me to keep up. it's a cat one hurricane in this area. it's well passed at this point. we are just seeing outer bands. we will send it back to you guys. todd: you are there at the scene. we have been showing this video the last hour, hour and a half. are fire crews able to get to this house. i know they were battling it earlier. are they more concerned now that this house is a total wreck moved on to other things? do you see firefighters battling this blaze. >> yeah, i mean i think they got it contained the way they want it i mean, obviously, this is a complete loss, i think they are going to let it fizzle out and let the rest of that fuel just burn down to nothing. there is no point in fighting it at this point. they have successfully managed to keep it away from the house right next door. they will let the little raindrops do the rest of the job. the guys are chilling in the trucks right behind me here. it's going to be a moot point. nothing left to burn.

todd: rob, you mentioned power lines. obviously we don't know if that is the cause of this fire. in your travels arranged the area where you are going, have you seen a lot of power lines down? it seems at this point when people end up getting back, that is the major concern besides flooding. >> yeah. well, yeah. right across the street there were power lines down. which is why i thought that could have been the igniter because that certainly would make sense to me. who would think that jeep wranglers are going to burn to a crisp in the middle of a hurricane. it's one thing to have a house fire or interior fire. with you this thing was like a bomb went off. these cars are melted. it's not what you expect to see when we had unnun dating rain overnight. he said this fire -- the chief said this fire was crazy when he pulled up to it he said if you think it's something now you should have seen a couple hours ago. did i see downed power lines across the street no. risk to us because the power is out in entire area. whole block behind us no power at all. maybe it was transformer exploded right here and

dropped a power line. house goes up. cars go up. huge mess. we really don't know at this point and the chief doesn't know either. we will send it back to you. abby: the fire started at about 2:30 in the morning texas time. so it's been going on three hours now, what we are being told from officials here they are wanting to let that house just burn and hope it doesn't start fires on homes nearby. clayton: check back in with rob in a few minutes there. abby: want to get it a fox news alert and search intensifying this morning for a u.s. soldier after a black hawk helicopter crashes off the coast of yemen. the chopper taking part in a training mission when it went down. well, u.s. central command says five other service members on board that aircraft were rescued. the cause still under investigation. north korea firing three more ballistic missiles in defiance of constant warnings from the trump administration. u.s. military officials say two of the missiles flew about 155 miles. the third ended up blowing

up immediately after taking off. it is the first missile test launch since u.n. sanctions were imposed on north korea. comes during joint military exercises between the u.s. and south korea. president trump also fully pardons former sheriff of arizona's maricopa county announcing on twitter, quote: i am pleased continue to form you that i have just granted full pardon t 85-year-old american patriot sheriff joe arpaio. he kept arizona safe. he says he is grateful for the president's support for law and order. >> it's great. i love that president. he supports law enforcement. i'm very humbled i said publicly recently pardon or no pardon, i will be with him to the end. ainsley: 85-year-old was facing up to six months in jail and calls the

conviction a witch-hunt. also in this morning, more changes in the oval office. this time deputy assistant to the president dr. sebastian gorka, he has left the administration. officials say he did not resign but he, quote, no longer works there. and, of course, this comes as chief of staff john kelly continues to make changes including the departure of steve bannon. clayton: every friday. abby: a lot of changes. clayton: every friday. who will be next friday? abby: where is harvey heading now? rick reichmuth in the storm's path. we will check with him and what we can expect in the hours and days to come. that's coming up next. ♪ ♪ coney island has been around for a long, long time. reminds me of how geico has been saving people money for over 75 years. hey, big guy! come on in! let me guess your weight! win a prize!

sure, why not. 12 ounces! sorry, mate. four ounces. i've been taking the stairs lately. you win, big guy. sorry, 'scuse me! oh, he looks so much more real on tv. yeah... over 75 years of savings and service. get your rate quote today. it's time for the biggest sale of the year with the new sleep number 360 smart bed. it senses your every move and automatically adjusts

on both sides to keep you effortlessly comfortable. and snoring.... does your bed do that? the new 360 smart bed is part of our biggest sale of the year where all beds are on sale. and right now save 50% on the labor day limited edition bed, plus free home delivery. ends saturday! ...better than a manual, and my hygienist says it does. but... ...they're not all the same. turns out, they're really... ...different. who knew? i had no idea. so, she said look for... ...one that's shaped like a dental tool with a round...

...brush head. go pro with oral-b. oral-b's rounded brush head surrounds each tooth to... ...gently remove more plaque and... ...oral-b crossaction is clinically proven to... ...remove more plaque than sonicare diamondclean. my mouth feels so clean. i'll only use an oral-b! the #1 brand used by dentists worldwide. oral-b. brush like a pro.

todd: tracking the very latest on hurricane harvey. rick, where are we? rick: there are always tornado concerns rotation have you from the storm can spawn little smaller rotations. because of that is a tornado watch in effect until 1:00 today for points to the north and west of where the storm came on landfall we will watch that not huge tornadoes when you get. this but smaller tornadoes that can certainly cause some damage. especially if your home has already been weakened because of the wind and the rain. take a look at some of the video coming in from aren't the corpus christi. just minutes ago a fire you get a picture of this. hard to imagine a fire in the middle of the storm. there is so much for one thing oil refinery work going on right across this area, that certainly potentially could be part of this. so one fire, at least one fire we know of. we keep on saying it's daylight now. it's going to take some time to get an idea of what is going on. not just the daylight but

being able to get in whereby the damage is because of all of the roads certainly washed out and absolutely unsafe to get there. take a look at the weather maps. show you what we're looking at right now. this year very interestingly last fall they launched brand new satellite. the satellite technology is getting better and better. first time we have ever had imagery that comes in every five minutes and produces pictures like this we have never seen on satellite image a hurricane that looks like this and a perfect storm really to get that kind of imagery where you see that perfect center of that storm moving over land beginning to decrease. when we now talk about it's down to category 1 storm. the strongest winds at the center when those go down that doesn't mean just that the winds go down, that wind field expands. so the stronger winds now are expanding throughout the storm and going on areas on either side of this. that is not good news for folks on either side. victoria texas 30 miles away from the storm right now. one report of 16 inches of rain from this storm. we have a lot of days to go.

16 inches. i'm sure there is a lot of flooding going on around there. we will probably see a record crest along the victoria river. storm pulls on in. there is high pressure been centered across parts of the southwest. that is going to stop this from pull any farther off towards the west. and it is going to nudge it and keep it right here. that's why the rainfall totals continue to be so extreme. what we are forecasting. places like houston may be in to the teens. but go just to the west of it and victoria, there you go. 53. port lavaca 53 inches. this is a model run. that's not saying that's exactly what's going to happen. we don't know where heaviest of the bands will line up. likely some spots in here that see 58 inches and 50's. large swath of rainfall totals maybe 2 feet. that's why we expect to see such a big flooding event here across parts of texas. thanks, guys. abby: many days to come. thank you, rick. clayton: kurt the cyberguy learn how to predict. he was there. is he going to join with us

life saving tech including this app. amazing to see life saving bands. kurt will be with us when we come back ♪ ♪ ♪ if you could book a flight, then add a hotel, or car, or activity in one place and save, where would you go? ♪ expedia.

clayton: welcome back. hurricane harvey pummeling texas overnight. expected to be the worst to hit in decades.ed to kurt the cyberguy joins us now to tell us about the equipment. >> you get into the mud and you get dirty and you learn how to get out of the mud. that's what happened when i was stuck in hurricane katrina. you learn thousand survive without power. you learn what you should have had, what you wish you would have had if you knew you were going to get in this kind of ugliness that

i'm afraid is going to be happening in texas for now at least the next two days. clayton: we are relying on cell phones, battery powered alps. we don't have home internet. we have our ipads and iphone and have you some apps including scanner 911. what does it let us look at. >> scanner 911. brilliant app. to have. keep in mind when i was in katrina much like today the cell phone towers that surround the storm, if the wires are still connected to them to the phone companies on the hard line side those for go about 2 to 3 days without any electricity. we were able to use that during katrina. and we would be able, to if you could keep your battery alive, you would be able to tune in to the local sheriff, the local fire and the local police. what advantage is that? if you have evacuated your house or you are stuck in your flood and you are looking for help, this gives you an idea where first responders really are and when is it is safe to go back home. so, they are going to be sending out the first responders in their own

county or city plan to say hey, is this area flooded? okay, no. next one. and they comb through your community and then they will say okay, it's safe to let everyone back. in you have will be the hero in your neighborhood when you have this app. because you will know this stuff. abby: what is it called again. >> scanner 911. i have it if you go to our website: abby: what do you have on your screen? >> whether have you phone, tablet desktop computer or laptop. it's called vin to sky. it's allowed us to have a lot of the brilliant algorithms that detect and plan and track where hurricanes go. so rick is our expert here. this allows you. abby: this is all live. >> this is live. right now exactly what's going on. the storm, we have the winds that rupp. tells you exactly the intensity of the rain. can you layer whatever you are looking for. if you want to look and find out the waves in that area. it will tell it to you live and predict out. tell you a little bit later this morning that this is,

well, it's going to get -- it's still just sitting there. even if we go toward 10:00 a.m. this morning. clayton: some gear as well you need to have your cigarettes. abby: cigarette lighter. what can you use this for? >> that is something that you should have no matter what. if you are in a hurricane zone or not, this is the one thing that i really wish i had during a storm. that is a 12-volt cigarette lighter adapter. right now they are like 10 bucks. for two of them. >> two u.s. b plugs. recharge your tablet, your phone. that is our life blood. our ability to stay in touch. other devices will let did you go and do that. abby: you have to see what you are doing which means you need a flashlight. >> yes. what great transition. clayton: do i have a flashlight as well. >> that is a really great tool. abby: old school. >> not relying on having a car, a plug or batteries. this thing you wind it up, you got a radio and a flashlight for under 30

bucks. i wish i had that. abby: how long does that last for, the light, the battery? >> you know, it keeps going. we cranked it up for just a few cranks this morning and had has not gone off. i have that essential the thing you see law enforcement officers go the mag light. > clayton: these are the ones can you run over with a car. i watch a lot of tv. >> in the garage right now at your house we don't think that bicycle lights are really great tools. so the front light of your bicycle. go grab it usually they are led battery power. that's a great flashlight while you were in there. one thing i wish i had that the flashlight on the head that you wear free's your hands up. very best apps online did you go to cyberguy or facebook or "fox & friends." abby: have you experienced it yourself so you know well. thank you, kurt. todd: hurricane coverage of hurricane harvey will

continue. we will check in with our team on the ground much it's all coming up next. ♪ ♪ there's nothing more important to me than my vacation. so when i need to book a hotel room, i want someone that makes it easy. booking.com gets it. and with their price match, i know i'm getting the best price every time. visit booking.com. booking.yeah!

one laugh, and hello sensitring a bell? then you have to try always discreet. i didn't think protection this thin could work. but the super absorbent core turns liquid to gel. for incredible protection... snap! so it's out of sight... ...and out of mind. always discreet. for bladder leaks. i've discovered incredible bladder leak underwear that hugs every curve. can't tell i'm wearing it, can you? always discreet underwear. for bladder leaks.

when only the best will do... tempur-pedic delivers. tempur material provides up to twice as much pressure relieving power, so you wake up feeling like a champion. through september 17th, save up to $500 on select adjustable sets. tempur-pedic sleep is power.

clayton: hurricane harvey slamming the coast of texas. the storm now downgraded to a carpet 1 hurricane. what does that mean? it doesn't mean much for the people living there dealing with this chaos. it made landfall last night around 10:00 p.m. local time. a category 4 hurricane. brings winds of up to 160 miles per hour. abby: this is the strongest storm to hit the yatsd in more than a decade and could drop close to 50 inches of rain in some parts of texas before this thing is all over. this is video you can see here from inside a police patrol car where officers are making sure neighborhoods are safe. thousands of people are already been evacuated. todd: take a look at some of the destruction so far. even before the sun comes up here. store fronts cade in by high winds. walls of an apartment

complex collapse and firefighters battling a blaze in the middle of it all. harvey is expected to leave behind about $40 billion in damage when all is said and done. president trump has signed a disaster declaration in the state of texas. texas.ed to. clayton: we have team coverage of hurricane all over the coast this morning. we do begin with a fox news alert. rob schmitt at the scene of that massive fire on padre island in corpu corpus christi. it started around 2:30 a.m. local time. rob, how does it look now? rob: yeah. it's still just simmering. a few flames as you can see here. it was a pretty big house. there is a lot of big houses and nice houses out here on padre island. a lot of vacation homes and second homes for people with a lot of money. a couple fire trucks left here. they will let this thing disz pate and burn itself out. this is going to be a complete loss. we understood it's a town house. four cars in the driveway here. they are all burned the truck did the best over here.

can you still see the back side of it still can you see the red paint. the front of it is completely charred. look at jeep wranglers over here. completely melted and then you see the house that continues to burn and let it burn out to nothing. they managed to save this beautiful house right next door. they managed to salvage that and 30 minutes since we last talked to you, i have watched at least three times, maybe four times a blue brilliant explosion happening, it's actually quite beautiful to see but it's happening back behind us. no point in seein seeing it it's all th the way back there it's transformer. so incredible to see it big pop and fire work up in the air. i don't know if that is what happened here. this intense fire the way it melted these cars. that makes sense but who knows it could be anything. according to the fire chief there was nobody in the house. they got out of here. this area is not under mandatory evacuation. doesn't appear to be loss of life. that's good thing. this house is totally gone.

four cars with it send it back to you. clayton: couple hours that house has been burning and simmering down to ashes. abby: right on the coast where the eye of the storm has just been lingering along that coast, rick. you say, look, this is not over any time soon. this is going to stay along that coast for potentially a number of days to come. rick: kind of the forecast models that we are watching now looking even worse than we saw yesterday. because we think the storm is going to stay really in the same area for a very long time. take a look right over here. corpus christi then there is the padre island up there. that's where that fire is going on right here on padre island, right across the causeway. it's all that area inside that bay that's having filled up with rain from the storm surge. not on this corpus christi side they have that offshore wind. it's a strong wind and also one of the things certainly that helps with that fire or certainly continues to keep that going. corpus christi yesterday the naval air station, that's out on the island. and that was one that had

winds recorded well over hurricane force for a number of hours. here is where the storm is right now about 30 miles away from victoria, texas. that's a significant town there they are going to be getting the worst of the winds just about right now. but it's moving so slowly, it's going to go on for a very long time. usually whether you have a hurricane make landfall, have you the storm surge and then the wind direction shifts and the storm surge all goes away very quickly. that is not going to happen in this case. you continue to see an on shore flow piling water into this area. it doesn't allow it to go away. and because the storm is going to stay in the general vicinity for the next four to five days, it's going to keep a lot of that water for at least probably the next day and a half, two days. 10 to 12-foot storm surge piling that water in there and then all of the rain that is going to continue to dump over the next couple of days. i will tell you some of the models now indicating that the storm sticks with us. maybe kind of dissipates. doesn't ever pull away. take a look at what we are talking about right now. the center of the storm here

just to the west of port laf carks towards victoria, texas move in towards tomorrow and in to monday, the storm is right in the exact same spot. that means continued rainfall all across this area. the flooding is going to be extreme and for people who are thinking we have maybe dodged a bullet places like galveston, you were never going to be the worst of it that doesn't mean the rain is not going to be with you. you will still see very heavy amounts of rain there the next several days. clayton: we will get to griff jenkins who is in houston, texas. abby: he said an inch of rain. clayton: an inch of rain is all it would take to get that city to flood. worried about significant flooding there. tell us about houston. rick: absolutely. houston likely getting over a foot of rain. get west of houston we will see those totals go over 20-inch amount. houston is notorious for flooding. numerous floods over the last couple of years. griff was talking about tropical storm alison in 2001 that dumped about

35 inches of rain. caused about $5 billion in damage. this will be a storm that has widespread flooding all across the houston area, again, unfortunately, a lot of floods we have seen the last couple years have been training thunderstorms have been going across the area and caused localized flooding in couple neighborhoods. this is going to be a widespread flooding event eventually towards houston as well. todd: let's bring in griff jenkins like we said live from houston. griff, it does look like it's getting a lot worse rainwise where you are. >> that's right, guys. we're just starting to see some of the rain squalls here in houston. we are in pretty much downtown and just as rick was talking about, the office of emergency managementible their web page says essentially any and every portion of houston is prone to flooding. but we have brought you to one of the locations that is identified as a prone warning, a prone flood danger zone. and just to give you a sense, this is basically the heart of houston.

it's highway 10 and 45's intersection. this car goes through, guys. watch, this right? it's going to go under this underpass. he is approaching slowly because, and obviously maybe thinking about not going under there. harvey has not even begun to unleash its havoc on this city. and that underpass is dry. i was just down there 10 minutes ago. if it rains like this for four days, the predictions that houston may suffer the worst catastrophic flood damage it's had in a decade or more that certainly may hold. it is just beginning. what happens is obviously that area, these low lying areas and underpasses flood and people become trapped in their vehicles. the emergency, the city of houston urging people to not approach danger places like that with flooding and they will be very susceptible to drowning in their car. this is one of the bayous.

there are scores of bayous in downtown houston and they flood. i can't show you now because the sun is not even up, but it's over those tree lines. the bayou like a low lying almost river creek area running under this underpass goes behind me. that's why the underpass dips. and it goes back around. so, we are just at the very beginning for our viewers that are waking up seeing this. this is a story. the flash flood warning expected to last through tuesday, guys. abby: griff jenkins live for us. expecting maybe up to 20 inches of rain there in houston. we want to go over to matt finn. if you want to get a sense how strong these winds are and how tough the current are go to matt finn who has been covering this all night long. matt, this has now been downgraded to a category -- did we just lose him? we might have. clayton: there is matt. abby: storms downgraded to category 1. you look where you are though it has only gotten progressively worst just

within the last hour. >> yes. i mean, it has gotten worse every hour leading up to where we're right now. it's very violent winds and rain. i mean, you would not guess this is a category 1. you would feel like this is much worse than that. what we are looking at is probably a very large storm surge here. when we first got here last night, we were able to see probably 5 to 10 feet out where the water line was and now you can see it's inching up behind me here. and in the distance it is probably 10 to 15 to 20 feet into the grass line. so a very large storm surge here mixed with perhaps the rising tide. local law enforcement told us they were worried about the damage that was going to be done to this fishing town of about 5,000 people. the power has been kicking in and out since we have been here. there is a large dock behind me and it's been going in and out and a large community to my left here.

and the power has been going in and out. we have been seeing blue sparks in the air the entire time we have been here. so you can assume that those might be power lines or they might be electricity or something going in and out. the head of the emergency official here in the county says that one of the biggest concerns is that there are some people who stayed behind, they tried to weather this storm. and they could be without power for days on end, which could spell disaster for them. there is and was a mandatory evacuation here. the buses left yesterday. and if you weren't on them, you are here now basically by yourself. local mayors and the county government says if you decided to weather this thing and hunker down, they cannot help you at this point. it has gotten progressively worse here. we have been hearing reports from the north and the south that perhaps the storm has faded. it has not here. it has gotten progressively worse. leading to where we are right now. so a dangerous situation for anyone who decided to weather this one out. back to you guys.

todd: matt, thank you very much. one of the concerns where matt is right now besides the obvious in the shot, the combination of the storm surge which you can see in matt's shot also the fact that when rick's forecast 58 inches of rain could fall there, combination of that, absolutely horrible for flooding. abby: matt, please take care of yourself out there. unbelievable. this is not easy for them to go out and do when you think about the heavy winds coming against them. he has been a trooper throughout the entire night. clayton: on a wooden pier no less. ken paxton texas attorney general will join us on response to harvey. special coverage continues right after we take a quick break. ♪ ♪ copd makes it hard to breathe.

so to breathe better, i go with anoro. ♪go your own way copd tries to say, "go this way." i say, "i'll go my own way" with anoro.

♪go your own way once-daily anoro contains two medicines called bronchodilators, that work together to significantly improve lung function all day and all night. anoro is not for asthma . it contains a type of medicine that increases risk of death in people with asthma. the risk is unknown in copd. anoro won't replace rescue inhalers for sudden symptoms and should not be used more than once a day. tell your doctor if you have a heart condition, high blood pressure, glaucoma, prostate, bladder, or urinary problems. these may worsen with anoro. call your doctor if you have worsened breathing, chest pain, mouth or tongue swelling, problems urinating, vision changes, or eye pain while taking anoro. ask your doctor about anoro. ♪go your own way get your first prescription free at anoro.com.

category 1 slams the coast of texas. casey stegall is live in galveston. he joins us now with the very latest. casey, how is it where you are? >> good morning. the power outages keep on going up and we talked to you at the top of the last hour. we told you that there were about 27,000 people in the area without now center point energy is reporting 57,000. so quite a hike in just an hour's time. we are currently under that tornado watch i talked about earlier in galveston county. that is something that is really a potential problem all over the region because, as these tropical bands continue coming on shore, they can spawn tornadoes. that is quite common and there have been a number of warnings issued all throughout. so, again, that is something

folks keeping a close eye on in addition to the rainfall. i know that has been a common theme here. we cannot stress it enough. the information coming out of the national hurricane center and local national weather service offices is that there could be heavy, heavy, localized flooding. because things right now just really windy in galveston. we have had periods of rain today since we have been out here. but it has not been that intense, however, we know a whole lot more is on the way. now, we want to show you some video. again, of a fire that is burning in bolivar peninsula. that is just north of this location. three homes on fire there. that is an area by the way that was evacuated so we hope that the homeowners were able to get out. we have not heard anything in terms of casualties from local emergency management officials. we should also point out that there are about 700 troops or so from the

national guard that have been deployed and they are stationed throughout the region. they have even brought in air assets in the event that rescues need to be carried out and they can assist with those. so, a number of different things that we are looking forward to as the sun will start to come up here soon. and it will give us our first look at the devastation harvey has left behind because, remember, this has made landfall in the night, evening hours. when the sun was already out and gone. so now once we start to have sunrise, we're going to see some pretty devastating images all throughout the region up and down the texas coast impacted by the storm. clayton: casey,just talk a little bit about the historical context. the people of galveston here know the devastation that the 1900 hurricane wrought on that city changed the course of this country forever. it was a large port. it was rivalling new york city at that time, destroyed

in that hurricane. reset itself. houston kind of took over. they built that 17-foot storm wall as a response and now rick talking about this flooding that will unfold over the next 1, 2, 3, even 4 to 5 days while this thing hangs out there. what are local officials telling you about that storm wall and the flooding they expect in that area? >> well, first of all, you're right. i mean galveston has a very long history and they are not immune to these storms. there has been devastation here before by previous hurricanes. not even the 1900 hurricane but hurricane ike did a lot of damage to this spot in 2008. and so the local officials here, they say that they are prepared. and the mayor held a press conference saying that they weren't expecting the high levels of storm surge here that were predicted in other places. the sea wall that you talk about is just off beyond those palm trees. you can't see it because, again, we are waiting for

the sun to come out. but i can tell you that the water is not even close to the sea wall itself. so we have not had a real big surge here. but, again, the flooding, the rain that is coming and the rain on the way, that has people concerned, galveston has built a lot of its businesses and homes on stilts. and they have raised it. they have elevated it as much as they can. but, if you are talking about a potential for inches and inches of rain over period of several days, we know that can be extremely problematic so time will tell. clayton: thank you so much, casey stegall live for news galveston, texas a lot unfolding up and down the coast. you think galveston was the wall street of the south. it was considered the wall street of the south and destroyed because of that hurricane. so, look at the economic damage and the way in which an entire country can be shifted as a result of the storm. abby: the long term impacts of these hurricanes. as he was mentioning, many people's homes on stilts.

people watching this storm from afar, not where their homes are, wondering what they're going to come back to. wondering if it is each going to be there. a lot we still don't know about because the sun isn't up yet. todd: we have about 40 minutes or so until the sun comes up. 6:55 local time. so we'll be checking back there soon on that. todd: meantime, the trump administration already taking action in response to hurricane harvey. we are live in washington, d.c. with the very latest. that's coming up next. abby: jason chaffetz says the government fell on its face responding to the defsz stating floods in lazarus last year. what he thinks about the plans for hurricane harvey coming up next. ♪ ♪ when you're close to the people you love, does psoriasis ever get in the way of a touching moment? if you have moderate to severe psoriasis, you can embrace the chance of completely clear skin with taltz.

taltz is proven to give you a chance at completely clear skin. with taltz, up to 90% of patients had a significant improvement of their psoriasis plaques. in fact, 4 out of 10 even achieved completely clear skin. do not use if you are allergic to taltz. before starting you should be checked for tuberculosis. taltz may increase your risk of infections and lower your ability to fight them. tell your doctor if you are being treated for an infection or have symptoms. or if you have received a vaccine or plan to. inflammatory bowel disease can happen with taltz. including worsening of symptoms. serious allergic reactions can occur. now's your chance at completely clear skin. just ask your doctor about taltz.

♪ todd: 23 minutes after the

hour now and a fox news alert. hurricane harvey, the strongest storm to hit the u.s. in more than a decade, bringing torrential rains and likely billions of dollars in damage along the texas coast. clayton: also president trump's first major natural disaster and taste of his young administration. abby: ellison barber is live in washington, d.c. how the white house is responding to this. ellison, good morning. >> good morning to all of you. hurricane harvey is considered a stress test of sorts for this administration. potentially the first major test of how they are respond to a natural disaster. one republican already warning president trump telling him not to make the same mistake president george w. bush made with hurricane katrina. the president is at camp david this weekend. his team says he is closely watching the hurricane. yesterday, he signed oa disaster declaration providing federal aid to texas before the brunt of the storm even hit the state. president trump tweeting at texas governor greg abbott that his administration will remain, quote: fully engaged with open lines of

communication as hurricane harvey makes landfall. america is with you. he also posted a photo from the oval office. the white house says it shows the president receiving a briefing from fema administrator brock long, chief of staff john kelly, and counter terrorism advisor tom bossert. bossert says the president is staying in touch with everyone in that room and directly speaking with state officials. >> the president is worried about the 4.6 million people or so that are in that area of texas that are going to be affected by. this because, to them, this is the most important thing they are going to have to worry about for the next 24, 48, 72 or more hours. i was extremely happy with his leadership instincts on this and that will carry through as you see him respond to this event. >> the white house says president trump is planning to visited texas he could do that as early as next week. abby, todd, clayton. clayton: ellison barber live for news washington. thanks. >> you bet.

clayton: how will the trump administration handle the emergency response? todd: let's bring in fox news contributor jason chaffetz. good to see you, sir. i think the big point i want to pull out from the research that you gave us on this don't think federal government is going to bail you out. explain that. >> no. don't think the feds are going to come running and save you. they will do everything they can. it does appear as if president trump is way ahead of this, much more than president obama was last year. you would think after katrina we had learned a lot of these lessons but not so because august of last year massive flooding in a no named storm in baton rouge, 146,000 people and their homes damaged. tens of thousands of people displaced. fema did a good job initially getting water out there. housing was a massive problem. it was an absolute disaster. they got more than 30 inches of rain. and, yet, fema was absolutely pathetic. we had several hearings on this in the house. i worry they haven't learned these lerches. abby: have you seen this at local level. jason and i go way back.

you have been congressman for a number of years. you were also the chief of staff when m dad was governor of utah. you dealt with a mine collapse when he first got in office froogd. have you seen how important at the local level to help the people out and coordinated with the executive branch. >> i was the newly lamented chief of staff to your dad. it was literally five days into his administration down in saint george, utah, massive flooding loss of homes. most important thing did he was got down there, feet on the ground. you can actually move and push resources: at the end of the day, it's going to be your local community. you know, this is -- the thing that's inspiring to me is you will have ordinary americans doing extraordinary things. it's going to be your local church group. it's going to be your local affiliate. it's going to be your local mayor who is going to make the difference. because it effects literally millions of people. clayton: what did you learn out of those hearings. you talk about the bureaucracy. is that the problem here trying to move these resources getting the relationships between the state and local officials and federal government?

what did you learn in those hearings? >> total lack of communication from fema. a lot of desk jockeys in d.c. talk to the local mayors where there ask less than 1,000 people in town that's where the real problem is there is a lot of attention on this. when would get to midweek and the storm starts to dissipate. that's when a lot of the problems come. in katrina two out of the three people who died happened after the fact because the lives broke levies . that's when the death toll starts to go up and that's what you really got to worry about. that's what fema, you would think, would learn these lessons. that's where they have fallen down. abby: you talk about president trump and this is really the first big test he has of a natural disaster being in office. how important is it to have the right people around you. you think about general john kelly who is now chief of staff in the white house who ran dhs who has been on the front lines of a number of different cris cease

overseas in war. how hopeful with thos helpful w? >> one thing donald trump has done successfully well the president has surrounded himself with people are w. a military mind set. they don't take no for an answer. they know how to move resources. they have a new fema director only approved by the senate about two months ago. you have got a fairly new fresh face there heading up fema. again, you also have a governor abbott who is very seasoned in this texas knows how to take care of itself. you had a fairly pathetic governor in my opinion in louisiana, governor edwards who didn't even know how many people were affected six months after the disaster down there. so, between governor abbott, i think the president, he does have a good military mind set around him. texas is pretty tough, too. todd: jason, in your opinion when should president trump visit the affected area? >> you have got to be careful. everybody is trying to move heaven and earth. he announced he is going to go. you have to let it subside a

little bit. on the phone with the governor. let the governor ask for resources. where do things need to be mobilized. they have 700 national guard down there. probably going to take more than that if you have that many millions of people. but, again, it's going to be your first responders. it's going to be that person who is a plumber who is just working, you know, 20 hours a day helping his neighbor. those are the people probably going to make the best. those are going to be the inspirational stories. abby: you are so right. the local community. let's hope it doesn't turn political any time soon as it often does. thanks for being here. >> thanks for having me. good to be here. clayton: president trump pardoning former sheriff joe arpaio. you are going to hear from him next. plus, how is texas preparing to respond to hurricane harvey as the sun gets ready to rise? we're about 25 minutes away from sunrise. ♪ ♪ my belly pain and constipation?

i could build a small city with all the over-the-counter products i've used. enough! i've tried enough laxatives to cover the eastern seaboard. i've climbed a mount everest of fiber. probiotics? enough! (avo) if you've had enough, tell your doctor what you've tried and how long you've been at it. linzess works differently from laxatives. linzess treats adults with ibs with constipation or chronic constipation. it can help relieve your belly pain, and lets you have more frequent and complete bowel movements that are easier to pass. do not give linzess to children less than six, and it should not be given to children

six to less than eighteen. it may harm them. don't take linzess if you have a bowel blockage. get immediate help if you develop unusual or severe stomach pain, especially with bloody or black stools. the most common side effect is diarrhea, sometimes severe. if it's severe stop taking linzess and call your doctor right away. other side effects include gas, stomach-area pain and swelling. talk to your doctor about managing your symptoms proactively with linzess. 'saved money on motorcycle insurance with geico. goin' up the country. later, gary' i have a motorcycle! wonderful. ♪ ♪ i'm goin' up the country, baby don't you wanna go? ♪ ♪ i'm goin' up the country, baby don't you wanna go? ♪ geico motorcycle, great rates for great rides.

year with the new sleep number 360 smart bed. it senses and automatically adjusts on both sides.

the new 360 smart bed is part of our biggest sale of the year where all beds are on sale. and right now save 50% on the labor day limited edition bed, plus free home delivery. ends saturday! ♪ todd: 34 minutes after the hour now and a fox news alert. police out in the middle of hurricane harvey risking their lives making sure everyone is safe. right now you are looking at video from rockport, texas. this is the fairfield inn in that area. you are looking at, i believe that san outside photo now we're going to switch it to an inside photo. you can see the damage. take a look at that. clayton: this was the hardest hit area as that eye wall hit the area. we tried to get reporters

into that area. they couldn't get in there because their cell tower is down. no communication. roads impassable. look at this fairfield inn. abby: look at towels all along the hallway. rob schmitt our reporter was trying to get to us from rockport. zero cell service. people have hopefully evacuated that area. had you people i guess from nursing homes had evacuated. people going to jails to find shelter. just now getting that visual as we are waking up this morning. clayton: look at dropped ceiling there goes to show you sure devastation. water sitting on flattened commercial buildings there. they don't have the runoff that you would have on residential buildings. some of those drop ceilings, tiles just collapsed right there right out of the ceiling. rick reichmuth standing by right now. downgraded now, rick to a category 1 but frankly who cares when you are seeing all of the rain and how much and how long this storm is going to hang out there? rick: absolutely who cares. the storm is always going to weaken once it's over land

it doesn't have moisture source anymore. i will tell you i think we see this weaken less in a sense because it is not going to get very far off of the land. or off of the water. and so it's going to continue to be able to pull some of this gulf moisture in the next couple of days. that's why we expect to see the rainfall totals so high. a lot of the models we are looking at. how much water is in the at no, sir fear. we are seeing records with this. numbers we haven't seen before as far as how much water is in the atmosphere. all that water up is going to go down and fall. came on shore. hurricane watch in effect until 1:00. continue to see that throughout the day today tomorrow. next number of days be a tornado threat because of the rotation in the atmosphere. small tornadoes not large tornadoes. small tornadoes can pop up far away from where the center of the hurricane is. you need to watch it. 48 hours of this storm evolving. this year we have a new satellite giving us imagery. called goes-16.

launched last year. became operational this year. first time we are seeing it and first hurricane we are seeing it with. and what a spectacular visual site o sight of this. 48 hour storm. unfortunately it got its act together right at landfall. a landfalling hurricane strengthening much more dangerous than a landfalling hurricane that is stable. there is an ability for the winds that are higher in the atmosphere to transported down to the ground which is where we are and causes the damage. because of that, once we see the images, i think it's going to be very bad. strengthening right up to landfall. in fact, no sign after it made landfall that it weakened for about an hour or. so that's certainly bad news. visually a beautiful sight. it's going to run southwest and that is going to nudge it back and keep it in the same spot. latest model runs looking -- you heard us talk forever about this cone of uncertainty as people call it here you go a big blob because, again, it's exactly

where it's going to go. look at the center line of it which normally we say don't look at the center line of it, if you do take a look at this, that 1 is where we are today, go in to tomorrow, the next day, the next day, the next day, we are all right in the same spot. in fact, you might see a second landfall that moves back over water and make a second landfall in the same spot maybe by wednesday. some uncertainty in that obviously. but the point is the indications are that the storm stays in the same spot. all that moisture in the air falling to the ground. clayton, even though you say down to a category 1. that just means those winds are weakening but that wind field also expands in order to do that. so the strong winds are going to expand out from where that center of it is. so places that were seeing maybe 30 mile-per-hour winds are probably going to see 50 mile-per-hour winds on top of the rain that will cause problems far away from the center of the storm. abby: thank you so much, rick. todd: let's bring in texas attorney general ken paxton. mr. paxton, thanks for being here. let's start off with the question a lot of people are wondering. in these type of storms

always have the best humanity. people coming out to help fellow man. and often have the worst people price gouging. what are you doing to prevent that and if you can't prevent it bring those to justice who are doing such horrible things in a time of emergency? >> that's a great question. first of all, i would encourage your viewers to pray for our people. obviously there are going to be people that stayed behind. we don't know how many. that's our first concern. but you are right. that's something we are out looking for. i have got people out looking for price gouging. we have already found one big retailer charging $42 for a case of water. another gas station $99 for a case of water. so i just want people to know we are out looking for those and we are finding them because we have plenty of people out there taking pictures and letting us know. we will be dealing with those people as we find them. clayton: so also repairs. this is a big issue. one thing you want to make people aware of repairs, building repairs. people who say they are going to do something. prey on individuals. give them money, put up cash and then what happens? >> same thing.

we have people that, you know, email us, they take pictures, they let us know so we pursue those people. we have strong civil penalties up to $20,000 per violation. if you do -- if you gouge somebody that's over 65, the cost is $250,000. so, there is some severe penalties and believe me, we are looking for them and we will be coming after them. abby: so this storm obviously hits at the dead of night as the sun is about to come up there in texas, it's been hard for us as newscasters to get a sense of just how bad the damage has been because there hasn't been cell access to a lot of these places. what do you expect when that sun does come up and we have a better sense of the damage we are looking at and damage that was done. >> i have people on corpus christi. even difficult for them to see but he has seen many ambulances headed out early in the morning. so we know that they are out there. they have been staging all over the area. so, as the sun comes up, just like you, we will be seeing more. but i do know that they have

had first responders out early this morning. clayton: we just got a tweet in the president up this morning from camp david tweeting in response to senator chuck grassley who told the president to stay focused and respond to this and not make a hurricane katrina mistake like george w. bush did, here's what the president says: got your message loud and clear. we have fantastic people on the ground. got there long before harvey. so far, so good. is that the response that you're experiencing at the local level there, mr. paxton? >> >> oh, absolutely. the president has been on this from early stages working with our governor, working with our people. so, you know, he was here early. i think he is very focused on that. we talked to the governor and i think he is pretty pleased with the response. they have already declared many counties disaster areas. i think we are on top of this as well as we can be. and i think the president has been, too. clayton: what does that mean for our viewers that don't understand? what does it mean to have something declared a

disaster area? >> it means that federal money can flow immediately. there is going to be lots of damage and matters resolved. rather than taking months and months or potentially years you speed the process up. getting that money flowing early makes a significant difference in the lives of people affected by the storm. abby: yeah. well, the storm is certainly not over yet. it sounds like what is so troubling about this, mr. paxton is it could last another four to five days along the coast. we have been talking to reporters there on the ground in houston, texas, saying even an inch of rain there can cause flooding. they are expecting maybe up to 20 inches of rain. how prepared is texas for that? >> well, i have lived here, you know, decades. i have never seen anything like this. i don't know if you can ever be prepared for a storm that drops that much rain. but i do know that we are very effective in texas dealing with natural disasters. we have had hurricanes before. we have got great leadership in our state. and we have great local officials. i'm confident that we will be doing everything we possibly can to make a

difference. todd: mr. paxton, we know you have a busy day ahead of you. few busy days ahead of you. we appreciate you giving us your time this morning. >> absolutely. thanks for having me on. todd: what is being done to help those people on the ground? we will check in with the red cross. that's coming up next. t has, you learn a lot about what people want. honey, do we have like a super creamy cheese with taco spice already in it? oh, thanks. bon appe-cheese! okay... [radi♪ alarm]

julie is living with metastatic breast cancer, which is breast cancer that has spread to other parts of her body. she's also taking prescription ibrance with an aromatase inhibitor, which is for postmenopausal women with hormone receptor- positive her2- metastatic breast cancer as the first hormonal based therapy. ♪ ibrance plus letrozole was significantly more effective at delaying disease progression versus letrozole. and ibrance plus letrozole shrunk tumors in over half of these patients. patients taking ibrance can develop low white blood cell counts, which may cause serious infections that can lead to death. before taking ibrance, tell your doctor if you have fever, chills, or other signs of infection liver or kidney problems, are pregnant, breastfeeding, or plan to become pregnant. common side effects include low red blood cell and low platelet counts... ...infections, tiredness, nausea, sore mouth, abnormalities in liver blood tests,

diarrhea, hair thinning or loss, vomiting, rash, and loss of appetite. julie calls it her "new" normal. because a lot has changed, but a lot hasn't. ask your doctor about ibrance, the number-one-prescribed, fda-approved oral combination treatment for hr+/her2- mbc. ♪ it's happening, it's happening! in the modern world, you can control just about anything with an app. your son is turning on all the lights again! and with the esurance mobile app, you can do the same thing with your car insurance. like access your id card, file a claim, or manage your policy. it's so easy it's almost scary. let's get outta here! that's auto and home insurance for the modern world. esurance. an allstate company. click or call.

abby: we are back with breaking coverage of the hurricane. more than 200,000 people in the dark this morning as hurricane harvey, now a category 1, slams the coast of texas. casey stegall is live there in galveston who has a long history of being hit by these horrendous hurricanes, these storms. casey, what can you tell us right now? >> well, i can tell you that a long history also gives you a great deal of experience. and a lot of people that we have talked to here on galveston were very prepared for this. and as we are starting to get the first bit of

sunlight, i'm going to have my photographer push now finally beyond the palm trees we have been standing in front of to show you how windy it is. you can see the gulf of mexico out there. you can see just how active it is. all of those white caps. there are rip current out there and tidal surges. there have been alerts coming out from local national weather service offices as the outer bands of harvey continue to -- we continue to feel the effects. you know, what's really fascinating about this and this really puts it into perspective. the state of texas is giant. for anyone who has ever been here, driving from one end to the other is more than 10 plus hour drive. and so when we talk about how big this storm is, and that they are feeling its effects hundreds and hundreds of miles away in the austin, texas area that is pretty incredible. again, heavy wind.

heavy rain and flooding the primary concern as harvey continues to push through here. todd: casey stegall live for news galveston, texas this morning. thank you very much. clayton: we want to get to this right now what relief is being brought in to help those devastated by the storm. joining us now is vice president of disaster operations and logistics for the american red cross brad kaiserman. brad, cool to see you this mornings. this is a time when people are waking up going online figure out how they can help, what kind of assistance they can provide. what do you guys need right now. >> good morning. i think what we need right now more than anything else is volunteers and people's generosity in donations. i think casey hit it on the head in the report he just gave. there is 30,000 square mile area out there that is about to take on somewhere between 25 and 40 inches of rain. i think people woke this up morning and said the hurricane has made landfall it's over.

it's not over. this is a two disaster problem. the hurricane is the first disaster and then catastrophic flooding that is going to come as the rainfall the second. so it is people and funds that we need in order to provide food and shelter and comfort to what i expect to be tens of thousands of people over the next several weeks who are going to need that as they are forced from their homes. abby: i was just going to say as we have seen in past hurricanes it's really the local communities who are the ones when you talk about how you can help at the executive level. really it comes down to local communities stepping up, church leaders, places like that to really help put a hand to help people survive this. where can they go? where can they go if they are in that community in texas and want to help out, what can they do? >> if you are in that community, the best thing to do is call 1-800-red cross or go to red cross.org. register as a volunteer. you can make a donation. can you arrange to give blood. we can connect with you other volunteer organizations. you are absolutely right. it does take a whole community to respond and recover to these events.

and that's the faith based community. volunteer organizations. government at every level. corporations, the media. we come together to do this. so if folks can go to 1-800-red cross, go to red cross.org, we can help them with volunteer opportunities and certainly give them an opportunity to channel their filphilanthropic. we ask people not to bring donations of food to shelters. it's very difficult to manage that. we make sure we feed folks in shelters. so, yep. clayton: thank you so much. busy morning for brad at the americaamerican red cross. go to red cross.org. that's right. red cross.org in order to donate. thanks. abby: we will make sure to put that on our website as well tonk. hundreds of folks are out in the dark. lights may not come back on for what we are hearing for weeks. what do you need to know to find food in your fridge if

you need power? we will have all the tips. you will want to stick around for this ♪ ♪ with my moderate to severe crohn's disease i kept looking for ways to manage my symptoms. i thought i was doing okay. then it hit me... managing was all i was doing. when i told my doctor, i learned humira is for people who still have symptoms of moderate to severe crohn's disease even after trying other medications. in clinical studies, the majority of people on humira saw significant symptom relief and many achieved remission. humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal infections and cancers, including lymphoma, have happened; as have blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure. before treatment, get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you've been to areas where certain fungal infections are common, and if you've had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have flu-like symptoms or sores.

don't start humira if you have an infection. just managing your symptoms? ask your gastroenterologist about humira. with humira, remission is possible.

♪ clayton: welcome back a fox news alert. a scary situation and latest report at this hour 213,000 people without power in texas. folks hunkered down. what do they need to know about the food in the fridge in case you lose power. obviously folks watching us right now are hopefully out of the disaster zone they are not without power. carolyn brown is a registered dietitian at food trainers and joins us now this morning. hopefully we can prepare. when you have a refrigerator and power goes out. what do you want to do first of all? you don't want to keep opening, right? >> you don't want to keep opening and closing the

fridge because you lose that cool air. food is good for about four hours with the doors closed. once the doors are open, you are letting all this cool air out. we are looking at our meats, our dairies well stocked fridge. clayton: talk about some of the different food after four hours it's all bad. >> not all bad. todd: some of it would be. what about the meat and darey. >> the meat and the dairy are the first thing you want to toss if the degree is over 40 degrees. for two hours or more. you really want to get rid of it. unfortunately. so when in doubt throw it out. clayton: talk about some of the fruit. >> fruit can absolutely stick around. when you don't have airconditioning, a lot of times fruit will go bad more quickly but it's really okay. clayton: talk about temperature control. it's 35 right now. once it goes over 40 have you some trouble. >> right. exactly. so you don't want to keep opening and closing to grab water, wine, whatever is going on. clayton: if you have this problem keep your wine outside. and water. >> then you really want to

stock up on water. clayton: we heard from ken paxton a few moments ago about price gougingment some stores charging $99 for package of water. stock up ahead of time. have these things in your house. what's some other perishable stuff. >> have stuff to make full meal from non-parishable items. bread, almond butter. tuna, canned beans. a little bit of almond milk. nuts, fruit, yeah, it's really really helpful to you have v. all of that nonperishable stuff on hand. clayton: terrible for folks in texas because they could have power for weeks. be prepared ahead of time when something like this happens. >> thank you. clayton: coming up on the show, it is now sun time in texas because 6:55 local time is when we are actually starting to seat first signs of the damage done by harvey. raging fires there. heavy flooding. we are going to check out and as the emergency crews hit the road, see what the

effects of this storm looks like with the sun up. we'll be right back. ♪ ♪ ♪

♪ it's a highly contagious disease that can be really serious... especially for my precious new grandchild. it's whooping cough. every family member, including those around new babies, should talk to their doctor or pharmacist about getting vaccinated.

one laugh, and hello so i tried always discreet. i didn't think protection this thin could work. but the super absorbent core turns liquid to gel. snap! so it's out of sight... ...and out of mind. always discreet. for bladder leaks.

♪ clayton: a sound i know all too well. todd: a fox news alert. hurricane harvey slamming the coast of texas this morning. the storm now downgraded to a category 1 hurricane with more than 200,000 people are without power at this hour. clayton: traps formers popping left and right. made landfall last night. bringing winds of up to 160 miles per hour. this is the strongest storm to hit the united states in more than a decade and could drop close to 50 inches of rain in texas before it's all over. thousands of people have already been evacuate evacuated. abby: it's not over any time soon. you can see some of the destruction right here. just a high school in rockport partially destroyed. luckily though, no one was

hurt. take a look at that. clayton: harvey made landfall in rockport overnight. here is what it looked like in the middle of it all. the storm is expected to leave behind about $40 billion in damage. president has signed a disaster declaration for texas. this morning the president tweeting from camp david closely monitoring hurricane harvey from camp david. we are leaving nothing to chance. city state and federal government working great together. this is scenario you think about texas. this is an area where have you major economic expansion. people moving to texas. one of the states held up as one the beacons of economic growth in this country about to be hit with 40 billion-dollar price tag from this hurricane. abby: think about houston and oil and all of those power plants that had to be shut off in advance of this hurricane. speaking of houston, they are also bracing for massive flooding as the hurricane barrels through. clayton: that's where we find our own griff jenkins. >> is he live with the very latest. as we have been checking in with griff the flooding has

begun. >> it has, you know. but it's -- i can't stress enough that while it may look calm behind me, those law enforcement officers behind me, the harris county constable are on high, high alert because of the flash flood warning that's in effect through tuesday. you saw in the last hour the massive squalls we were getting. this area of south-southwest houston is expecting to get in the next hour, hour and a half some 2 do 3 possible inches because of strong bands of harvey. and while we have heard that the category 1 downgrade is, perhaps, relief of some of those in the corpus christi down in the rockport area, it doesn't mean that the rain is any less expected. it's the same amount of rain that we can see here. and if that delivers, it's going to be that catastrophic flood event. that constable from harris county behind me is going to be sitting there because this part of north 610 and highway 59, you see how low

that gets there, they are watching and monitoring for that to grow. an emergency vehicle going through there. as soon as they get 2 to 3 inches or more in that area, and this is that area that frequently floods in 2016, 2015, they are going to start shutting some of these roads down because you simply have the most dangerous situation in a fourth largest city in the u.s. that is people in their cars in floods. and they are putting out on the office of emergency management web page and through social media what to do. don't approach these places. the sun is starting to come up. that's good because you might not see some of the low lying areas, the water gathering. but they are telling residents in houston if you see water. back up, don't enter it because the number one cause of death in flooding in flash flooding are people trapped in their vehicles in and drowning. they refer here in houston as i mentioned before to the tropical storm alison back

in 2001. claimed 23 deaths in texas. caused upwards of in damage. what you are seeing out here with one crew from you constable of harris county is one of scores of dozens that we have been stopping and talking to as we moved throughout the area, guys. todd: don't drown, turn around. it's so simple but so important. griff, thank you very much. abby: thank you, griff. all right, let's go over to rick reichmuth. he has been following this all morning long for us. rick, as you know it's been downgraded to a category 1. this thing is far from over. and in some places along the coast of texas it's only getting worse. rick: well, for a lot of places it will get worse because of the rain that's going to continue to fall. the worst of the winds are going down. you like to see that in order for that to happen that wind field expands. we start to see stronger winds going out much farther from the center than we initially saw. that's one of the things we

are going to watch. clayton, you might like to see this. i know you like technology. this last year i said there was a new satellite launched we are getting much higher resolution imagery. three days ago where the storm was. it had been a storm way out across parts of the atlantic. weakened as it went through the caribbean and yucatan. and then emerged here with a 35 mile-per-hour storm. and within a two-day period went from 35 mile-per-hour storm to 130 mile-per-hour storm. and the satellite imagery that we are getting here you see it became really well organized right before making landfall. which is exactly what you don't want to see if you live anywhere along that coast. now, because the storm is moving now very slowly and is going to stay right there, we are going to continue to see the rainfall for days. and places like houston, take a look at this, it's these feeder bands, outer bands, that that rotation continues to pull moisture from the gulf. gulf water very warm. there is a ton of water to deal with here to pull up. it will be those bands that those lines come through dump two to three inches of rain in a short amount of

time. clears out a little bit. another two to three inches of rain with the next band coming. in the center of it is still where most of that moisture is right now that is headed just around the victoria, texas area. the center of it just a little bit towards the west. so incredible rain. now think about last night we made landfall, it made landfall down around the rockport area. it's in the bottom of your picture. still heavy rain falling there. and the victoria, as of early this morning had a rainfall report of 16 inches of rain already. we have days and days of this rain to go. all indications are that the storm is going to stay in the same spot. i want to run through some of these numbers. they seem extreme but this is a model we like a lot. one of the computer models we like a lot. it's been putting up these kind of numbers for days. that means we have a higher confidence that the numbers are going to be very extreme. do they get to 58 inches like you see in port la vac can a there lavaca there. i don't know but chance two to three feet range. north houston and galveston

area, you see houston there 15 inches, just to the west into the 20's. and then inland a little bit, that i-35 corridor from san antonio to austin a big rake there a lot of the population just to the east of it numbers are very high. do we get to the 10 inches around san antonio, possibly. that will cause more flooding. keep in mind it's been a wet august already. the ground was saturated before this storm got here and now we have this to deal with the next five to six days. todd: rick mentioned the eye of the storm there in rockport. we will show you video now just in to fox news. take a look at this. this is rockport during the height of the hurricane. you can see just the winds whipping the rain all around. you see the branches flowing in the breeze. flowing is an understatement. now we are going to go inside a fairfield inn that suffered significant damage. you can see the outside area there, panels ripped off. it's to the a good scene there now we will take you on inside. when the video starts off it

doesn't look that bad to start. as we walk down the hallway as clayton pointed the out the first time we saw the video towels on the ground and dripping coming from the roof. and now you will see a bunch of ceiling files showing the devastation in that area. abby: video coming from a news crew inside of there. the reason we are only seeing this now todd rockport was the eye of the storm. they lost all cell service in that area. even one of our reporters rob schmitt was trying to get there to do a live report for us. had to turn back around to go to corpus christi which is right near there. they can't get access, no cell service. we are beginning to get these videos and a sense of just how bad some of this damage is that's just one hotel there, the fairfield inn. who knows how many more of these type of videos are going to come in throughout the morning. clayton: it's going to get a lot worse over the course of next few hours here. sun will be up in just about 10 minutes. casey stegall was finally able to get us some shots beyond some palm trees as

the sun has risen there. casey, how is it looking in galveston? seems like they were pretty prepared for this. >> they were very prepared. and fortunately, the storm wall is in good shape because the water didn't even really reach it. i my photographer go ahead and push back out to the gulf now that we have some daylight. it's filtered because it is raining and obviously cloudy and still extremely windy. you can see the high tide out there and those white caps. we have been watching those come in all morning long and the folks here in galveston are certainly happy that there is still quite a bit of sand. there is quite a bit of beach from the water lying there to the sea wall itself. that hasn't been so much of a concern because the folks who call galveston home and those who vacation here, they are all too familiar with this. we want to show you some video of preparations that were underway ahead of

harvey because obviously galveston out here, lots of boating. so the marines yesterday, a mad dash to get very pricey boats out of there. and get them towed out. that is a pretty big feat as can you imagine. hundreds of thousands of dollars of property people were trying to get secured and out of the way. when i covered hurricane ike down here in 2008, we were over just on the other side of galveston over in clear lake, texas near houston. and we saw ships, boats, in the road upside down. i had never seen anything like it. so can you imagine the rush to get those protected. also, we want to tell you about cruise ships. galveston has a cruise ship terminal. and there are ships that come in and out of here. four ships are impacted. three carnival ships. two were already enroute to galveston which harvey was

coming ashore. >> so they rerouted and they are going to now dock in new orleans to refill on fuel, supplies and water. guests on that ship, those two have the chance to get off if they like or will eventually return to galveston once the weather clears. third carnival cruise ship was being held in cozumel mexico another night and then a royal caribbean ship was scheduled to leave and then come in to gravels stolen tomorrow and the cruise line said it is monitoring that closely. so about 15,000 passengers between the four ships impacted. a lot going on. a lot we have got our eye on as the rain and wind continues to hammer us here in galveston this morning, guys. clayton: cozumel. abby: casey stegall. you can see the homes on stilts. as have you been talking about this morning back in 1900 that huge hurricane

that hit galveston, texas. a lot of people evacuated and are waking up this morning and wondering what their homes, what their boats, where they live what it looks like this morning once they go back and able to see it when the sun comes up. clayton: insurance adjust errors will have a busy time. affecting whole region not just in texas. people in florida people trying to get insurance. people saying you can't get any coverage yet until the storm has passed. we won't even write policies right now. abby: brian babin's district is right in the path of hurricane harvey. the congressman is joining us live with an update on the ground there. he is up next. ♪ my day starts well before

i'm in the kitchen. i need my blood sugar to stay in control. i need to shave my a1c i'm always on call. an insulin that fits my schedule is key. ♪ tresiba® ready ♪ (announcer) tresiba® is used to control high blood sugar in adults with diabetes. don't use tresiba® to treat diabetic ketoacidosis, during episodes of low blood sugar, or if you are allergic to any of its ingredients. don't share needles or insulin pens. don't reuse needles. the most common side effect is low blood sugar, which may cause dizziness, swtiting, confusion, and headache. check your blood sugar. low blood sugar can be serious and may be life-threatening. injection site reactions may occur. tell your prescriber about all medicines you take and all your medical conditions. taking tzds with insulins like tresiba® may cause serious side effects like heart failure. your insulin dose shouldn't be changed without asking your prescriber.

get medical help right away if you have trouble breathing, fast heartbeat, extreme drowsiness, swelling of your face, tongue, orhrhroat, dizziness, or confusion. ask your health care provider if you're tresiba® ready. covered by most insurance and medicare plans. ♪ tresiba® ready ♪ time's up, insufficient we're on prenatal care.es. and administrative paperwork... your days of drowning people are numbered. same goes for you, budget overruns. and rising costs, wipe that smile off your face. we're coming for you, too. for those who won't rest until the world is healthier, neither will we. optum. how well gets done.

i expect things to last [kina looong time.as, and so should you. midas has a lifetime guarantee on these parts. that's right. on things like struts, brakes, shocks. all kinds of automobile parts. [king] guaranteed for life. does he turn everything to gold? [kinbrakes. not everything. [kinbrakes. not everything. [kinstruts. luckily, he's not a dog person. [kinshocks. luckily, he's not a dog person. at midas we're always a touch better with limited lifetime guarantees on select parts, complimentary courtesy checks and more. book an appointment at midas.com

abby: hurricane harvey making landfall on the coast of texas overnight. todd: this is the strongest storm to hit the u.s. in more than a decade with billions of dollars in damages expected. so, the question is how are texans planning to recover from this absolute catastrophe. clayton: joining us by phone is texas congressman brian babin. i'm sure you didn't get much sleep last night. nice to have you on the show this morning. what's the latest there. what are you bracing for at the state and local level at this hour? >> we're just -- i couldn't be more proud of our governor and our local officials. and the president. i'm going to have to say the president has been very proactive as well as the governor. and we have been very, very fortunate. i have a 36th district which runs from southeast houston over to louisiana. it's my colleagues south and west of me blake and randy

weber and some of those other fellows that have those districts that way. that's where the storm is sitting right over rockport, victoria going to be dumping a lot of rain. that's the big danger. abby: congressman, the storm is going to last for four or five days. the amounts of rain that's going to be dumping and big parts of texas like houston where you know chemical plants have had to completely shut down days before this hurricane even hit. what can you expect in your area but also in the state of texas overall as we look at the days to come and how it needs to recover? >> well, that's a great question, abby. i appreciate that. because my particular district has more petra chemical refining facilities than any other district in the entire united states. that's why it is so important that we eventually get some kind of storm surge

protection. because we have -- this is a national security issue where these -- all these plants are and the tens of thousands of people employed there our fuels, aviation and highway fuels, chemicals, we will see a real devastating impact nationwide if these plants stay down for any length of time. but so far, so far we're very lucky. it's just rain bands that are coming through. the big question is will this storm, after a couple of days of being stationary head back to the gulf? will it head towards our district up in the houston area? and we're already having, you know, some floods out west of houston. so i think, there again, folks need to be smart. heed the warnings. turn around, don't drown. and avoid high water areas.

todd: in the time we have remaining, just quickly, can you tell us what needs to be done to fully protect as fully as one can the economic resources, the economic drivers in your area that abby mentioned? >> that's another excellent question. i think that, again, we have so much -- we are the epicenter of refining oil production and chemical. so, it is so important that we saw a huge devastating storm in ike back in 2008. we had a lot of these plants were down. we had a spike in gas price prices. but we have to have protection, we call it the coastal spine. we are looking at it right now. it's storm surge. and it's actually a series of levees and berms and the

gates that go across galveston bolivar roads. ship channel. it would prevent a huge storm surge from coming, in devastating entire houston area and galveston bay where all these plants are. todd: right. >> so we are looking at that real closely. working with the state. i'm working it at the federal level. you know, our president wants -- he wants some real infrastructure programs to be come up with. and i think this is what we are looking at. it couldn't be more important than -- you bet. clayton: congressman, we appreciate you joining us this morning. we know have you a busy morning ahead and stay safe there as well. thanks, congressman. >> well, stay tuned. thank you. todd: all right. flooding is going to be a major issue, of course, as the storm rages on. we have tips what to do both before and after your home is flooded. that's coming up next.

♪ ♪ it helps block 6 key inflammatory substances that cause symptoms. pills block one and 6 is greater than 1. flonase changes everything. you're searching for something. whoooo. like the perfect deal... ...on the perfect hotel. so wouldn't it be perfect if... ....there was a single site... ...where you could find the... ...right hotel for you at the best price? there is. because tripadvisor now compares... ...prices from over 200 booking... ...sites ...to save you up to 30%... ...on the hotel you want. trust this bird's words. tripadvisor. the latest reviews.

the lowest prices. you push yourself every day... tempur-pedic helps you recover every night. tempur material provides up to twice as much pressure relieving power... so you won't toss and turn. through september 17th, save up to $500 on select adjustable sets. tempur-pedic sleep is power. we were in a german dance group. i wore lederhosen. so i just started poking around on ancestry. then, i decided to have my dna tested through ancestry dna. it turns out i'm scottish. so, i traded in my lederhosen for a kilt.

clayton: froforts protecting record rain fall and flooding. how can you prepare hgtv host chip wade joins us now what we can do to prepare before and afterwards. good to see you this morning. >> thank you so much. clayton: if you have a house like, this you are probably familiar with, if you live in this particular area that deal with natural disasters on a regular basis, they are dealing with floods on a regular basis. you say preparing for the flood to build a flood barrier i wouldn't know where to start how do you build a flood barrier.

>> there is no way to fully prepare for a flood. it's such a powerful force. however, we can do as much as we can if you know you are in a low lying area having something like a flood barrier. obviously having band bags available. i keep a lot of building materials around my house nothing dissimilar to much. keep some sand just for general use and have some bags available. again, this isn't for everyone in the u.s. but for areas more prone to this, this could be a great step. but really for everyone, what can you really do is get in the basics in order. i keep something as simple as a nice waterproof bagged and i have several. they are very available now. get them between 20 and $30. i use them like a backpack but i keep all of my most valuable documents and everything inside one of those even inside my safe. things as simple as moving things up to the second level. very, very basic fundamental things put new better position to react. because, the evacuation as we are seeing right now on flooding is -- it happens very quick. and you don't have time to

process exactly what needs to happen. so this preprep of getting your important documents, even an evacuation route on a standard old school like laminated map. don't rely just on your cell phone because infrastructure can go down. i actually have a map and have it sharp idea on the map itself. so if you need it, it's going to be a physical copy. abby: another big tip is town plug any electronics. judge gorsuch good tips, because the category is now to a 1 for this hurricane this storm. we are just seeing the beginning of the flooding as it goes further north in the state of texas. places like houston that may expect up to 24 inches of rain there for the homes that have already experienced flooding that are waking up this morning and aren't sure what to do, what are your tips for them? >> gosh, well our thoughts and prayers go out to all these families. once you are in that position. what you don't want to do is to reenter the home before authorities tell you to. just like you were saying, the length is a big issue. there is underground utilities, fallen power

lines. we think all the power is out. it's not necessarily. you don't want to walk into standing water where there is potential hazard. also the water itself is more dangerous than just potentially a fear of drowning. you don't know exactly what's in that water. it could be suj. it could be other chemicals. so having boots that are high even waders is a better thing. touching things only with gloves. guys, don't let your kids help with you your clean up efforts. we don't know what's in this water and where it's coming from. so aside from that natural pests potentially like snakes and other things that could be floating around, we want to be very, very careful. you also want to get that water out as fast as possible. so hopefully if you haven't been hit really hard with it, you want to try to get that water out, under 24 hours to try to salvage as many building materials as possible. mold can start growing within 24 to 48 hours. if you can actually get that water out and start the drying process, open up your windows. obviously in a hurricane that's not going to be

possible. but for a typical flood, that's what you want to do. air dry it out for your valuables though. you want to dry them slowly. even things like pictures. if you can't address them now. put something in the freezer. it will keep it from deteriorating immediately and allow to you address it without ruining necessarily. abby: super helpful. chip wade. thanks so much. over to todd piro for other headlines. a lot of news we are getting in this morning, todd. todd: north korea test firing three more ballistic missiles in defiance of constant warnings from the trump administration. u.s. military officials say two of the missiles flew about 155 miles but the third blew up immediately after launch. first missile test launched since new u.n. sanctions were imposed on north korea and comes during joint military exercises between the u.s. and south korea. now, to a fox news alert. a search intensifying this morning for a u.s. soldier after a black hawk helicopter crashes off the coast of yemen. the chopper taking part in a training mission when it went down.

u.s. central command says five other service members aboard that aircraft were rescued. cause under investigation. a terrorist is shot dead while attacking police with a knife in brussels. police say he yelled allahu akbar before slashing several officers. that terrorist was identified as 30-year-old man from somalia. this comes as the city is on high alert after 32 people died in terror attacks there last year. and those are your headlines. coming up, what is the latest on harvey's path and what county gulf coast expect going forward? we have a live update from the national hurricane center when we come back ♪ ♪ looking fabulous in my little black dress? that's cool. getting the body you want without surgery, needles, or downtime? that's coolsculpting. coolsculpting is the only fda-cleared non-invasive

treatment that targets and freezes away stubborn fat cells. visit coolsculpting.com today and register for a chance to win a free treatment. hundreds of dollars on youmy car insurance. saved me huh. i should take a closer look at geico... (dog panting) geico has a 97% customer satisfaction rating! and fast and friendly claims service. speaking of service? oooo, just out. it was in. out. in! out. in! what about now? that was our only shuttlecock. take a closer look at geico. great savings. and a whole lot more.

♪ todd: welcome back. 8:33 here in new york city. 7:33 in texas. a fox news alert for you. hurricane harvey slamming the coast of texas this morning. the storm now downgraded to a category 1 hurricane. but more than 200,000 people without power right now. clayton: so it made landfall last night around 10:00 p.m. local time there in texas. a category 4 hurricane at the time. winds up to 160 miles per hour. this is, by the way, the strongest storm to hit the united states in more than a decade. it could drop close to 50 inches of rain in parts of texas before it's over because this thing is going to hang out for a number of days before being pushed off. thousands of people have already been evacuated. abby: yeah, this thing is far from over. one family making the trek

through the storm to deliver their baby. >> we're officially going to the hospital to have our baby in the middle of hurricane harvey. abby: unbelievable. clayton: that's not something you want to have to deal with everyone else is evacuating. abby: you prepare so much to have a baby and last time you have in mind hurricane the night of your birth. rick: 12 years since we have had a major hurricane make landfall anywhere in the u.s. that was a record. i am certain we will not see that again and this is a good reminder how quickly these things can form this time of year september 10th is the statistical peak of hurricane season. we are still about two weeks away from that and we are very active out across parts of the atlantic. so certainly anybody needs to watch this. a little system that's going to develop off the coast of the carolinas. not making landfall but certainly causing problems across some of the seas the next couple days as well.

this obviously our initial storm. this is the last 72 hours of this storm as it developed and you see right here in the last about 12 hours before it made landfall really starting to get its act together. and that eye became very well defined even just about four or five hours before continued to make strengthen as it made landfall. here you go. it is now going to bump into that big h you see there across new mexico. it's likely going to bounce it right back right across the exact same area where it's been. because of that we expect to see the same area for about the next four to five days dealing with this rain. probably see the center of this storm loop around and impact the exact same areas that's it's impacting right now. some of our models don't even pull it off towards the north like you would usually see with this storm. some of them just keep it right there and dissipated this over about the sex seven to eight days. i'm not saying we have seven to eight days of rain here.

if it does stay in that area all of that moisture that's up in the sky is going to come fall right back down across parts of the ground. that's why we are so concerned about this flooding. storm surge also has been such a concern for us. and because the storm is staying so close to the shore, the onshore flow continues. we don't have any chance at least in the short-term 24 to 36 hours seeing the water subside. rain on top of that. you get the idea. clayton: as the hurricane continues to rip through the coast of texas, what can we expect going forward here to break it down chief specialist from the hurricane center michael brennan. you heard our own meteorologist talking about the length of time that the storm is going to hang out. what are you guys bracing for? what are you seeing in the latest models? >> well, i mean, in terms of the forecast, we're expecting basically the system to stall. the steering current are collapsing. we are beginning to seat motion of the storm slow. it's down to about 6 miles per hour now in our latest

update. can you see the eye here moving slowly inland of the middle texas coast centered right now 20 miles southwest of victoria. the real focus now is turning to the heavy rain. the winds are starting to come down. there are still hurricane force winds with this system. down to 80 miles per hour sustained winds. now you can see feeder bands of rain moving in off the gulf of mexico. so there is two parts to the rainfall we are looking at today. there is moderate to heavy rain that's associated right with the core of the storm. because that's moving very slowly the areas near that storm center are going to get very, very strong or very, very long duration high rainfall rates. and then you also have these bands where there are almost like showers or thunderstorms. they will do what we call train over the same area. so you will get an area that will be under one of these bands for potentially hours. so we could see rainfall rates in 6 to 12 hour period of 4 to 6 inches in some locations and over the next several days that's what's going to add up to those 25 to 35 with isolated amounts as high as 40 over a very

large area over here in southeast texas. todd: michael, is there any sense as to when the storm surge is going to regress? because obviously you are talking about the rain from the sky. that's going to be a huge problem over the course of the next four, five, six days. what about the storm surge when in conjunction with the rain from the sky just causes an absolute catastrophe? >> well, right. that storm surge -- we still have a storm surge warning up for much of the texas coast. we still are seeing unnun accommodation values some tidal gauges 4, 5, 6 feet above ground level. there is still significant storm surge flooding going on. because the storm is thawing out the wind is blowing on shore right to the center. water levels will stay up several more tide cycles before the winds gradually begin to come down and water levels will gradually recede the next few days along the texas gulf coast. clayton: busy day for you guys there at the national hurricane center. thank you for joining us. we appreciate it. abby: thank you, michael. >> thanks.

abby: a long few days ahead. a busy morning. president trump pardoning former sheriff of maricopa county on twitter. i'm please to announce i have just granted full pardon to 85-year-old sheriff joe arpaio. he kept arizona safe. is he convicted of defying orders traffic patrols illegal immigrants. he is says he is grateful for the president's support for law and order. >> it's great. i love that president. he supports law enforcement. and i'm very humbled. and i said publicly recently pardon or no pardon, i will be with him to the end. abby: that was the sheriff on hannity last night. the 85-year-old was facing up to 8 months in jail. he calls the conviction a witch-hunt. president trump also making it official. transgender troops will no longer be allowed to serve. the pentagon receiving official orders last night from the white house to put the ban in place reversing

policy from the obama administration. in his initial announcement, the president cited the quote tremendous medical costs and disruption to the armed forces. and more than 17,000 california national guard soldiers can now keep the millions of dollars in establishment bonuses handed out by mistake. the pentagon confirming they won't have to repay the more than $190 million disentlezly given between 2004 and 2010. the decision comes after months of wrangling over whether to take the money back after an audit revealed the payments any soldier who already paid it back will be refunded. and those are just some of the headlines we are following closely this morning. all right, coming up, president trump facing his first true natural disaster. how do states end federal government work together during events like this? we're going to ask former governor mike huckabee who knows this all too well. he's up next. i make it easy to save $600 on car insurance,

so being cool comes naturally. hmm. i can't decide if this place is swag or bling. it's pretzels. word. ladies, you know when you switch, you get my bomb-diggity discounts automatically. ♪ no duh, right? [ chuckles ] sir, you forgot -- keep it. you're gonna need it when i make it precipitate. what, what? what?

(hard exhalation) honey? can we do this tomorrow? (grunts of effort) can we do this tomorrow? if you have heart failure symptoms, your risk of hospitalization could increase, making tomorrow uncertain. but entresto is a medicine that was proven, in the largest heart failure study ever, to help more people stay alive and out of the hospital than a leading heart failure medicine. women who are pregnant must not take entresto. it can cause harm or death to an unborn baby. don't take entresto with an ace inhibitor or aliskiren. if you've had angioedema while taking an ace or arb medicine, don't take entresto. the most serious side effects are angioedema, low blood pressure, kidney problems, or high potassium in your blood. ♪ tomorrow, tomorrow... ♪ when can we do this again, grandpa? well, how about tomorrow? ask your doctor about entresto and help make tomorrow possible.

♪ todd: welcome back. time now for a fox news alert. hurricane harvey making landfall overnight. now a category 1 storm. abby: president trump signing a disaster proclamation to provide federal learelief to texas. hurricane harvey makes landfall. america is with you, governor abbott at fema and of course dhs gov. clayton: hurricane harvey is the president's first ever test responding to a natural disaster. what can the president do to help the states. joining us is former governor of arkansas former g.o.p. presidential candidate and fox news contributor hike huckabee. nice to see you this morning, governor. >> good morning. great to be with you guys. clayton: i'm not blessed to have a form father who is a former governor. i ask you these questions. what can the president do to help at the state and local levels? >> the most important thing the president must do accept power the people at the local level. these decisions really are

being made by governors, mayors, county executives. that's where the power lies to act. but what the president has to do is to empower everyone in the federal chain of command to provide the resources and assets as they are requested and not let it get bottlenecked like it was in katrina. michael brown got a lot of unfair criticism but he was asking for things. it's just that it got bottled up within the administration of the bush white house and let me just be very fair about that. it was a total disaster, not only on the ground but also in the administrative chain. here's something that should be done eventually. the fema director should not be folded up under homeland security. that was done after 9/11. that person, when fema stands up, needs to report directly to the president and the president needs to ensure that every person and every agency responds to requests. the second thing is this: most people don't understand that when you have hundreds of thousands of people who are forced out of their homes, it's not just that

the physical property is damaged. here's my question. when they don't get social security check and don't get medications and can't get insurance check mailed to their homes because their homes are not there. there are a whole lot of very practical things that have to be done at the local level. empowering people at the local level is simply the most important key. let me mention this one thing. president trump is surrounded by some very sharp people. fema director. top notch. tom boss sertd. his guy in the white house couldn't be better. and as much as who as it is what, he has a great group of who, who surround him and advise him during this time. >> not to mention his new chief of staff john kelly ran up dhs. >> exactly. abby: oftentimes these disasters can make or break a politician's career and usually it's up to the local officials to really step up. obviously you need help at the federal level but you know, this being governor of arkansas, stepping up and making sure you are there

for the community leaders to step in. but, also providing some emotional relief. this is obviously an emotional time for so many people on the ground who are waking up this morning that evacuated and aren't sure how their home was left. how important is it for the leaders of these -- of the state of texas right now, the mayors, the governor of that state to really step in not just as a leader but emotionally connect? >> it's an incredibly important point, abby. i'm glad you made it for example, you are seeing governor abbott, as well as the mayors of these communities that are very visible. and they are being very practical. they are bringing calm but they are also bringing reality to people and telling them how hard this is going to be over the long haul. the president is going to visit next week. i think that's important. not that he can go and magically roll back the floodwaters. he will be criticized for showing up. let me tell you what he does, when he shows up every television camera in america shows up. the drama of the storm is when it is hitting. but the impact of the storm and the time to really spend

the effort to get people in recovery, it's in the not so sexy moments in the days, weeks, and months that follow and the president plays a vital role in keeping the spotlight focused on these folks whose lives will never be the same as a result of hurricane harvey. todd: governor huckabee, let me ask you this. if there was one legislative that we learned from hurricane katrina, what would you say that is? >> the big lesson was don't let decisions go up the ladder. push them down the ladder. let people who are on the ground, the ones who are physically touching a widow who is scared to death, let that person make decisions. don't ask them to send it up and let a committee look at it and just don't let it get bogged down in 15 minutes worth of unnecessary bureaucracy. you have to trust your people who are on the scene, give them the resources they need. turn them loose. it's easier to get forgiveness than permission at a time like this.

this is a time when people need to be given the latitude to make tough decisions but to do it as they see it, rather than as some bureaucrat sitting in washington thinks it ought to happen. that was the disaster of katrina. it was compounded by the bottleneck that happened within the bureaucracy. abby: that's so well said, governor. you know this all too well. always good to have you with us. todd: thanks, governor. clayton: thank you, governor. >> thank you. clayton: coming up on the show, hurricane harvey taking aim at dozens of our nation's oil refineries. experts say that could cause gas prices to spike nationwide. how will that affect your wallet? we are already seeing prices go up. when we come back. ♪ ♪ it's date night and... ugh... nothing fits. you're just bloated from gas. i can see it and i know you feel it. take gas-x®, the #1 gas relief brand. it relieves pressure and bloating fast! so you can wear whatever you want.

but prevagen helps your brain with an ingredient originally discovered... in jellyfish. in clinical trials, prevagen has been shown to improve short-term memory. prevagen. the name to remember. one laugh, and hello sensitring a bell? then you have to try always discreet. i didn't think protection this thin could work. but the super absorbent core turns liquid to gel. for incredible protection... snap! so it's out of sight... ...and out of mind. always discreet. for bladder leaks. i've discovered incredible bladder leak underwear that hugs every curve. can't tell i'm wearing it, can you? always discreet underwear. for bladder leaks.

♪

abby: we are back with breaking coverage of hurricane harvey. it has now been downgraded to a category 1. but this storm is far from over. likely to last another four or five days. you're seeing live footage there rockport, texas, where the eye of the storm hit overnight. it was without power for a long period of time. we're just hoping that everyone was evacuated during that time. but, as the storm has hit the gulf coast. a number of the nation's oil refineries they stand in its path. clayton: experts believe gas prices set to spike. how significant will that spike be? tracy is a correspondent with fox business network. she joining us now. i know just over the past 24 hours, tracy, we have already seen spikes and ticks up across the country, right? is it going to get worse? >> it will. the good news is that so far as an average across the country, gas prices are relatively low. but analysts are predicting we will see anywhere from 15 to 25 cents of an increase over the next week, two

weeks, possibly longer. then you look at next weekend, labor day, a lot of people are going to be traveling. this is really going to impact people's wallets. because, when you look at where harvey hit, that is the direct path, where a lot of our oil is refined. the texas gulf coast. that's responsible for at least 25% of our country's refined oil. the whole gulf coast region that includes inland texas, louisiana, that's nearly 50% of the oil. a lot of the refineries in that area, they shut down ahead of harvey. you have got citgo, flint pills resources, valero, they shut down before harvey hit as a precaution. they didn't want to do an abrupt shutdown. so -- clayton: this is a state we have seen so much economic growth. everyone holds up texas like the state everybody is moving to, right you? are seeing boom town. you are seeing the economy there and some people are excited about texas' economic growth. $40 billion of potential damage here goods and

services coming out of that region. do you see this might affect the dow more broadly in the stock market over the coming weeks more broadly than we already saw it this week? >> definitely. we could be looking at oil prices, you know, what's going to happen there. everyone is going to be focusing. we are not going to know until monday. until we really get a full scope of all of the damage. abby: you think of that area, thousands of people that work for these companies. you're talking about these oil plants, for example. >> millions of barrels. abby: millions of barrels not just flipping off a switch off and on. this is something that is going to last for days being shut off and who knows how much longer after that it's t. is before they are up and running and get their business booming before the storm hit. the damage could be catastrophic for these industries? >> yes. have you got the rigs. have you government the refineries. have you got pipelines. all of this stuff affected. todd: also from a broader stock market perspective. while there are always going to be losers in this type of a situation, ie your gas companies and things along those lines oftentimes in this situation we see

winners in the home improvement sector, home depots, lowe's. serve pros those individuals and companies that benefit when a lot of rebuilding needs to be done. which remains to be seen what is going to be needed down there in texas. but obviously based upon the weight and mass of this storm certainly looks like it's going to be at least something. >> yes, absolutely. clayton: thanks so much for joining us this morning. abby: hoping for the best. clayton: dan patrick joins us live next as hurricane coverage of hurricane harvey continues right after this. keep it right here. ♪ ♪ e-commerce deliveries to homes than anyone else in the country, we never forget... that your business is our business the united states postal service. priority: you

...

>> todd: we are upon 9:00 a.m. in new york city, 8:00 a.m. in texas. a fox news alert right now hurricane harvey slamming the coast of texas that storm now downgraded to a category 1 overnight but more than 200,000

are without power right now. >> clayton: the super strong storm hit the united states in more than a decade and could drop close to 50 inches of rain in parts of texas when it's am over. you heard us right, 50 inches of rain. thousands of people already evacuated. hundreds of thousands of people are without power. >> abby: this far from over. harvey made landfall in rockport , as a category 4 hurricane leaving behind a trail of destruction. the storm is expected to leave behind about $40 billion in damage, but president trump has signed a disaster declaration in texas. >> todd: as you can see right there, houston one of the areas hit hard but so far, not the area hit the hardest by any stretch of the imagination . we saw matt fin's live shot throughout the course of the morning there in texas and the combination of the storm surge combined with the fact that as rick was predicting that area could receive upwards of 58 inches of rain, really underscores what that area is facing. that said, we heard our houston

reporter griff jenkins explain ing houston is an area already saturated because of weeks of rain in that area. it's also an area that when it gets just one inch of rain is prone to extremely heavy flooding. we're not just looking at houston. we're not just looking at that entire coast area of texas. >> todd: i want to show you hotel video right now this is amazing this is the fairfield in n in rockport. look at this the inside of this as the local affiliate there walking through the hallways with the roof basically collapsed and of course the commercial structure, so you have a flattened roof there, all the ceiling tiles collapsed, water pouring through the roof and the outside of this fairfield inn in rockport also ripped apart. rick is standing by and we will get to him in just a moment with the latest on the hurricane track he's standing by but griff jenkins is live in houston because that is the big concern the flooding now unfolding in houston. oh, boy and griff, a few hours

ago you could see the street. not any longer. >> reporter: that's right, clayton, todd and abbey. we've talked about in fact here is a truck right now watch this. this is in the south southwest parts of houston. we're just off the southwest freeway and as you see, the flooding that they predicted, the flood warning that goes through tuesday, there's cars coming on this road trying to get to the southwest freeway and 59 south and there's some turning away. we've seen one tow truck go through and another suv, but we're just going to watch and see who decides to go through or not. you can see just to the left here, guys of me, this car in a parking lot which obviously didn't expect this to flood but there you go. i don't know when that car owner is going to come and get it but we aren't quite sure how much water this is but i'm going to w ade in it a little bit for you the old fashion way and try and give you some sense for it, and what you're getting here and we've been listening to the

radio all day was the bands and while this storm has been downgraded to category 1, this is exactly what they're worried about and these bands that keep coming and delivering in low lying areas like this in houston , they're worried about this flooding going on for days. it's saturday morning, and they expect harvey to deliver this kind of rain. these bands delivering two, three, four inches at a time for days and clearly, this is how as we were saying earlier, the flood warning out of the emergency management in houston is do not drive into this and do not drowned. turnaround don't drowned, but i don't know this has got to be at least 10 inches, maybe a foot at this level. right now they've warned about as much as a foot to two inches. we are near the area we're in is near keegan's bayou, and i'm not

exactly sure how far down behind me it is but this is the area where the keegan's bayou is starting to flood and we know from monitoring on social media, twitter the city of houston is saying there's 13 high water areas already under alert in the last hour as we showed you the harris county law enforcement just waiting to close roads. clearly this one is going to be a hazard throughout the day. who knows what the next few days will bring to dozens of areas like this. >> abby: griff jenkins live on the ground in houston expecting to get a lot more rain to come stay safe. we want to go to rick whose following us closely all morning and rick we have the attorney general on the texas saying people are paying up to $99 just to get some water and as you've been telling us this could be just the first of many days to come. >> reporter: it is and also think about how far inland you'd have to go if you do evacuate. usually you have a coastal storm

you go 10 miles inland this might be a case where you go 15e economics of that are extreme as well. want to point out a couple things obviously the storm came onshore last night. last couple satellite images jogged this thing a little bit off to the right instead of to the left most of our model guidance has been thinking we'll go to the left. i don't know if that's exactly what's happening but it could make a difference in 20 or 30 miles difference in one direction or the other and that could cause a difference inexact ly who gets how much rain want to point out one other thing. tornado warning right now around brian, texas so where you have when you have a landfall and hurricane you always have some tornadoes especially off to the right of that. far away from the center tornado concerns this morning. take a look here at the evolution. this is the last three days of this storm. it was a tropical storm and very quickly became a hurricane and then a major hurricane. i will tell you the national weather service did such a great job on this one nailing the landfall location about three days out and for about two days out calling for a major hurricane, category 3 close to

category 4 so impressive work with how good they did. we're getting better at forecasting all the time which you certainly love to see it helps keep people out of harms way to give them that kind of notice. very heavy rain though still falling at the center of this. heavy rain also falling in the outer bands, that's the outer bands is what's going to keep places like houston under the flood threat but in the short-term so the storm came onshore around rockport, over towards port levaka, victoria, texas earlier today had a report of 16 inches of rain still getting heavy rain and you get the idea if you already have those kinds of rainfall totals and we have four to five days that's why we are watching incredible rainfall totals these models have been so consistently putting up these numbers that seem unbelievable to us that when you see the model run day in day out we're about four days where we've seen these kinds of numbers we start to have more faith in those numbers so get ready especially where the storm came onshore but you get far away from this towards the

houston area still a lot of rain one good piece if there's any good piece it's for louisiana where we thought the storm might trend farther towards the east, that would have brought your rainfall totals up in louisiana, maybe into that 8-12-inch range. i don't think we're going to see that. that's certainly good news for the folks in louisiana but the bad part guys is now all of that is certainly looks like at this point or most of it is going to stay in texas causing the flooding there. >> todd: back and forth if you think about it a number of years ago with katrina people being evacuated to houston to the astrodome and having to stay there and many of those people now currently live in houston and never went back. >> reporter: so true and one last thing about three weeks ago remember the flooding we had in new orleans from a big thunderstorm they had right there that brought nine inches of rain causing incredible flooding. it's a great thing if we don't get this moisture in to the new orleans area at least great for new orleans. >> abby: rick you've been stellar all morning long. casey stegal is live in galveston texas where he's been

all night and morning long this is a place that is unfortunately used to hurricanes. we're seeing a lot more rain where you are and a lot of people without power this morning. >> reporter: you're right about that. the national weather service just issued a flash flood warning for the galveston area. you can see why. you know how everyone's iphones and mobile phones get the emergency alerts? they all went off in unison not long ago alerting us to this and this is what we're talking about when we say it is a two prong threat. you initially had landfall and the danger with the winds and the storm surge but the really big story is rick and griff jenkins and matt final of our colleagues stationed up and down the coast have been talking about is the threat of flooding. this is why, because the ground is saturated and you just will have this for days and days according to all of the forecast

models, so it doesn't take long for it to start filling up roadways and things like that very quickly. if there is a good bit of news in galveston where we are is that they do have a whole lot of experience doing this and a lot of the buildings and we've shown you video from here we have shot , homes up on stills and everything is elevated as much as it can be so that when you do have hurricanes and tropical systems they are at least somewhat protected, so you can see live in galveston at this hour the rain is coming down and interestingly the wind has subsided a little bit but we have these bands and it is very intermittent. i sound a little bit like a broken record because we've been talking about this since yesterday. when these bands move in, it is pretty intense and you've got intense rainfall, intense wind, and then it's really strange it might do this for 10 minutes and then it lets up and it will be

looking as if it's almost clear ing almost but you might go an hour without rain and then it comes down really hard again like we're experiencing now so it's hit and miss and it's going to be touch and go for the next several days, again big picture here national weather service at the national hurricane center advising us this flooding potential won't move out of here until at least tuesday and that could be devastating for people who are already water logged. scott? >> todd: live for us in galveston texas. a lot of people worry that would have been ground zero but people are tripping to understand where is ground zero? where is the worst hit area and it looks like at this hour that rockport, rockport, texas is ground zero for the worst of this, cell phone towers down, crews trying to get there and they can't almost impassable to try to get there, cell phone

towers so people don't have cell service of course power outages and this is the big story of the day what happens in rockport, texas could be the story of the day as we start to assess it. no one is there yet. we can't get any images out of that area. >> abby: these hurricanes to your point are so hard to predict exactly where the eye of the storm is going to ultimately make landfall. it's liking like as you said rockport is where it has been most of the night. this is video we got in this morning we're just getting it in in the past hour or two because there is zero cell service in rockport, this is video of the fairfield inn. this is a news crew just walking down a hallway there. you can see the towels. just the damage that is done inside the walls of this hotel. we have outside footage as well of the fairfield inn that shows the damage of the stuff taken off the walls of the hotel just from the strength of the wind. you can see it right there. the damage that has been done this is just one video. how many will come in throughout the day we haven't received yet

is because we don't have cell service. >> todd: satellites get that info up to us from local news stations so think about all of the other videos and stuff we will see as this show unfolds over the next few hours and keep it here on fox news. >> clayton: to abbey's points the difference of a few miles one way or another can mean the difference of you having a house when you get back and not. >> reporter: think about everyone. coming up texas lieutenant governor dan patrick will join us live with an update on the state's response. >> todd: and president trump is up and tweeting about hurricane harvey this morning from camp david as he faces his first natural disaster as president. it's always a test for a new administration a live report from washington on that straight ahead.

♪ it's a highly contagious disease that can be really serious... especially for my precious new grandchild. it's whooping cough. every family member, including those around new babies, should talk to their doctor or pharmacist about getting vaccinated. you're searching for something. whoooo. like the perfect deal... ...on the perfect hotel. so wouldn't it be perfect if...

....there was a single site... ...where you could find the... ...right hotel for you at the best price? there is. because tripadvisor now compares... ...prices from over 200 booking... ...sites ...to save you up to 30%... ...on the hotel you want. trust this bird's words. tripadvisor. the latest reviews. the lowest prices.

>> todd: 15 minutes after the

hour now we want to show you this picture sent to us by our crew there in houston. griff jenkins, aj hall you see a number of cars under water there at least the bottom halfs are and just underscores the nature of the flooding that you see in houston as griff mentioned multiple times throughout the morning it is an area once it's past one inch of water on the ground is prone to severe flooding. >> abby: i was just reading a wall street journal article this morning about why houston is so prone to flooding in recent years and they were saying how the ground most of it is made up of clay. so it doesn't absorb the water which makes it really hard when eve an inch of rain gets in that part of texas and we're expect ing maybe up to 24 inches from what we've heard. >> clayton: sand and clay doesn't have like the new jersey saturation where it rains every day and you could be fine so this is also president trump's first major national disaster and a test of his young administration. ellison barber is live in washington d.c. with more on how the white house is responding to all of this good morning ellison

>> reporter: this is considered a major storm and a major test for a young administration. the first potential test of how they will respond to a natural disaster. one republican already warned president trump not to make the same mistake president bush made with hurricane katrina. president trump replying this morning saying he got the message loud and clear and the administration has "fantastic people on the ground who got there before the hurricane." he ended the tweet by saying so far, so good. the president is at camp david this weekend. his team says he's closely watching the hurricane and president trump reiterated that in another tweet this morning writing in part "we are leaving nothing to chance, city, state, and federal governments working great together." trump signed a disaster declaration yesterday to provide federal aid to texas before the brunt of the storm was expected to hit the state. he also posted a photo from the oval office the white house says it shows trump receiving a

briefing from fema administrator brock long, his chief of staff john kelly and his counterterrorism advisor tom foster. foster says the president and his team are coordinating with local officials but people really need to listen to those local officials in order to stay safe. >> i'm telling you from my own personal experience it's important in every emergency and i've been through a lot of them to remind people to listen to their state and local officials because inevitably people don't and they end up thinking they wish they had so you have nothing to lose but your life. >> reporter: the white house says president trump is going to visit texas and they're making plans for a trip early next week abbey, todd, late or? >> reporter: ellison barber live for us. >> todd: coming up next texas lieutenant governor dan patrick will join us live. >> abby: curt the cyber guy learns how to predict the impact of major storms after he was trapped in hurricane katrina. he joins us with the life saving text you need to know right now. stay with us.

o shops' fall hunt, the biggest hunting show and sale of the year. (male announcer) hey, it's time for great deals on great gear! plus, weekends during the classic, you can get up to a $100 instant rebate on select gear when you purchase with your bass pro shops mastercard. it's just a burst pipe, i co(laugh) it. no. with claim rateguard your rates won't go up just because of a claim. i totally could've - no! switching to allstate is worth it. what was the worst thing don't you get lonely? have you ever killed anybody? ♪ what did you think when i asked you these questions? i had never met anybody from the navy that's why i was, like, asking you all kinds of questions. yeah. i honestly didn't know what the marines did. everybody's experience is unique. you got musicians, you have cooks, you have admin people. ♪ i just think people should be more open minded. just get to know the person. ♪

live-streat the airport.e sport binge dvr'd shows while painting your toes. on demand laughs during long bubble baths. tv on every screen is awesome. the xfinity stream app. all your tv at home.

the most on demand your entire dvr. top networks. and live sports on the go. included with xfinity tv. xfinity, the future of awesome. >> todd: well the eye of this storm would fall on corpus christi texas it didn't but that doesn't mean that it didn't also face enormous devastation there. overnight at 2:30 in the morning large house catching on fire, fire crews responding trying to keep other houses there right near the water from catching on fire and they did contain it but this is just some of the devastation that we're already seeing in corpus christi texas overnight. >> abby: that's in padre island right as you said where corpus christi is. that's where they thought the eye of the storm was going to be rockport has seen probably some of the most devastating things happen to that part of texas. we want to now bring in joining us on the phone lieutenant government under of that state of texas dan patrick.

lieutenant governor good to have you with us. unfortunately under these circumstances i have no doubt you've been up all night what can you tell us this morning? >> good morning. well first of all i want to thank our brave responders, our fire and police, whether it's the state level, highway patrol or at the county level or at the city level. they're risking their lives to help others and also from a state level at a county level, in a short period of time, abbey and todd and clayton, the state was able to ramp up very quickly you know, we have been through this many times before. not storms that will bring us 30 or 40 inches of rain every day. that's a large amount of rain some areas may get more and not a storm that will stay onshore this long but we've been through many floods and many storms over the time and our people at every level are very qualified, very prepared. the governor was on top of this, very early. you know you have to remember

that last weekend, skies were sunny along the coastal areas, there was this tropical depression over the yucatan that everyone thought was going into the gulf and it turned into a tropical depression headed this way, it grew very rapidly as you all know and so it was a very short period of time. also want to thank the white house. i know that the governor and the president have talked and the president has offered the governor whatever has been requested and they have been on top of this as well, so we are as prepared and as coordinated as we can possibly be. no one can handle this, texas- sized storm better than texas; however we're going to have a long week ahead of us with massive flooding, unprecedented in some areas and this storm quite frankly and i know from your own meteorologist and all of our state folks are looking at this, this is still very unpredictable for the next several days so all of the people of this area for our folks in the coastal areas and from the coastal the way to san

antonio which is about a couple hundred miles from houston to san antonio another couple hundred miles you're talking about a massive area of hundreds and hundreds of thousands of homes and a million plus people just in the major area and then if you get into total houston you're talking about millions of people that's san antonio. this is going to be hitting people today, tomorrow, monday, tuesday, wednesday, some areas very hard some areas not so hard but everyone will get a lot of rain. >> clayton: dan i have to ask you about rockport. as a news crew we've been trying to get information out of rock port. cell towers down there is very difficult and we have some images we were able to get from local news crews in that area but very minimal at this hour and it seems like that is the big story rockport, texas as perhaps ground zero for the damage. what are you hearing from the state level as far as emergency crews getting into that area. what are you hearing about the damage there that we cannot get

from cell phone coverage? >> reporter: well of course communication is difficult everywhere, that sums it up now for several hours, making it a little safer for people to try to travel in and also beginning to get images out, but the state along with our count itches now will respond to those areas and of course they have to assess the damage for themselves but as they make requests, governor abbott put about 700 of our guard on alert and really there wasn't a specific spot to send everyone, we knew the general area of course where the storm was going to hit corpus or rock port. we kind of narrowed that in the last 24 hours but they're staged so that they can respond where as needed and they will respond appropriately where needed. it's the same thing with the flooding. look, we have some of our rivers west of houston, columbus, texas , they've already had seven or eight inches of rain in some areas. right now east of houston again

that's over 200 miles roughly 200 miles from rockport, east of houston now getting three to four inches of rain an hour in areas. so when you see these forecasts of 25 and 30 inches of rain it's cumulative over several days. >> todd: speaking of houston we'll go to a reporter dan patrick thank you very much lieutenant governor the state of texas appreciate you taking the time on a very busy morning for you. let's go back to houston griff jenkins live in houston with the latest on the situation there and griff, we saw your shot earlier of cars flooded out i don't imagine that situation is getting any better. >> reporter: certainly not. let me just show you the pictures we're in that same location of keegan's bayou in southwest houston and in this parking lot you'll see four cars submerged in that parking lot but the big problem everyone warned about and we're just at the very beginning of what is expected to be a imagine or

catastrophic flooding event for the city of houston is a road just like this just off the southwest freeway, best belford road. a major thoroughfare we haven't seen anyone go through because we believe this to be at least over a foot. guys, just look over here at this car. this black car. it is literally at least a foot and a half if not two feet under water. granted, that is a parking lot and we can see from the terrain to get perspective if you have a low lying parking lot something like this is going to flood but the road is the story. this is what they feared was going to start playing out. this is going to cause major problems for the city. when they compare we've heard it before the comparison to tropical storm allison in 2001 and the damage it inflicted 23 deaths in texas and some $10 billion worth of damage, this is the very beginning. we are expecting these bands from harvey to keep coming through and keep causing

situations just like this and we've heard at least now 15 high water areas across this area. we're going to keep searching for you guys. >> abby: this is a city that's not built for rain. griff jenkins live in houston. we'll check back shortly thank you so much. >> todd: the heavy rain from hurricane harvey starting to slam texas right now and it's only going to get worse as you saw with griff. our team coverage on the ground continues next. we'll be right back. day 13. if only this were as easy as saving $600

when you switch to progressive. winds stirring. too treacherous for a selfie. [ camera shutter clicks ] sure, i've taken discounts to new heights with safe driver and paperless billing. but the prize at the top is worth every last breath. here we go. [ grunts ] got 'em. ahh. wait a minute. whole wheat waffles? [ crying ] why!

>> todd: 33 minutes after the hour there we're looking at a shot there of corpus christi you can see a tree uprooted, for the very latest we go to fox 26s steven morgan he is live there in corpus christi with the very latest on the ground. steven? >> reporter: yeah, good morning. we have some wind still blowing here. we have the rain that's continued to fall and in fact it's lightened up a little bit but that wind still how els and as the sun has risen we're getting a first look at the damage in corpus christi. we're actually at a t head. it's a local restaurant actually that you can see the corpus christi bay and if we want to pan over and just see some of the damage done here at the land ers shrimp and seafood house as they call it, some debris

scattered on the ground here. also some glass has been shattered. when those winds came at about 130 miles per hour, just yesterday as hurricane harvey landed and really pummeled the coast just north of corpus christi, we still saw a lot of the damage. you can see the roof here completely torn off just sort of the frame left, the canopy and the covering was tossed about 50 to a hundred yards out to sea close to out to sea just near the beach and as we still stand here just this morning, this afternoon that wind continues to howell, and people have been out checking their boats seeing damage done and i'm sure there will be quite a bit of damage they have to pick up but a category 4 storm making landfall last night at about 10. we still feel those winds, its since been downgraded as its made its way inland. now we just have that rain and

flooding to deal with. here in corpus christi though we are dry. we're just going to have a long cleanup ahead of us. >> abby: steven can you give us a sense corpus christi where you are was supposed to be the eye of the storm. it's really hard to predict what happens with these hurricanes and where they go. it has moved up the coast. rockport, texas is really seems to be hit the hardest. they've totally lost cell service but where you are though in corpus christi has it pretty much been evacuated? is there anyone out and about? what does it seem like? >> reporter: well slowly but surely yes people are starting to come out actually the hotel we were staying at lost power and there are a few residents who actually escaped that live closer to the coast. they moved inland too to try to stay away from where the brunt of the storm is experiencing and we're going to make the attempt, we're going to risk and try to go up to rockport later this afternoon because i know there is a lot of damage up here but down here in corpus christi, people are slowly getting out and just assessing the damage that has happened because of

hurricane harvey. >> abby: looking at it this morning tough for a lot of people there steven thank you so much. fox 28. >> todd: let's get down to rick now whose been tracking the storm and rick as we look at the map in front of you there on the floor and we see the different ways in which this thing is spin ning, where can we expect to see the most rain? i always get confused is it the bottom side of the hurricane? is it the top part of the hurricane, what area is it? >> not all hurricanes are created equal so they don't all behave in the same fashion. anywhere closest to the center is where it's going to be and likely to the right of it because that's where we will have the feeder bands that continue to be pulling in. the south side of it towards corpus christi is going to get a lot of rain over the next couple of days but if you go just kind of south towards kingsville beyond that i think you're mostly going to be dry. i want to show you so talk about the forecast and forecasting has come a long way in the last couple of years. thursday morning, this is what the national hurricane center put out of a forecast and we always say don't follow the exact line but if you do follow

this exact line to landfall, that's where it made landfall about five to 10 miles off of that center spot so the nhc is getting very very good and they even are getting better at strength forecasting and they were forecasting a major hurricane category 3 almost to a category 4 and that's what it was. also this year guys we have new satellite imagery because of the satellite that launched last fall. take a look at this image a couple hours before it made landfall you'll see the center of the storm the eye that was about to go over rockport. rockport is the town we're talking about it was just on the left side of it so they got very strong winds but they were in the center of the eye so they had that experience of going outside and having calm conditions for that little bit. here is the setup we have now you've got this high pressure off towards the north and that's going to block it and we talked about on models we look at and sometimes talk about spaghetti plots this is that. because sometimes it looks like spaghetti. all of the different models just meandering this thin all around the area and if you look at the end of the lines that's thursday

morning. you get the idea here we are saturday morning. we've got another five to six days of this storm in the same area. that's why we expect to see the rainfall totals so high. it's because of the rotation these things rotate counterclockwise so the center of it has the worst of the rain at this point but these bands that come up and will continue to get pulled up into that rotation, that's where we will see the raining of the thunderstorms for hours at times and sometimes we'll see maybe three to four inches of rain and then clear out a little bit and another band feeds back into the same spots. overall once you put all of this together, the rainfall totals are extreme for some and model outputs continue to be scary to be honest with you alarming to see these amounts in the 50-inch range. certainly we'll see spots well over 40 inches where that is hard to say but a big swath that are going to be over two feet of rain and that's why this flooding will be extensive and very damaging for the people who are right in the path, guys.

>> abby: wow okay live for us thank you, rick. >> todd: rob schmidt has been live for us this morning trying to get into rockport, texas earlier this morning but cell towers down it was too impassable to drive, barely able to drive and had to turn around and head back. rob where are you right now and what are you seeing? >> reporter: well we just came back into corpus christi just to get you guys some of this video. nothing special about where i am right now i don't know if we get a signal to send it to you but what we saw was category 4 hurricane. we saw what the eye of that storm can do the most dangerous part of the storm a lot of flooding we had downed power lines, leveled homes. let's play some of that video we'll show you the highlight ree l. we're coming up in rockport, texas this is ground zero for the storm that you can see this is a category 4 hurricane and this is the damage it can cause. we hope and pray that nobody was in this house because this is really terrible. this is complete devastation here and another one right over here a number of homes we've seen these as we've driven down

this main drag this is market street through rockport. it's a small town maybe 10,000 people and we're just about a mile from the water that way and the eye wall came right through here and we're expecting to see more devastation like this and a lot of water. there's so much water even parts of the freeway that we took in here would be under water for a good quarter to a half a mile. we saw just completely under water a lot of water, a lot of wind. this is a category 4 hurricane. >> reporter: we're back now we have another one that we have if we can play it. i'm not sure if we have it but we have one from downtown on market street which we don't have that one just yet. we're working on it right now but you can see some of the devastation there. that home just completely leveled. we saw a couple of cars near that house too. we hope that nobody was there at the time and to be honest with you i don't think anybody has gotten to there yet so back to

you in the studio. >> todd: rob what did you see in rockport? emergency crews out we were asking the lieutenant governor a new minutes ago about rockport because it seems like that is ground zero and with cell towers down communication people taking to twitter to try to tell people that i'm here, maybe i'm even stuck. i need help what did you see as you were driving through the streets there, emergency crews and otherwise? >> reporter: we saw two rockport volunteer fire trucks move through. they looked like vintage fire trucks and that was it. it honestly felt like we were the first people that had come through in some ways. let's show you that scene from market street. this is kind of like the central part of rockport. >> it's 8:00 in the morning and getting slammed by this storm here in rockport. this is where the eye came through and this is the epi center of the storm and look here behind me you can see this traffic light completely spun around by the heavy wind and here a tree in the middle of the

intersection and just debris everywhere. metal pieces and sticks every where back here behind us. that's a trailer in the middle of the intersection and across the street you can see this gas station that got ripped apart by the high wind and that dangling traffic light and this shows you the impact of a category 4 storm . and we saw a lot of flooding as well. we had to drive threw two feet of water in some places just to get through it so a real mess and we didn't really even scratch the surface of that town we went down market street and had to hustle back to get this stuff on television for the show there was no cell phone service just a mess in that area. we'll go back in and see what else we find. >> abby: rob just the winds. i mean the speed of the winds what it must have been to knock over the size of those trees and it looked like an rv was turned over. you were feeling that wind. how hard was it?

>> reporter: oh, yeah here in corpus christi it just seems like it would be a bad day to play golf where i'm standing but you go 20 miles that way even right now and i mean the sustained winds were so much more powerful. it was what felt like a constant 80-mile an hour wind it was incredible and the difference it can make in a small distance was something else. it's really bad in rockport that's where the story is the next few days. >> clayton: rob schmidt live in corpus christi great work and please stay safe. you know, you see these images at this point coming out now and you are realizing that's someone 's home, that's someone's memories, that's everything they've worked for probably in that home and just now the human toll really sad to see. >> abby: absolutely. well, coming up hurricane harvey expected to be the most devastating storm to hit texas in decades. what will the economic toll be? trish reagan is here to discuss all of that with us on the couch , next.

>> todd: welcome back as communities pick up the pieces in the wake of hurricane harvey, what will the economic toll be? joining us now is the host of the intelligence report on fox business trish reagan and she always raises the intelligence on this. >> trish: thank you for that. >> todd: good to see you there and flattery always gets you. $40 billion could be the economic impact of hurricane harvey in that region. oil refineries, all of the trucks that are going in and out of that region goods and services, what do you think are the broader implications of this >> trish: typically there is a huge economic impact and a lot of economists tell you it's a wash at the end of the day because as long as stuff gets rebuilt it's okay. you think about hurricane sandy in new york in this area it cost somewhere in the vicinity of 60 to $65 billion but guess what everything was rebuilt and so there wasn't really the economic toll that otherwise you would have. you compare that, guys to say something like hurricane katrina

and you've got areas there in the lower ninth ward that were never rebuilt and parts of new orleans that just will never be populated the way they once were , so that cost roughly 120 or 125 billion and it's unclear that they will ever recoup those losses, so really, it's going to depend on the community. when you talk about texas and you talk about those oil refineries, i can guarantee you those oil companies are going to make sure those refineries are back up and working very soon and they have insurance for this and so they will be able to shoulder this kind of loss in a way that the poor person loses their house in new orleans simply can't. >> clayton: well some of the issues here the people face too is they may not have named storm coverage and being able to pick up the pieces of their lives. half the time some people may have flood insurance or flood coverage but they don't have named storm coverage so companies get to pick and choose who they're going to cover. we saw this with hurricane katrina. oh, you were flooded but it wasn't hurricane insurance and

then the federal government had to step in. >> trish: it was terrible and by the way when you have to rely on the federal government to step in that's not a good thing. i can remember i covered hurricane katrina in its aftermath and seeing all of these fema trailers lined up, hundreds of them in parking lots and then i'd go and talk to people who were desperate to get a fema trailer and they couldn't get one and there was this real disconnect, the total bureaucracy you can imagine of the federal government trying to get these resources and aid to the people and that's where the break down comes in. i would argue that the companies and the private sector does it a whole lot better, but then you have to deal with the companies that are going to try and get out of some of these things. it's very challenging in these events about when it's that destructive and you need to to rely on the federal government for help. it's always scary. >> abby: trish reagan always good to have you with us. >> trish: thank you. good to see you. >> abby: there's a lot of news

we've been following all morning long. i want to bring you other headlines we're watching closely starting with this one several right wing alley rallies forced off the street in an effort to avoid violence. organizers with the group patriot prayer canceling rallies in san francisco and berkeley saying they didn't want to attract groups of white nationalists who would only promote racism and this comes after one person was killed in slashes several weeks ago in charlottesville. >> abby: and the most talked about fight in years in just hours away. boxer floyd mayweather coming out of retirement to battle it out with usc fighter conor mcgregor. mayweather looking to earn his 50th career win against mcgregor who will be making his pro boxing debut. the action begins tonight 9:00 p.m. eastern at the t-mobile arena in las vegas. >> todd: but let's be clear it's 9:00 p.m. eastern but that fight won't start until like midnight right? just when we're waking up? >> abby: will you be up? [laughter] >> clayton: well the sun is ris ing in texas and we're getting our first look at the

damage done by harvey from raging fires due to the heavy end to the heavy floods.

>> todd: six minutes before the top of the hour now let's go live once again to griff jenkins in houston where the flooding is growing by the minute. griff? >> reporter: guys i just moved off the main rode i was showing you hpd houston police department trying to assess what to do. they have these high water rescue vehicles ready to go, perhaps coming at some point if someone gets in trouble but very quickly i want to just give you that dynamic of the anatomy of what's happening here. if you look far and see that running water, it looks more like a river.

that is keegans bayou. that is a small river small stream keegans bayou and it normally runs it has crested by at least a foot there and its flow to cross this grassy area that's not normally the bayou would be dry into this parking lot coming all the way back across into the cars that we showed you flooding and in just beyond that, beyond the check cashing store, that was the rode belford that we were on that's literally shutdown for at least two blocks heading in that direction, so this is the scene that is going to be playing out all across houston, we're still in the southwest area, but this is what they're looking at and if we get more of these bands for several days it's going to be a major problem. >> todd: thanks, griff we've also got more video coming in from rob schmidt in rockport, texas ground zero area. >> abby: near there that was apparently the eye of the storm

overnight. >> clayton: look at that. >> abby: this is coming in from rob schmidt down on the ground as clayton was saying he's now in corpus christi but you can see there the damage of the heavy winds, what they were capable of doing. people now coming out this morning waking up as the sun has come up they're able to see the damage that it caused to where they live, to everything they own. i mean this is just heart breaking to see as we are all waking up this morning and getting a better sense of how hurricane harvey has already impacted so many lives on the ground in texas that is in rockport, texas. we'll be back right after this with more fox & friends. for your heart... your joints... or your digestion... so why wouldn't you take something for the most important part of you... your brain. with an ingredient originally found in jellyfish, prevagen is now the number one selling brain health supplement

in drug stores nationwide. prevagen. the name to remember.

>> todd: welcome back. heart breaking images coming in now from rockport, texas near rockport, texas moments ago, people coming out waking up walking outside their trailers seeing devastation. these are the first images from rockport, texas what we thought would be the headline of the day

the major devastation ground zero, hurricane harvey, keep it here to fox news channel throughout the day for updates. >> abby: we'll see you right back here tomorrow morning. >> clayton: cost of freedom is live right now. the pause that is not necessarily refreshing welcome everybody i'm neil cavuto, fox under texas under siege as hurricane harvey un^ leashes all sorts of hell. here is what we know right now. harvey is a category 1 storm and it is still packing a lot of winds and heavy rains, several areas are under tornado and flood warnings better than a dozen texas counties in fact, dramatic pictures are showing buildings on fire, houses on fires, others that are collapsing so authorities are warning the worst may yet be to come with potentially devastating floods which tends to be a rule of thumb with hurricanes of this magnitude. so i'm asking to say that the damage early on they're pegging at