speak of the strongest storm to ever there in west louisiana and north texas coastline. laura is a category four, nearly five which is as powerful as it gets, sustained winds and gusts to 185, whipping a wide stretch of the golf coast, bringing a wall of water and a long wide path of destruction and grieve over the coming days, weeks, and months. >> people need to heed the warnings they've been given and to evacuate.

if you think you are safe because you made it through we set in southwest louisiana, understand the storm is going to be more powerful. >> and early warning from the governor of louisiana resonating across the south as b29 years shore with potentially catastrophic and life-threatening winds and storm surge be i'm rick leventhal with the most powerful hurricane to strike the u.s. so far this year. its danger has not been understated by forecasters using the term "under survivable on survivable," apotential walld capable of wiping out entire communities along the louisiana surge line. she's been on our radar for days, but it's but mueller increased from a tropical storm to category four is rare. with flash flood warnings.

swarms of tornadoes also at risk. at least 20 million people are in the storm's path. more than half a million ordered to evacuate. most have heeded the warnings but some have not. with the ongoing danger of the coronavirus, shelter is not as easy to find. flood warnings are being issued as far north as kentucky, but texas, louisiana also on the front lines of this monstrous storm and are now starting to see the worst of it. tens of thousands of homes already in the dark and laura has yet to make official and follow. legal invader is standing by in lake charles, louisiana, in the center of the storm's path. tell us what it's like in this hour. >> hey, rick. that i wall, we are about 12-15 miles of the eye passing over us. so far, the highest is

105-108 miles per hour. it's unpleasant to stand out here, the sandblast effect of the wind. a pretty fast-moving storms of the words we are hearing is catastrophic and unsurvivable don't necessarily come from the winds if you are able to take shelter but from the storm surge, you can't really take shelter from. that's what we are seeing come up here. they are talking about a 15-20 feet of storm surge which would come out the just about here. this is one of the highest parts of lake charles, louisiana. talk about 500,000 people who have evacuated, many of them will have their homes underwater. those did not evacuate are going to have to face a very, very uncertain predicament here over the next 12-18 hours as the waters continue to rise, which they will, and the winds continue here for about six or eight hours from daybreak. the coast guard is not going to be able to go out for their search and rescue until the

winds died down below 45 miles per hour, same with the sheriff's office. with the intensity of laura grew over the last 12-24 hours especially, there wasn't time, officials say, issuing the kind of warnings to get people moving as quickly as they should to higher ground. in many parts of lake charles, there isn't higher ground to go to. you watch the storm surge really intensified. we want to keep in mind that there is a silver lining, 30 miles of bayou is between us and where laura came ashore so that a bit of time for the wind thes to die down from the 150-160 range we were hearing, now down to 115-130 as it'll be here in the next hour of so. somewhere along the lines, rick, i've lost the communications link between austin to you, so i'll toss it back to you now. >> rick: hang on to the offense and will get to you

multiple times over the next couple of hours. the national weather center calling laura destructive, a catastrophic storm surge of 20 feet or more capable of swamping entire communities. the cat four with sustained winds near and 150 miles per hour. it's the most powerful hurricane to strike the u.s. this year and the strongest to ever hit that region. perhaps the best source of information on this storm is the director of the national hurricane center ken graham. we appreciate you staying late for us and we appreciate the crew staying late as well. tell us about the latest forecast, first of all. speak of the latest forecast here, we are still seeing 160 miles per hour winds. we see this continuing to move inland, still a tropical storm. tomorrow evening and also to thursday morning through friday morning, still a tropical storm up to arkansas. it's not just their coastal

situation. trees down, heavy rain, flooding as far as down as arkansas. >> rick: the hundreds and thousands have evacuated because the communities but far too many have stood their ground in the ground could be potentially be gone in the next couple of hours. >> you look at this radar here and you think about the hundred 50-mile-per-hour winds right around the iowa wall, we've got the 700-mile you are just getting thesebandse of the storm surge. think about the 15-foot of water and waves on top of that. that's just extreme. that's what we talk about with on survivable. a dangerous information. rick just handed to me too a brand-new information in our advisory, we just had ran down my clan follow. we've got the center of the point, we just had landfall of hurricane laura. >> rick: i witnessed the aftermath of the surge of

katrina along the gulf coast which threatened the pretty much everything in its path. i don't want to overstate the danger here. we know where the storm is heading is not nearly as populated as the mississippi gulf coast, but how bad could this be for folks who are living down there? >> any of these structures, you think about the hurricane force wings, that's damaging enough. it's the storm surge, the deadly part of these tropical systems. it's just a force of water. think about all the wind blew relist pushing on the waters in the well inland, north of i-10 in certain areas. think about that, it's destructive. even the storm surge can destroy houses and structures but just an incredibly dangerous situation for all those folks. >> rick: this storm was a tropical storm less than 24 hours ago. how did it strengthen so fast? >> all the perimeters were just ripe. think about all the ingredients that have to come together especially for that rapid

intensification. the gulf of mexico, plenty of warmth, the structure was perfect, the upper portions of the storms of the warm water could be the storm, the air comes up and feeds over the top. everything has to come together. getting a storm just like this. >> rick: i know this was predicted to be a very active hurricane season. it appears to be that. and we aren't done yet, are we? >> we haven't even hit the peak of the hurricane season and we are already using the m names. we have to be prepared for the rest of the season. we are well on our way. >> rick: we hope people heeded your warnings, ken graham. we appreciate you staying up late for us, sir. >> thank you. >> rick: to port arthur, texas, were mandatory evacuation order has been infected since since that tuesday afternoon. ordering massive c 1:30 one planes to help residents leave safely. port arthur sits west

of residen hurricane laura's pa. how are things going? >> we just lost power in our hotel at port arthur. 25 minutes ago. as a matter of fact, the winds, the gusts are as high as been gone this far. the golden triangle, about 50 miles away from that western eye wall. but you can see the big concern here in the southeastern part of texas is actually the wind because of the direction in which hurricane laura to look with that i. that's what they are hoping, the storm surge is a bigger issue were lee linde is. let's talk about the power loss. one of the few things you can see here is the oil refineries. you can see them lighting up the sky in the back. that is big here. this is gas country and the largest oil refinery in the country is right here in port arthur. again, there was a mandatory evacuation in the five counties around this area. the authorities told us that

they don't believe as many people as they would've like left. they're concerned about the storm particularly right now, about flooding in orange which is part of the golden triangle, about 15 miles north of us, particularl may be the water coming in from louisiana and the cameron parish actually moving east to west into the southeastern part of louisiana. that's a concern there in orange, right here in fort archer, the concern is this wind. we could be seeing a an extreme wind advisory given to all of our phones as a warning to everybody here in port arthur. these are some winds, we have not seen in quite a long time. they are used to flooding here. they went to hurricane harvey. they went through tropical storm nilda. they went to hurricane ike. it was a mandatory evacuation particularly because this city

is only 7 feet above ground in terms of its low level. they are concerned about this window. there it goes kicking in right now. they really ask people to abide by that because these when thes as that eye wall makes its way on, a little bubble to the left and we could be in the western d that's a whole different situation. you talk about a difference in miles here between the difference what we could be feeling. we are 50 miles west of where leland is going for the brunt of this, but people clear in port arthur, many people, tens of thousands, in and around this area in texas already without power. the storm is making its way on right now. rick? >> rick: all right. try to stay dry for a few minutes. we'll get back with you with an update in about 20 minutes from now. forecast warnings are one thing.

the reality of the storm is another and sometimes these storms don't live up to the hype why in every hurricane some choose to ignore the evacuation orders in an attempt to ride out the storm. that's happening in texas even though just three years ago hurricane harvey caused catastrophic flooding and many deaths. >> when they said it's going to be a category, going to end up being a category four and there is a possibility we would be in the eye, i was kind of scared. with harvey come up we went through it with harvey. it's like, let's go, let's get out of here. >> rick: joining us now is the lieutenant governor of texas, dan patrick. lieutenant governor, thanks for being with us. >> hello, rick. >> rick: we understand there are more than thousands of members of the texas guard to help out with a hurricane response and looks like they could be for a few busy days or weeks perhaps?

>> the biggest result of the storm will be in the aftermath all the power that is lost. we could still as the weather meteorologist said earlier, this storm could still be a tropical storm all the way up to tyler, texas, or marshall, texas, a couple of hundred miles up north where the storm is right now. when you go to the area and this is a heavily wooded area for ease texas and most of these countries, you have lots of trees down from a lot a lot of power down, takes a while to get in there to chop up the trees, get the power lines off the road, the governor in iowa being there as soon as we can tomorrow morning to examine the damage in that area. but that's going to be the biggest issue. our biggest fear as you talked about was a loss of life because of people not leaving and as you just heard, a matter of 10 miles, a 15-mile wobble of the eye to determine if you lost your home, lost your business, or lost your life.

louis has louisiana will be hit harder than texas but texas will have a lot of damage and it still coming. it can wobble more west and do more damage here. very concerned about lost of life. the biggest recovery will be getting the power back it when it's 95 degrees and high humidity for a couple of weeks you don't have power? that's a tough next couple of weeks for everyone involved. >> rick: i was there three years ago, lieutenant governor, for harvey in east texas and i saw so much of it underwater. it was incredible. i guess you are a little better off this time because the storm has jogged a little bit to your east, but are you prepared for the potential for more catastrophic damage this time around? >> it's very early. we will know when we get there when the sun comes up and we can get up in the air and take a look at the area.

rick, we are as prepared as you could possibly be. we've been through so many of these and we have a thousand national guard ready. we have buses to get people to get out when we can get them to land. we will have the coast guard. we will have air. people with boats. a lot of these people have boats. they will get down to the water and they'll get the houses with people up on the roof. if the storm surge stays more in louisiana than texas, we don't want to see anything bad happen to anyone but that was a concern of ours, a city like port arthur being washed away with a 20-foot surge. it's very early, so we'll see what this looks like tomorrow. we are very prepared for it. the people of texas working together. during harvey, when you go in a boat to rescue someone off the roof, you don't care if they are a liberal or conservative or if you're in a boat liberal or conservative, it doesn't matter. texas strong, texas one, everyone comes together.

hopefully not a loss of life, a lot of loss we could have seen, hopefully not in louisiana either. think about this, rick, if the storm goes easter further out west, you have a cat four or five going into new orleans or houston and that would've been one of the large disasters in american history had happened. this is the biggest storm that hit us in modern times. we don't want anyone to suffer. >> just a few seconds left. your message to residents tonight who are still home? >> if you don't have power, you decide to hang it or a generator, the propane is cranking it, stay where you are. you surely don't want to go out. totally dark right now. if you didn't leave, it's time to hang and get to the highest level you can because you don't know what's going to be happening in the next several hours and the storm should move through quickly by 6:00, 7:00 in the morning the worst of it. if you are there, hang in and texas will be there to help you. your fellow texans will be there to help you. we will do all you can to get the power on as fast as you can and to get the area cleaned up

and get back to living again like we always do after every storm. i'm always amazed, rick, how people come together. they clean up, will be out cleaning up debris tomorrow morning in the 95 degrees heat. >> rick: lieutenant governor dan patrick, we appreciate your time tonight. storms as powerful as hurricanes be 29 don't hit the u.s. is often but officials know the drill, evacuate residents from low-lying areas. equipment, food, water, other resources. as you heard from the lieutenant governor, along with aviation assets and high water vehicles. louisiana deploying even more, 3,000 guardsmen lure less and airmen with 2,000 more standing by. and a couple of high level water vehicles. it could be day or weeks before some evacuated residents could get back home, so what will they find when they get back? fox news chief meteorologist joins us for the latest.

rick? >> i didn't hear your question because they were talking to me at the same time. but i think you are saying when are they going to get back? we've got a long ways to go here. the storm is moving quick. you hardly remember it because all the flooding because the storm stayed in one spot and it rained for so long. 60 inches of rain. this isn't one of those storms which will move much quicker which is good news but because it's coming on shore so strong it's going to take a long time over land before it weekends even before hurricane strength. it's going to be hurricane strength as far up in shreveport. this storm came on shore between cameron louisiana, just about 15-20 minutes ago, pulling off towards north port arthur. on the north side, making a brush with the eye wall, but i do not think you will have much problems. lake charles going to be in the eye wall for a really long period of time. it will begin to weaken now that it's going to lose its moisture source getting out of land, the

center of it getting out to land. take a look at this, and a lot of moisture here, and a lot of wind. lake charles, wind gusts up to 170 miles per hour, not anywhere near the inner eye wall. it's going to get worse for you. because the storm is pulling off a little bit to the northwest, you might stay a little bit more inside the eye wall and lake charles i think for possibly a couple of hours and that'll cause some really big problems. storm surge and lake charles is going to be possibly up to 15 feet. this is the storm surge forecast from the national weather service. anywhere in the red is over 9 feet of storm surge and that goes potentially about 40 miles inland. most of this area along the coast, not a lot of populations. in fact cameron has about 400 people there. hopefully most of them are gone because of the storm surge up to around 20 feet. but you go a little bit of inland and you get towards lake charles, that's where we have a bigger population zone, 75,000 people live there.

going to see areas downtown likely under a really significant flooding, significant water. going to take a while for the water to go down. tornado concerns, going to be with us all night long. tomorrow even as the storm continues to pull off towards the north. as it does, eventually we start to see this getting towards northern louisiana and then into arkansas. that's going to be the two areas where we'll see a lot of rain, about 5-8 inches of rain and probably have winds tropical storm force across areas of northern arkansas where there are a lot of hills, trees, a lot of flooding. >> rick: we'll get to your question next time. folks getting smacked with that powerful cat four hurricane with fears of "unsurvivable 20-foot storm surge." stay with fox news channel as we continue tracking this storm. more with your local fox news as

we stay on the station. guys, are you tired

of frequent nighttime bathroom trips? well, force factor prostate helps reduce urges to urinate, plus fully empty your bladder and promote a normal prostate size. don't settle. choose force factor prostate, from the #1 fastest-growing men's health brand at walmart.

>> rick: the aftermath of hurricane laura could be devastating to homes, businesses, and infrastructure, and repairing the damage could take months if not years. the cost is immeasurable especially in texas and

louisiana. we are joined via skype by stabilization staterepresentative, how is your area, your region prepared to deal with the hard days ahead? >> well, you know, i think we've unfortunately had our fair share of storm impacts over the years. with audrey in '57, al veda 'oh five, and i can '08 we are aware in the days and times we have ahead the road to recovery would deftly be a long one. but i assure you that if there is any group of people who can endure this storm, it in fact it'll be our people in the southwest louisiana who are strong and resilient. this seems to be an unprecedented storm.

but i think that people are certainly looking forward to getting that community back intact. >> rick: do you have any sense of how many people, the percentage of your constituents actually evacuated or heeded the warnings? >> we are local officials, i have to give quite a bit of credit to local elected and appointed officials who worked over the past week very digital diligently to get individuals out. we do not have reports. they were initial discussions of individuals who thought they would want to ride the storm out. but i think for the most part we got our family is out. protect life was the most important thing and it seems that we have a vast majority of individuals who were able to evacuate. yes, sir. >> rick: how are the conditions where you are at right now? >> we are facing some wind and a

little bit of rain. we've gotten some area reports that tides have risen within the town of cameron an hour or so ago. we have fared well up to this point. >> rick: we hope you continue to fare well, sir. i guess it's too soon to know how bad things are going to be but it sounds like you guys are ready to get out there and put things back together when you can. >> i appreciate that. i want to thank everyone across this country for their prayers and their thoughts. we are going to need the support of everyone. as has been mentioned, these are unprecedented impacts. tomorrow when the sun rises, maybe we won't like what we see but we'll have to get there together. >> rick: best of luck to you and everyone down there in south louisiana. state representative, we appreciate your time tonight. get some rest.

you need it. speak all right. >> rick: and you come katrina, hugo, harvey, thus between nine makes the list to tell mike of the strongest hurricanes to make landfall in the u.s. also destroyed the lives of thousands of jewish survivors still suffering today. god calls on people who believe in him to act on his word. "comfort ye, comfort my people." when i come here and i sit with lilia i realize what she needs right now is food. these elderly jews are weak and they're sick. they're living on $2 a day which is impossible. this now, is how god's children are living. take this time to send a survival food box

to these forgotten jews. the international fellowship of christians and jews urgently need your gift of $25 now to help provide one survival food box with all of the essentials they critically need for their diet for one month. no vitamins and no protein so my legs and hands are very weak. oh, oh, oh let's make sure that we bring them just a little bit of hope. by bringing them a little bit of food. become a part of the fellowship today by reaching out to bless these precious people of god. for just $25, you can help supply the essential foods they desperately need for one month. that's less than a dollar a day. i just want to encourage all of you to join with yael eckstein and the wonderful work of the international fellowship of christians and jews.

god tells us to take care of them, to feed the hungry. and i pray holocaust survivors will be given the basic needs that they so desperately pray for to survive. that they so desperately pray for to survive.

>> rick: she is by far the most powerful and dangerous hurricane this country has faced so far this year. a category four storm, laura is bearing down on the coastal communities of louisiana and texas. members of the national guard seen driving school buses around lake charles, louisiana, transporting people to shelters. space in short supply because of the coronavirus threat. leland vittert is an an in lake charles. how are conditions there now? >> i ended up having a huge wall

of glass explode above me. that's the storm, this was built to withstand storms like this and it's taking a beating. we are still probably another 20-30 miles an hour worth of wind gusts before you are going to get the eye wall and that's some of the sheeting being pulled off on the side of his casino and now just getting tossed around, heavy, heavy sheet metal. you can see it's ripping off some of the boarding from one of those windows that they have boarded up and built the plywood facade just earlier today. we are undercover in about 40 or 50 feet back in once the dried-up valet area of this casino. but if you can imagine what it's doing to this casino that is built to withstand a hurricane like this with unlimited funds, imagine what it's doing to people's homes right now. as we said, the eye wall with the strongest winds, the 150-mile-per-hour gusts are

still a long ways off from us, probably a good 30 minutes of this kind of beating that's so much of suddenly saw their louisiana is taking. the storm surge, we are taking in the order of 20 feet of water that could come to this part of lake charles, louisiana. locals who were in the hotel, a lot of them evacuated from the refinery across the way, they sort of just forgot about their homes. it's going to be a total loss. the area we are in is the very highest part of lake charles, louisiana, and they expect we are going to get some water here in the ground level of the casino. i'm going to have thomas pan off one more time so you get a sense of your ferocity of these winds. this is a pretty protected area, rick, in terms of what's happening. in terms of search and rescue, there were 500,000 people who evacuated, a little bit more. but the intensity laura grew

over the last 34 hours made it hard for them to have the mass evacuation that would be necessary to really get everybody out. of course, as you know, there are always people who decide not to leave which happened in this case for sure. that means tomorrow morning you are going to have a lot of coast guard search and rescue, also have a lot of the local sheriff's risking their lives and trying to go out as soon as the winds get down the 45 miles per hour in the who they are able to rescue here, rick. >> rick: we are hearing howling and some pretty loud noises behind you, leland. are we hearing things being ripped up by the wind or is that the wind howling around the structure around there? >> a lot of both. we got a lot of the sheet metal facade of the casino being ripped off. you are hearing the howling of the wind as it comes through this valley area we've taken refuge under. and you've also got the plywood that's being torn apart.

as we said earlier, as we talked we were on the beach side of this resort which is on a lagoon kind of bayou area in lake charles about 30 miles in line inland. we had the blast above us blow out. as you know, rick, from doing this, the eye wall is probably about 35-40 minutes away from us and when it comes over you are going to get that little moment of calm and the winds and ferocity are going to pick back up. >> rick: we are going to be checking back with you. definitely take shelter there. we don't want you to get hit by any of the debris being thrown around, leland. be safe. >> thanks, rick. >> rick: to the other state being hit hard by hurricanes between nine. correspondent brian yunus in port arthur, texas. how are things there? >> good evening. the winds are not as nearly

strong, different story what we saw in lake charles. the western edge of that eye wall is about 15-20 miles away from port arthur. that is good news. concerned that the eye would come into southeastern texas, and which inundates that area with water. that is not the case and that's good news in the area. tropical storm when thes, some gusts, but frankly even the power off. we've had according to one of the larger power companies in the region, in port arthur while our area is without power, across the street there were still power and the hospital has generators and we don't see any down power lines here in port arthur. what we do see if you look behind me, that's a construction site for a building and we can deafly tell you that the right side of that roof has come off.

not anything major. under construction in that sen sense. we've seen a couple of tiles fall off our hotel. we've seen a couple of trees. we aren't talking about widespread outages. across the highway here, you still have truck that down thetraffic lights on. a good situation compared to what they were expecting in the worst-case scenario. they are still expecting flooding for orange and orange is a different situation. orange is 1818 miles north of port arthur. they are getting the eye wall and they are going to be getting some surge from the sabine river that's coming in. we'll be there hopefully at daylight there. but for the port arthur situation, right now we are getting some gusts, power outages. but you know not what it could

have been had the western eye wall touched here in southeastern texas. it stayed a little bit east of us here. >> rick: they definitely suffered and hopefully they won't suffer too much for the storm. thanks for your reporting there. hurricane laura making landfall within the last hour. the most powerful storm this year within the u.s. smashing the gulf coast with 150-mile-per-hour winds, that 7 miles per hour short of a cat five hurricane. laura being called dangerous, catastrophic, unsurvivable with it storm surge. half a million people did flee and it's pushing emergency shelters to its limits. on an update with the storm itself we go back to fox news chief meteorologist, rick? >> if there's any benefit to where the storm hit, there is not a ton of population in southwestern louisiana. at least the central golf that's the least populated. that's one little bright side. that said i if you are in that

area there's going to be damage especially right along the coast. came on the shore with 103 file you are right now in the inner why wall eye wall, he was winging up to 127 miles per hour in lake charles. that's around 40 miles inland where the storm came on shore, port arthur, you are just barely outside of that eye wall, so you are going to be spared the worst of it. probably another 10 miles off of it. the radar is becoming spotty a little bit. have to do a little bit of checking in a bit here. some of the images we are seeing has the eye wall in the lake charles area. we are going to be watching flooding concerns go all the way up to arkansas eventually towards the tennessee valley and in some spots probably 5-8 inches of rain all the way across areas of arkansas.

when you get into northern arkansas, and a lot of ozarks and mountainous terrain there. we are going to be watching a lot of the mountain flooding going on. that's going to be a big concern. tropical storm conditions all the way into friday as far north as little rock. rick? >> rick: thanks very much. we'll see you in just a few minutes. hurricane laura's power growing by 80% in 24 hours and it is a record breaker and it's already causing tens of thousands' of power outages across the louisiana and texas gulf coast. stay with us as we continue to track the storm's path.

>> rick: hurricane laura striking area still suffering through the coronavirus pandemic. a massive storm forcing communiqués to suspend testing at a crucial time as schools and college campuses continue to reopen. prehospital still still treating covid-19 cases now

bracing for this storm. evacuations also leaving many in the fear that it could further spread the coronavirus. in these difficult times, nonprofits like the red cross step up ushering hundreds of trained disaster workers while sheltering thousands. for more to stay safe and how you can help, mary jane munn. thank you for joining us tonight or this morning. >> hello, thank you. >> rick: how big an issue has the coronavirus been for people staying in their homes but then concerned about going to a shelter where they might get sick? >> people are very concerned and the coronavirus has made sheltering a little more complicated and yet at the same time it's allowed the american red cross to step back and look at how we provide our services. we do have over 600 people who have come in from around the country to be positioned up and down the texas gulf coast and

louisiana. they are there and they are assisting local communities with their shelters. but at the same time we are providing services virtually that would've been done in person before such as mental health services, casework, other things that we are doing half-and-half with people on the ground, but still done virtually and services are still available. >> rick: whereas in the past you had to taxi into a lot of these schools. some of these schools are closed and you can't put people shoulder to shoulder insult hers anymore. give us more detail on how you are distancing in this time. >> certainly. the shelters right now are run by the state. i can't speak for those but what i can tell you is the american red cross sections, you are following specific protocols separating the beds by a certain degree. we make sure that when people enter, the temperatures are

taken, we provide ppe. if somebody is feeling sick, not necessarily feeling their best or there is a concern that they thought they might have been exposed, they might be kept in an area that's separate so they can feel comfortable and the other individuals as well. they are really focused on safety and we really want people to evacuate if they have been told to do so by the local authorities. >> rick: you mention counseling services available online or via phone, are there websites you want to tell us about? >> absolutely. 1-800-read-cross. that number will help you learn where the shelters are. once you go to an evacuation center, you can also find out where shelters are. that number will allow you to share what your concerns are if you need mental help services or casework. there's a lot you can do, or you can go to the website, redcross.org. >> rick: excellent.

we know your services will be necessary in the days and weeks ahead so we appreciate you being here with us tonight and this morning. hurricane force winds extending 60 miles from hurricane laura's center. forecast warning when the storm surge could plug entire communities. stay with us when we continue to track this monster a storm through louisiana and texas and beyond. we live with at&t and we are well past the honeymoon phase.

ocupado tom. at&t, what's this i hear about you advertising a 100% fiber network? only like a fraction of my customers can get that. that's it?!? you have such a glass half-empty attitude. the glass is more than half-empty! you need to relax tom. oh! tom, you need a little tom time. a little tt. stop living with at&t. xfinity delivers gig speeds to more homes than anyone.

>> rick: we've just got an update on power outages from hurricane laura. louisiana what almost 103,000 homes without power. more than 700,000 in calcasieu texas. almost 42,000 without power already with hurricane laura just coming ashore with the past hour or so battering the gulf coast with sustained winds tier 150 miles per hour. became a category four hurricane overnight doubling in power, and hundred of thousands of gulf coast residents did heed the evacuation orders and got out, but some did not of course. the national guard on scene to do its best to help those who opted to stay. for insight on the impact of the storm's capacity, the commander of the u.s. coast guard, vice

admiral steve ruland. >> my pleasure, thank you for having me. >> rick: your concerns at this hour about people who are still in their homes? >> first, let me start by saying thoughts and prayers are with every body along the gulf coast in louisiana and texas who are going to be impacted by this storm. they coast guard is ready to respond. our focus is on saving lives, the second line of effort is to ensure the reconstitution of our ports and waterways. and third, to respond to any environmental hazards. that's our focus. but primarily we are about life saving. >> rick: yeah. and you are risking your life, the lives of your coast guard's personnel to save the lives of others. >> this is what the coast guard does. we do rescues all year round.

this is in our dna. and we are just committed to serve the citizens here in louisiana and texas. >> rick: vice admiral, what point can you get out in the water? >> we are going to have to wait and see what the weather looks like. as the hurricane moves further on shore and the wind the pluralists abate a little bit, we'll get out there as soon as we can. we'll do surveys with our aircraft, we've got small watercraft where we are ready to respond. what's important for us is to remain closely linked into the state and local found tease at we've got people placed in the emergency foundation places, links to the governors of texas and louisiana and i think we've got a great unity of effort here. >> rick: this area is very familiar with storms but this one is a bit ridiculous. 185-mile-per-hour wind gusts? that can do significant damage

to that region. >> absolutely. this is a historic storm and that's why we've encourage people to heed the warnings. local officials to evacuate the area. this is a lesson we learned in every storm. listen to local authorities when they recommend or mandate evacuation. but even so, we have flown additional assets and personnel into the area and we are going to be ready to -- we encourage people -- >> rick: we appreciate your service. coming up on a hard break. we appreciate your service and we will continue to cover hurricane laura at the top of the hour. stay with us.

.. guys, times are tough.

but force factor's test x180 can help us man up, america, by boosting total testosterone. build muscle, fuel desire, and improve performance. get test x180 from force factor, the #1 fastest-growing men's health brand at walmart.

>> the strongest storm ever to impact the louisiana gulf coast making landfall in the past hour. laura is a category for packing sustained winds at 150 miles an hour and gusts of 185. forecasters call it an extremely dangerous hurricane with a surge of water that could do even more damage. a wide path of destruction is likely.

i am rick leventhal with continued live coverage of the most powerful hurricane to strike the us so far this year. forecasters are warning laura's storm surge could be an survivable, steady rise of water 20 feet high capable of wiping out entire communities on the texas and louisiana shoreline. laura has been on radar for days but her rapid intensity from tropical storm to category 4 in roughly 36 hours is rare. 15 inches of rain predicted with widespread flash flood warnings. many roads are already impassable and will over 100,000 homes of lost power. swarms of tornadoes are also a threat. more than half 1 million people ordered to evacuate and proceeded the warnings but others did not. >> we were going to try to stay but when they said it would be a category number for the possibility we would be in the eye. >> is hurricane laura churns on the gulf coast one of the biggest fears is the prediction of that 20 foot storm surge,

linked through wiping out shoreline communities. lake charles, louisiana is one of those places at risk. we have an update on the situation there. stuff was breaking off the buildings. >> we are inside the golden nugget, nice enough to stay here. you can hear that howling and that is the high wall with winds of 140 miles an hour making the howling sound, windows around here and restaurants breaking out. the water is that way. thomas, our cameraman out here with us, and survivable was there to further word officials used about the conditions laura would bring and we felt that firsthand. you can imagine as it was ripping parts of this casino apart as it was ripping off

sheet-metal and blowing out the glass they have here, this was a casino built in 2014 to withstand a category 5 hurricane. imagine what it is doing to people's homes right now and this isn't just 150 mile an hour winds, this is sustained 150 mile an hour winds was 20, 30 minute, we've not gotten the other side of the eye wall and what is coming in is the rushing water, storm surge. this is a record storm surge never seen before in louisiana, up to 20 feet in lake charles. 30 miles inland from new orleans reaching cameron where laura came ashore but she was pushing with her millions and millions and millions of tons of water into the bayou and that is flooding into areas, we are at the highest point in lake charles and they said to expect even water on the floor here. in people's homes this water is

rushing in. you talk in your intro how the storm intensified from a tropical storm to a category number 4 or 5, borderline numfive, in a matter of 48, 72 hours at that a lot of folks by surprise. as we talk to people today they were saying i am staying but now i'm really nervous in a way that i wasn't, gas was sold out, people weren't able to leave and move in the way they would have if they had more notice which means talking to the vice admiral of the coast guard is going to be a lot of search and rescue efforts underway at first light as soon as the winds died down. there's a lot of folks that didn't evacuate that are in for a very difficult ride right now. >> that howling is hunting. how bad was the nugget hit by the storm? can you tell how bad the damages are? >> you can't. haven't even gotten to the other

side of the eye wall. it is not a past tense sense of how bad it was hit but how bad it is being hit. we can see the sheet metal being ripped off, hurricane preparation video. we've been out there watching it, people are boarding up and dropping plywood in windows and the like and yet that was just being ripped off by these winds in this is only the beginning of the most intense period, talk about that howling of the wind and how eerie it is, if you were standing inside double cinderblock construction that is really safe comparatively to being in a wood home or trailer someone wasn't able to get out of it would be frightening beyond words to hear this, not only are you helpless but you are going to be helpless for hours and hours and hours and after that there's going to be feet and feet of water rushing into your house.

>> i've stayed in that hotel. i'm friends with the guy who runs the place and he is scheduled to be on this show in 30 or 40 minutes. we can get him in front of your camera so we don't have to do it on the telephone. >> reporter: please do and tell him thank you if he's not able to get down here. we are the cadillac mexican kitchen. i'm sure he knows it well and you can tell him thank you from all of us, the team has done an incredible job posting us and keeping everybody safe as well. >> try to get word to jerry to get in front of the camera. we will move to another state at the mercy of the storm, port arthur texas being drenched in heavy rain. we are told fox news correspondent brian yunus is there. tell us how bad things are. >> night and day that sound in

louisiana, these are the winds, we get intense wind gusts but nothing like they are seeing in lake charles and frankly lake charles is 45, 50 miles to the northeast of where we are in port arthur, texas, the western part, the edge of that i will always 50 miles away from us and it is amazing the difference between what you are seeing there and what it would have been here had port arthur been in that i wall. we are seeing some intense gusts, a construction site, you can see the top of that building and the paper flying off of that building been in a situation where leland is, that would be completely demolished. in the background you see fire from the oil refinery, largest oil refinery in america is here. we lost power to 50,000 people

in texas, in jefferson county and also in orange county, but to most affected counties on the southeastern portion of texas right now. those are going to be the areas especially orange county that will be affected the most by the storm surge as well as the wind. orange county, texas is getting that i wall so we know texas has emergency personnel and 400 buses that nearly hundred aircraft, 200 boats, i water vehicles ready to come in and most of that concentration will be added toward bridge city and orange city which is just north of jefferson county, most of the power outages are in jefferson county, we lost power but across the street there are lights that are still on and i would say based on the outage map, port arthur lost power but compared

to what we have been going through it is amazing, a lob a little bit to the left, 15 or 20 miles. port arthur was worried about that search and the good news is the surge is not the store, high wind in some areas with southeastern portion of texas along the border from louisiana and texas but orange county is where we will be looking at it. >> we were there three years ago, orange and jefferson were underwater, much of those counties underwater and i know they were worried about it this time around. i am sure they are still worried about it with the possibility of flash flooding and rain, you are not that far from lake charles where this thing is banging the floor right now so stay safe and keep us posted on developments there, try to stay dry if you

can. how bad of the guests been. what is the worst you have seen? >> reporter: probably 60, 55. i think it has been tropical storm. we would have to talk to rick. even if we experienced hurricane, 70 miles an hour but we are seeing things like this, shingles, we are getting gusts kind of like this, we are protected by a car right now but i'm sure we've reached 65, 75. >> reporter: that the flying through the air is what you got to worry about. thank you. hurricane laura went from a category one to a high end cat 4 ingested day, the largest storm surge since hurricane katrina.

national hurricane center is expecting catastrophic damage with widespread power outages, we are seeing 150,000 at least without power already. some towns could be submerged by the search, hundreds of thousands of residents did flee the gulf coast ahead of that surge. what is it doing, rick? >> reporter: the katrina record was record storm surge of 28 feet and is storm is around 20 feet. it will do a lot more damage like we saw with rita which was the same year as katrina and a lot of that area, i have this map up, this graphic for you, september 10th is the statistical peak of hurricane season, we are not there yet and we are through our m storm, next storm, maybe a week or so away it looks like, nothing that threatens the us but the next one is next, we can look forward to that. the center of the storm, lake charles in the eye, you get a

little bit of a break but you on the edge of the i wall and where it came on shore in cameron, that side of the i wall, 90 minute break or so and we are seeing the rain and wind pickup, different wind direction. all the debris that has been knocked down from the other direction will move storm surge to the other side of lakes and bays, trees and potential stuff that has been loosened you get the wind from another direction causing more debris to start flying. we have flood watch is in effect complement of the ohio mississippi river valley, the boot hill, missouri and parts of tennessee, mississippi. we are watching the storm move 5 to 8 inches of rain causing flooding very far from where the center is on shore.

and parts of arkansas. in the meantime we have 150 mile an hour storm to get through. such a strong storm, it will take a while to wind down. by tomorrow morning we will have hurricane force conditions all the way to shreveport, i 20. really rough day, power outages, across northern parts of louisiana into arkansas by tomorrow afternoon. >> eventually making its way to the atlantic coastline. >> this weekend might have windy conditions across the northeast from this storm still. we have a ways to go. >> nana is next, grandma is coming. thank you. this storm is not stopping in coastal texas and louisiana, likely to bring flooding in northeastern arkansas before heading to the atlantic coast. we will be watching for the

larry latest as this powerful storm makes its way inland. our . >> tech: just leave your keys on the dash and we'll replace your windshield with safe, no-contact service. >> tech: schedule at safelite.com. >> singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪

.. experience the ultimate sports hub. where you can find games, news and highlights. all in one place, right on your tv. the xfinity sports zone. use your voice to search every stat and score. follow the teams you love. and, even get notifications with breaking news alerts and more.

with the xfinity sports zone everybody wins. now that's simple, easy, awesome. say xfinity sports zone into your voice remote today. >> welcome back to coverage of hurricane laura, 1.5 million people under evacuation orders,

100,000 got out, a process made more difficult with continuing threat from the coronavirus. the president and ceo of the disaster recovery institute international, you might have some advice for people who did or didn't leave their homes. >> i sure do. this is great advice for those still there but really for everyone which is important to remember first responders are brave and courageous and out there, they will be unlikely to be the first responder to help someone in an incident. it will most likely be a family member, neighbor, coworker, friend. the key message to remember is we all are citizens and individuals have an obligation to prepare ourselves, to be ready, to understand what the risk isn't do everything we can

so government resources are there as a last resort. even fema will tell you best case scenario they are here in 24 hours but more likely to be 48 hours more and it is the first few minutes the count in terms of saving lives. >> might be a little late to take cpr courses or brush up on their first aid. of people are listening to this what do you encourage them to do? >> it is important to take shelter as much as possible, make sure the windows are concerned -- sealed to the extent they can come you don't want to go outside, not something you want to do. put something heavy against any windows, stay as far away from them as possible and have some other source of power because very likely the power will go out. flashlights, candles can be dangerous, flashlights are great. and important thing is to

remember you have your most important information. one thing people often forget when evacuating is to have their prescription information. life-saving medication, if they evacuate without that information they are at risk, the pharmacy might be closed for a long time and they might have trouble tracking down what medications they are on. >> the less reliant you are the government coming in to help the better off people will be. i want to hear from the dallas mayor, what he had to say about dangers from the storm and the ongoing threat from coronavirus in the shelter and that sort of thing. is the dallas mayor. >> we want to prevent the spread of covid-19 so this won't be exactly like our previous efforts when we had to shelter people. we have no plans to create a congregant shelter in the

convention center as we have done in the past week we will use hotels this time, provide shelter to those in need using that method. >> a whole different mindset. >> the community is than sweating about this since before hurricane season started, saying covid-19 looks like it will continue for a long time so when you have a pandemic which is such a weird disaster where we have to stay apart rather than come together to help each other it creates all these extra complications. one study modeled the evacuation from hurricane irma and if covid-19 had been around at that time, would have increased by 20% in the state of florida. think about that kind of risk that is troubling to the planning community about the repercussions for our ability to get our economy back up and running and see each other in person again.

it is scary. a strategy to use hotels to encourage people to go to family and friends and stay apart as much as possible is really great and it comes down to individual preparedness again about educating yourself about mask etiquette and washing your hands even if you end up in a shelter making sure there's hand sanitizer and you are trying to make six feet of distance even worst-case scenario end up in a large shelter scenario where there are people present, you distance as much as possible. the red cross doing that. >> challenging times in texas and louisiana. appreciate your time. the energy industry is bracing for extensive damage from the catastrophic storm surge and wind, oil and gas producers evacuating half of the platforms and nearly all the rigs. we will take a look at the

economic impact from the storm and bring more live coverage on the ground as laura is coming ashore. even if you're on a statin? statins may lower some risks, but may not be enough. that's why science delivered vascepa. for people who have persistent cardiovascular risk factors and take a statin only vascepa is clinically proven to provide 25% lower risk from heart attack and stroke. don't take vascepa if you're allergic to icosapent ethyl or any inactive ingredient in vascepa. tell your doctor about any medicines you take, and if you are allergic to fish or shellfish. stop taking vascepa and seek medical help if you have symptoms of an allergic reaction. serious side effects may occur like heart rhythm problems and bleeding. heart rhythm problems may occur in more people with persistent cardiovascular risk or who have had heart rhythm problems. tell your doctor if you have symptoms such as irregular beat, lightheadedness, dizziness, shortness of breath, chest discomfort or fainting. possible side effects include muscle and joint pain. proven by science, fda approved.

vascepa can reduce your risk and add cardio protection. call your doctor about vascepa today.

they have businesses to grow customers to care for lives to get home to they use stamps.com print discounted postage for any letter any package any time right from your computer all the services of the post office plus ups only cheaper get our special tv offer a 4-week trial plus postage and a digital scale

go to stamps.com/tv and never go to the post office again. >> 15 years ago lake charles, louisiana 7 extent of damage from hurricane rita a month after katrina hit, lake charles finds itself once again at the mercy of nature's fury. we have an update. how are things? >> reporter: continuing to get worse and that eerie sound of the wind howling through these buildings is scary as all get out, inside a structure created to withstand these winds, can't imagine what people who didn't evacuate are going through and you brought up a good point about hurricane rita and

memories of that from 2005, a lot of people road rita out and we talk to them today, i would read out, i'm going to be fine tomorrow but what we've learned over the past 12 or 18 hours but a lot of people didn't get the message on is laura is much worse, a category i which means the winds are stronger but also the storm surge, rather than 12 to 13 feet we are talking 16 to 20 feet of storm surge which means advice point lake charles, louisiana, likely to be water on the floor which means anybody else's house in lake charles will probably be underwater, people who didn't evacuate are writing out this wind and on top of that they will have water rushing into their homes, scary in a way you can't believe. we were outside a couple times before this, the 1:30 a.m. central time hours and the giant glass partitions they have here

up above the people look out on this beautiful vista, those blue out and winds were ripping sheet-metal like a giant destroy something in a movie and plywood the used board up windows was being ripped off and they talk about this being historic, catastrophic and an survivable and if you are not in a structure like this, it will be a difficult and scary night. >> thank you for the update, we will now move to port arthur, texas where we've been visiting brian yunus joining us for an update on how things are going. >> there are 56,000 people without power in southeastern texas, that's the big story and that is good news.

category 4, an survivable surge, 40 miles to the northeast, 45 miles northeast of us where leland is but here in port arthur we are getting these guests 71 miles an hour with the highest ghost we've got here, we've seen the guests and to give you an idea, that is a construction site behind us and it is still standing, we've seen some things come off of it, papers being torn off of it but that gives you an idea of being just a few miles from the center of this monster storm and the trees are still up, the power lines are still up and it is one of those situations here where we do have people without power but we are not seeing that epic storm surge they were initially fearing for the golden triangle, beaumont, orange and port arthur, they thought they would have water coming into this and

really flood beach's river and the 15 river and inundate these areas that were destroyed by hurricane harvey just 3 years ago but that is not the case thus far and it won't be the case in terms of the surge. it will be the wind and if there's an area that will worry about the surgeon will be 20 miles north of us in the city of orange but that is a population of 20,000. we've spoken to emergency personnel, positioned and ready to go as soon as these winds died down for rescue operations. as soon as they are under 50 miles an hour they will go in in place like orange, inundated with high water vehicles and as such and the navy is ready to help southeastern texas as well as southwestern louisiana which is definitely going to need the help of the cajun navy which is a volunteer group that was just

heroic after hurricane harvey but this is the kind of situation we are dealing with in port arthur, rain and wind and loss of power and not what leland is going through in just a matter of a few miles, 10, 20 miles and this could have been a different story but we are still riding it in plenty of bad weather to go. >> appreciate your recording. hurricane laura has made rainfall, downgraded to 140, massive power outages knocked down trees and power lines. we go to rick for an update. >> we look at the radar to get a sense of who is in the center of the storm. lake charles looks to be in the center and things should be calm or but a couple radars of gone down, we are not communicating to the data system, the angle,

the radar gets shot, disturbs a little bit of radar, looks like you are good but this is offset a little bit and looks like you might not get out of that i wall at all which is not good news, wind gusts 134 miles an hour in lake charles, you should stay in that i wall another couple hours. it did come uncial 150 mile an hour storm winds, 140 miles an hour but because it came uncial with such a strong storm is still going to be a hurricane in the morning all the way north toward shreveport by tomorrow afternoon still strong tropical storm across arkansas. we will watch for tornadoes and one of got to you, you've seen this from the storms you've covered, it becomes jagged and ragged when they come onshore, not the case, the storm has held together really well on all sides. even on the west side of the

storm, the left side of the store where brian is getting pummeled by the storm. a lot of ways to go. >> a lot more hours for you. hurricane laura devastating the gulf coast with category 4 storm disrupting the economy of the region. oil prices spiking as refineries shutdown. after oil and gas producers evacuated more than half the platforms and nearly all the readings in the region. you to break it down is former special assistant to the director of international affairs at fema. we know the storm will be brutal so what is your guess on the economic fallout? >> it will be huge. you have this catastrophic storm coming into a region that is predominantly energy-based, all platforms shutdown, two ports drastically affected in lake

charles trying to rebuild based on this, very glad the storm has moved more left, into the wheel facilities, hit houston beaumont area with destruction but we are looking at very very significant economic damage. >> how long after they clear out from those rigs can they get back on and get the oil flowing again? >> could be down a week to 10 days. the other issue is facilities in and around the lake charles area. the storm flooded those facilities did extensive damage they could be off-line two weeks. every american consumer will be

impacted by this store. my thoughts and prayers are with the people of lake charles. >> we will be paying at the pump. >> you will be paying at the pump and with regards to other consumer supplies based on what we know. the houston port and the port of houston. >> thanks for the bad news. appreciate your time. >> everything is going to be all right i'm sure. >> thanks so texas and louisiana ordering half 1 million people to evacuate but getting out isn't so easy, social distancing increasing capacity by two thirds and traditional shelters and leaving many people with nowhere to go. for a closer look at how texas has been preparing we go to county judge and emergency management director of orange county texas, what can you tell us? >> right now we are in the

middle of this thing, we are feeling the full impact now. the lake charles area is taking the brunt of this. it shifted a little more east for us which is a benefit, the storm surge they were predicting, we didn't get in any capacity like they were sitting beginning 120 mile an hour windss, receiving that right now. another 45 minutes or so with that. >> the mayor of dallas says he is not opening traditional shelters. people going to hotels instead because of covid-19 concerns which is a statewide issue for you? >> it is one of the things we have to look at when we started making our plans for an event like this, to have places we could bring our folks and have covid-19 restrictions and bus capacities, two thirds of what they should have been in down

two thirds they should have been and the thing we had to plan for we did and we made arrangements for sheltering and the storm damage we are going to receive is a lot less than we were anticipating sharply we will not have the shelter needs we thought we would going in. >> it is a warning for future storms in more populated areas that if you can't put people next to each other what can you do? >> that's right and that is the thing, the rest of this going on with covid-19, we've got to hope for treatment plan, something to let us get to back to some sense of normalcy because one thing we know for sure especially in this region of texas and louisiana is this isn't our last storm, we will have another one. we hope it is a long time down the road but to think we are not going to have another one is -- we know it will happen.

we got to plan for that and that is a different thing for us. we had to increase our bus capacity, the number of must we get outside the region by three times and like you said about shelters, they are cautious about bringing you and where you put a lot of people, we make other arrangements. it is what you do. >> we are happy for you that orange was spared the worst of this particular storm but we do understand you will have more and we appreciate you being there and thanks very much. hurricane laura crashing into the gulf coast, 7 miles per hour short of being a category 5 context. hurricane katrina was a category 3 when it devastated new orleans and mississippi in 2005. we will continue tracking this very very powerful storm.

>> welcome back to our coverage of hurricane laura. inet our next guest during super storm sandy when he give hotel rooms to those in the golden nugget, he put our crew up in the nugget three years ago during hurricane harvey and he is back in lake charles with hundreds of energy workers and first responders staying at his hotel ready to make repairs as soon as the worst of laura is over. senior vp for gaming at lake charles, there you are. i know you had a busy morning. tell us how the hotel is doing. >> the hotel is doing well. we have a plan in place we've been working on since this weekend. no surprise laura has been coming. so far so good.

the winds, we lost a few awnings and glass breakage here and there. the good news is our team members and guests are safe so that the priority for us. >> we heard a gust of 140 miles per hour hitting lake charles, that will do some damage to the structure. you've got to stay ahead of that. >> we been running from one scene to the next and that is a challenge to make sure the crews are staying safe on that. some glass, loss of awnings, lost a wedding gazebo, pool areas, downed trees, stuff that is going to happen with those kind of winds with the eye is over us, we have called before it starts up again. >> this thing grew really quick so i would imagine you were hard-pressed to prepare for it since no one really have a lot of time to prepare because it happened so fast.

>> we struggled, we brought some crew income had a great team. i have almost 100 essential team members staying on the property to keep the place running and safe and ready for the cleanup so we will get at it in the morning, assess the damage. we don't know what the damage is, too early to assess but we will be ready for it and open again as soon as possible. >> is this the worst you've seen in terms of storms? >> from the wind standpoint it is. we went through sandy, the flooding affected us with that more than anything. we didn't have much flooding here. maybe it is coming on the backside. the wind was insane. it sounds like a freight train going through. >> i'm guessing the casino floor is closed but i guess you have bars and open for your guests. >> we didn't have enough but

yes, the casino is closed for now but we had a couple restaurants open. hopefully things go well tomorrow. we will open some bars and restaurants. >> you have hundreds of energy workers and plant personnel to get going as soon as this thing is over. it is awesome of you to put folks up. >> it is great they are here to help rebuild and get back to work as soon as possible. we are glad to be part of that. >> think you will get any sleep tonight? >> i highly doubt it. you know how that is we've been at this before. we are used to it. i'm not the only one here. we have a bunch of guys here surrounding me. we will get through it. >> good to see you, you look good. >> appreciate it. hope to see you soon.

>> hundreds of thousands heated warnings to evacuate their homes in texas and louisiana but national guard troops are out in force ready to rescue those who didn't. stay with us for continuing coverage of hurricane laura right after this. >> tech: at safelite, we're here for you with safe, convenient service. >> tech: we'll come right to you. ♪ upbeat music >> tech: you'll get a text when we're on our way. >> tech: before we arrive, just leave your keys on the dash. we'll replace your windshield with safe, no-contact service.

♪ upbeat music >> tech: and that's service you can trust when you need it the most. ♪ upbeat music >> tech: schedule at safelite.com. ♪ upbeat music >> singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪

♪ i got it all from you ♪ i'm always pushing through ♪ i know we'll make it to the finish line ♪ ♪ i know you're waiting on the other side ♪ ♪ i'm like you on-demand glucose monitoring. because they're always on. another life-changing technology from abbott. so you don't wait for life. you live it. so we collaborate ♪ ocean spray works with nature every day to farm in a sustainable way

>> the gulf coast has seen its share of powerful hurricanes but laura could be the strongest and forecasters warning half 1 million people packed their cars and packed highways on the way to higher grounds. uncertainty over what will be left when they come back. experts warren entire towns could be submerged. louisiana activating the national guard for the first time in a decade. we are joined by search and rescue aircraft commander john mixon. i'm sure you've had some pretty crazy experiences. wear you down there for katrina for all those rescues? >> i was was one of thousands for the response during and after hurricane katrina in the area to the west or to the east of where we are now.

>> those images were riveting for folks at home. i can't imagine what it is like to pilot a helicopter and pull people off of rooftops like that and there's a big concern that sort of thing might be necessary when the sun comes up. >> might be. hopefully most people evacuated, less populated than the new orleans area. folks that didn't leave and ended up having to go, to get them out a. it is one of the less populated areas. >> people may need to get out and not have another way out. a basket being lifted from one of your choppers. >> some of these roads are very rural, some folks out there and

i can assure when first light comes up in a short area might not. >> what is the biggest challenge for you guys? >> locating them. if it is after the weather there will be obstacles finding debris and power lines to get to the folks, interfering with hoisting them in and pulling them out. initially it would be probably won't do much in the way of going in to the storm. somewhat clear in this particular case. >> what was your proudest moment during katrina? >> we had brought in ten people on the helicopter and it was early in the morning after katrina crossed. to get the gas the coast guard

guys have gone in and we are unloading the folks there one was probably 3 or 4 years old, carrying the little girl out of the helicopter by the building, she had everything she had on her back, she pulled out a candy bar and offered it to the rest of us to say thank you. the only thing she had left. real touching. >> that is terrific. at what point can you fly, at what wind speed when it drops below a certain windspeed can you fly? >> not necessarily wind speed especially with helicopters like the jayhawk, an amazing machine. it is more visibility.

any time there is lightning, the visibility and the heavy showers. >> we hope the coast guard won't be as needed this time as they were 15 years ago but we appreciate those guys being out there and you as well. thank you for your service. hurricane laura making landfall two hours ago near cameron, louisiana as a category 4 storm, from 150 mile-per-hour winds to 140. tens of thousands, 200,000 without power at this hour and some people who did not evacuate are now requesting assistance. we will stay on top of this story on the fox news channel. still suffering today. god calls on people who believe in him to act on his word. "comfort ye, comfort my people."

when i come here and i sit with lilia i realize what she needs right now is food. these elderly jews are weak and they're sick. they're living on $2 a day which is impossible. this now, is how god's children are living. take this time to send a survival food box to these forgotten jews. the international fellowship of christians and jews urgently need your gift of $25 now to help provide one survival food box with all of the essentials they critically need for their diet for one month. no vitamins and no protein so my legs and hands are very weak. oh, oh, oh let's make sure that we bring them just a little bit of hope. by bringing them a little bit of food.

become a part of the fellowship today by reaching out to bless these precious people of god. for just $25, you can help supply the essential foods they desperately need for one month. that's less than a dollar a day. i just want to encourage all of you to join with yael eckstein and the wonderful work of the international fellowship of christians and jews. god tells us to take care of them, to feed the hungry. and i pray holocaust survivors will be given the basic needs that they so desperately pray for to survive. that they so desperately pray for to survive.

>> fox news alert, laura lashing the gulf coast making landfall as a category 4 hurricane. >> 150 mile-per-hour hireling -- howling winds and an survivable storm surge. >> monster hurricane striking on the third night of the are in see, the focus honoring america's bravest defending our freedom. >> i've