>> how many of you are there? okay. do you have a crate or a bag? >> what's your name? we'll get you out of here. how about your neighbors, tune of any injuries? >> old people and gone to a shelter. >> okay. i'll talk to them. >> get a bag ready with your

phone, change of clothes, iv. >> i'm a marine, brother, i'm ready. >> we're going to get you out of here. >> i'm going to check on your neighbors, be about five minutes i'll be back. >> thank you. neil: this is playing out hundreds of times across the state of florida right now where they're recovering from ian. 1.3 million are still without power and the rescues go on, better than a thousand, we're told by last count. home by home, checking on folks, many of whom can't reach rescuers because their power is out, cell phones are largely still out. so, it's a problem to put it mildly. as for ian, well north of this area right now into the carolinas, northward still with a lot of rain. let's get the latest on its track with rick reichmuth from the fox weather center. oh, no, i apologize, max

gordon, i apologize, lost my space. max is at fort myers, florida. >> hey there, neil, good morning. the danger isn't necessarily over here in florida. currently a shelter in place warning for a community in sarasota county because of concerns that a levee there might break. and then we're getting reports of overwhelming numbers of 911 calls because of flooding in the community of north port. that's south of sarasota county there. meanwhile, we're at a food and water distribution center, aid efforts are ongoing. this one is being run by the cajun navy, a group of men and women who go out and they make rescues with their personal watercraft and right now trying to help the folks here. but they say there's simply not enough food and water to give out to people. this line of cars, well, it stretches down the street. i counted at least 50 to 100 vehicles in this line, a tough situation for a lot of folks and making things worse, we have a closure along i-75.

that's a mileage artery in western florida. and this closure is because of flooding along the myakka river that causes delays in both directions along i-75. even though the storm has passed, runoff is making its way into rivers and water ways and that's causing the flooding. that flooding causing issues in sarasota county where the shelter in place warning was issues after concerns that a levee could break. while many are in the dark and they're slowly restored around 42,000 utilities workers in the state from all over the country and last check, 1.3 million customers were without power. other issues have popped up in the wake of ian, collier county, hit lie by the hurricane. 911 systems went down and trees down and boats scattered. and for folks trying to help, a call for donation and supplies. >> the cars have been here for

hours waiting and they're waiting because we don't have a lot of supplies. we've had a couple of small tuckloads, maybe 100 cases of water and we have about 50 cars in line now, those cases will be gone in no time and we need sup supplies. >> meanwhile, gas has been very hard to come by. you can get it here, but the lines are very long. we've-- we've even had issues with our own vehicles running low on gasoline. you know, it's just going to be a long road ahead for a lot of folks here still in the dark without supplies and in some cases without gasoline. neil, back to you. neil: incredible, max. sorry for my confusion, max gordon in fort myers, florida. and now to rick reichmuth where ian is going right now. rick at the fox weather center, what are we looking at? >> you saw the shot where max was, lots of sunshine and that's good news. the weather is going to cooperate for the next five to six days, tons of sunshine, daytime highs into the mid 80's, overnight lows into the

60's, humidity's dropped so those are good things that you want when you're still in search and rescue and eventually into recovery mode here. we have all of the rain that fell. you see this line from up around daytona beach around 24 inches of rain and same here just to the north of where the storm came on shore. and the storm surge around fort myers. and the myakka river you're talking about, interstate 75 is closed due to flooding and up here in an agricultural, more rural area is where the concern for that levee potentially that could have some issues. it did have a breach in 2003, and that was when they got 20 inches of rain over a three-day period. here they got 20 inches of rain in under 24 hours and because of that, we're seeing all of this flooding. latest observation is at 12.67 feet and this is its highest ever flood. that's going to stay at that level for a couple of days.

florida is so flat that water doesn't have any gravity, really, to pull it down like you would see flash flooding in mountains. this is going to be a slower flooding situation as the water has to drain off of the flat area of florida. all right, here is where ian is now, heavy rain moving in across parts of martha's vineyard and nantucket, cape cod, southern parts of new england seeing the rain and then back across areas of west virginia. we're going to see, put this in kind after future track. watch what happens, this first batch of rain for the most part pulls away and this is really what was ian and this circulation is with us throughout the day tomorrow into monday. this takes us toward monday, midday and we have rain in jersey, towards the city that i-95 corridor, we have a ways to go before we're fully done with this. i want to give awe quick look ahead. we're in the meaty time of hurricane season, which, neil, i want to point this out. we've had what seemed like a really relatively mild hurricane season and we always say, hey, it only takes one for

the hurricane season to seem really dramatic. well, this is that one. ian happened and we haven't had any land falling systems and then you get one and ian will be remembered for a very long time. as you move forward in time, we've got about 30% of our hurricane season still to be had here, although we're on the downhill stretch, which is good news, but we have activity and in general we've got probably for any real activity, about a month left and when we see storms develop in the month of october. they generally form closer to home and you get less of a heads-up around it and we hope none of that will happen and let now what october typically can look like, neil. neil: i appreciate that, i'm sure our viewers do as well. rick, thank you very, very much. rick reichmuth. we're getting words that thousands of homes have been irretrievably destroyed, particularly fort myers, this is a before and after of a beach cottage, before, beautiful idyllic, afterwards,

gone, essentially. these folks own it in jacksonville right now. and they're hurricane ian survivors, their collage not so much. guys, how are you doing? >> we're doing good, neil, thanks for having us. >> maybe not under this circumstances. maybe you can tell me what happened to the cottage, essentially i guess it's gone now? >> it is. we evacuated on tuesday morning when the mandatory evacuation came through, and had been staying on the east coast for the last few days. on wednesday morning, about 11:45, we were watching our rain camera at home before the power went out, and saw our belongings start to wash away out of our ground level and then shortly thereafter our power went out and we were no longer able to watch the feed and grateful that we weren't. >> just amazing. now, so i would emergency, not only your home, but any around

it, including these looking through your ring camera, they're destroyed as well? >> absolutely. >> yeah, we've seen a lot of footage, whether it's been on the news or from friends and every cottage that's two story or less is gone. the area that we lived in was the northern part of the island, so there was a lot of the older original cottages from the 50's that were there. and they're just flat. it's all just-- it's covered in sand so it looks like beach, but anything that's not over two stories is flattened and turned into debris. neil: amazing, it looks like it was literally on the water. maybe you could tell me what it was like. >> i'm sorry, we couldn't hear you. neil: it looks right on the water. or close as you can get. >> yeah, we were just about 50 steps from the coast, from the water. most of the time. and we later in the day, now, when we started seeing other pictures and things come through, we knew it was

probably going to be pretty bad, but it was a beautiful area, it was very quiet, we were on the north end of the island, beside another smaller resort, but our island was always-- or beach was always very quiet. there weren't very many people out there. we were just kind of living the dream, watching the sunset every day from the beach and it was ideal. it was beautiful snoof. neil: well, i know it quite well. and a peace of heaven and i imagine you can't go back, would you rebuild? >> we will go back. we're actually making plans to go back as soon as possible. really, the only reason we're not there now is just we figure we would be more burden, we're in the same boat as a lot of people we've lost everything, so going back and trying to stay on people's couches and things right now, there's other people that are need of that so we're going to take a couple of days and regroup and make sure that we have a way for us to be sheltered there and then we're

going to go back down in get in the mix with everybody else. >> and making sure that we're okay and help coordinate the effort to get need out to people who really, really need it. and we were so blessed that we got out and we have our lives and our fur babies and it just could have been so much worse, so many people lost so much more. neil: it sounds like you do want to rebuild though? >> yes, most definitely. >> just to clarify, i don't want this to be misleading at all. but we actually leased our cottage so we were not the owners of the cottage, but it was our primary residence and living in that cottage for a year, so, all of our belongings were actually what we lost, i just didn't want that to be misleading to anyone. neil: no, i apologize. i did misrepresent. bottom line you lost pretty much everything. so i wish you well and especially if you go back to

try to rebuild and reform a life down there leasing or not. but very very much, you've got your priorities right and alive and well and appreciate it. >> thank you. neil: i want to go to ashley moody the florida attorney general. in the middle of this, we get reports of looting, i don't think in the areas where folks lost their homes, but we're hearing reports of that. it doesn't seem to be a widespread problem. the governor says he has made it clear he doesn't want to see it become one. what's the latest? >> right, we want to make sure, as your program rightly pointed out, we've only just hit the peak of hurricane season and we have a significant time to go, in no way, shape or form, do what we floridians-- we don't want floridians to think they can't leave their property. it's been an issue in the past when you see hurricanes or natural disasters come through

and so, we strongly urge prosecutors to seek pre-trial detention of those during these periods, these times of distress and times when folks have to leave their homes behind, we want them to feel secure so we ask prosecutors to seek pre-trial detention so the folks can't get back out in the middle of an emergency and do the same thing. yes, we've seen instances of folks going into homes and trying to burglarize them and we don't want that to be any reason for folks to be hesitant to leave in the future or even now. so, we've issued those strong warnings and certainly, florida governor desantis has been strong and made sure that everyone knows that florida is a law and order state and that will not be tolerated. neil: thank you very much. the attorney general of the state of florida, ashley moody. want to take you to some flooding going on right now. this is naples in the middle of the week and i believe in sarasota, of course, that's southwest of florida here, and

we also have this separate issue that we're following with some flooding on a key river. and that right now, has prompted a 14-mile closure of interstate 75. this is around the myakka river, which has been rising, some say because a levee broke there. we're not able to get confirmation of that, but it would be surging and had been surging regardless of what's happened to nearby will haves and prompted the highway to be closed in that area. i think this is about an hour south of tampa. and that's closed in both directions. so, it's complicating traffic and ukraine efforts, but it's the kind of thing that happens after a storm of this magnitude and it's playing out in a lot of different places. nothing quite like this, but we'll keep you posted with more on this. i earn 5% cash back on travel purchased through chase with chase freedom unlimited. i earn 5% on our cabin. hello cashback! hello, kevin hart! earn big time with chase freedom unlimited with no annual fee.

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and you'll also get this free beneficiary planner. and it's yours free just for calling. so call now for free information. >> all right, we know, obviously, that ian was a big issue in florida, but it was a

multi-state phenomenon, hitting south carolina, north carolina, as well. it's going up through the atlantic states right now and it will still be an issue for folks in new york and in new jersey and all of that right through monday. but for now, the biggest hits of course certainly in florida and in myrtle beach certainly in south carolina. it wasn't suppose today originally be that way. charleston seemed to be the bullseye of the city, but again, it moved a little in a different direction. let's get the latest there from nate, i believe in myrtle beach as we speak. nate, what dids does it look like there? >> yes, we're in myrtle beach and one of the marks, the shrimp boat that washed ashore. officials have set up a perimeter of cones and it's not a secure situation, a lot of people are coming to check this out. i was talking with officials

and they're not sure how they're going to take care of this boat, but one way that they could is building a trench, flipping it around and towing it back out into the ocean. i want to show you the moment that it washed ashore. i want to show you the video, new video from the city of myrtle beach, this happened about 3:00, four people were on the boat, two of whom initially refused to get off the boat. all four eventually evacuated and thankfully all four are safe. we have another rescue with more new video from the city of myrtle beach. and firefighters use add cherry picker, who were stuck on the second floor as flood waters rushed into the first floor. and we told you about it an hour ago, and we have the new video. an electrical box shorted so firefighters needed to use the cherry picker because people could not walk through the water. take a look at the next video, neil. the streets off the beach pretty much an extension of the ocean, over four and a half

feet of storm surge rushing into nearby businesses and a nearby amusement park flooded and the businesses are damaged. all of that receding leading to a lot of work for crews today cleaning up debris in the streets and damage here on the beach. back out here live, neil. i can tell you that it seems life is about to resume to normalcy if it hasn't. people are out on the beach and enjoying the beautiful weather and playing beach volleyball. a lot of people here in myrtle beach have power, but crews have a lot of work to do and of course, getting this boat off the beach is one of those things, but they have debris to pick up, some homes nearby are damaged. but as you mention, the worst of it avoided here in south carolina. we'll send it back to you. neil: incredible. nate foy, thank you very very much. nate in myrtle beach. the myrtle beach, south carolina mayor kind enough to join us now. mayor, how are things looking in your community, particularly with those still without power? >> well, good morning, neil.

thank you. it's actually a beautiful day here today. i have been out since early this morning with crews on the beach and we literally rode from one end to myrtle beach to the other and a lot to be done, a lot of cleanup that needs to be done, but, boy, we sure did get spared from the worst of it. neil: it helped that it was low tide when ian came ashore. it could have been very different, we learn, when it's high tide as we certainly saw in florida. so that made it a little less of a catastrophe here, but there's a lot of rebuilding that's going to have to go on. what are you looking at? >> mainly beach erosion, the eregulars of our sand dunes, we had built up our sand dunes the last few years, and i credit the way that the sand dunes were, that saved a lot of our beach front parties from any more damage. the sand dunes did their job

and the problem they are all, but obliterated at this point so we will have a lot of beach erosion, we will have to rebuild our sand dunes and that takes a lot of money and we do have a lot of debris on the beach from some of our ocean outfall, but the governor will be here later this afternoon and we'll be able to share this information with him and he's been so gracious with his time and accessibility to us and we're grateful to him for the support that we get. neil: as you know, mayor, far better than i, a lot of causeways, bridges, have been battered, if not outright destroyed in florida, of course, sanibel island and all entry points that have been ralph vaged from the storm. how about in south carolina and your neck of the woods? >> further south from myrtle beach from us, a small beach community called garden city

and i'm told that people are not able to get into garden city at this time. i don't know if that's because of the bridge or what the issue is, but i do know that they're not letting locals back in there. i have not heard of any other damage. we have some minor damage to some of our beach accesses. those are easy to fix and all in all, you know, when we look at what the devastation in florida is having to endure, we are so blessed and you know, with-- it's a beautiful day back today. and i do encourage people if you're on the beach, be careful. we don't know what kind of debris has been buried in the sand. we know there is some debris in the ocean, so, people need to still be cautious when they're out on the beach or in the water. neil: to say nothing of riptides in the area. mayor, you have such a beautiful town, city, state, and i'd ask the same

particularly of florida mayors of all stripes up and down the gulf and indeed the east coast that was not nearly affected, and both are popular with tourists and many who have moved not only your community, but south carolina, and florida and draw, you're the two fastest states in the country. i'm wondering if an experience like this make you continue to be, people cool it, there's a flipside to living in the beautiful local and storms like this. what do you tell them? >> well, i was born and raised here so we-- from locals, people who have lived here all of our lives, we're used to this and i hope that people will see that the city does a lot to prepare for these types of storms. and it really comes down to preparation, listening to the warnings, listening to the officials, and if this had been a category 4 storm, of course,

we would have had a mandatory evacuation and it's so important that people pay attention to that. when people choose not to follow the directions they're given is when people get in trouble. but, as i've said, today is absolutely beautiful. the weather is gorgeous. the beach is amazing. we always recover quickly and i know that florida can't say that right now. it's going to take a lot of time for them to rebuild, our prayers are certainly with them, but, you know, we do tend to, even when we've had worst storms to recover very quickly and it's still such a great place to live. neil: indeed, a beautiful place at that. thank you very much, brenda bethune, the myrtle beach, south carolina mayor and as the mayor pointed out. it could have been a whole lot worse. ian hit myrtle beach at low tide. if it would have been high tide, it would have been an

eight foot difference in surge. it did not come to pass. we are following developments across the country, including at the southern border of our country and the growing migrant surge right now that apparently doesn't stop for attention on storms in other states. let's get the latest from matt at eagle pass, texas with more on that, matt. >> hi, neil. that migrant surge did not stop this week. it was consistent all week long. so far today we've seen some migrant groups crossing into the united states, yesterday was a notable day and our crew saw hundreds, if not a thousand migrants across into the united states at the southern border and we have video, groups of men, women and children and as we see nearly every day, border patrol lines the migrants up and places them on bus and taken to a processing center perhaps to be released and then they travel all over the country. also, we have an update on a horrific deadly crash not far from here in uvalde.

texas dts says a 17-year-old girl from austin texas had nine illegal migrants from mexico crammed into her pickup truck when border patrol pursued her. she ran a red light and crashed into a semi tractor-trailer and hit another car. the young female driver and another person were killed and many people sent to the hospital. immigration is one of the key issues in texas and across the country headed into the midterms last night, last night greg abbott debated beto o'rourke and he defended his busing, who says the small texas towns are overwelcomed. in the debate, abbott challenged o'rourke, why they don't criticize el paso's democratic mayor for busing. >> the fact of the matter, the el paso mayor, the democrat, the city council, democrats, they are now busing more people

than the state of texas is busing, he's not calling them out. >> it's apples to oranges and i tell you this hateful rhetoric and troeting human beings as political pawns, talking-- >> okay. and this week, we did an interview with the democratic mayor pro tem here in eagle pass and she agrees with governor abbott's busing program and buses are arriving in new york city right now with migrants from texas, neil. neil: you know, matt. i don't want to put you on the spot. i heard beto o'rourke saying apples and oranges. a bus is a bus, and sending it out of texas, it's out of texas. it isn't apples and oranges, if you're going to criticize that. >> and those are his words, if there's any more follow-ups, i can do that. neil: i hear that. out of eagle pass, texas, the

lieutenant chris, he tells it like it is, texas department of public safety. i caught that from beto o'rourke and i try not to play politics on this show. that's a numbers games here. if you have buses shipped out of el paso by a democratic mayor and angry about that kind of thing out of governor abbott. you should be angry no matter what the bus or who is commissioning them, shouldn't you? >> you're absolutely right, neil. we know for a fact el paso has seen a massive surge in immigrants that are coming across the border. averaging 1500 a day and never experienced that before. not only that, neil, we talk about cruel and humane treatment of the migrants, some of them are sleeping in the streets in tents. adults and kids and nothing, there's no outcry, and no outrage from the officials in regards to that. but yet, when texas and again, we talked about this, too earlier this week, when texas is busing from migrants to the

sanctuary cities, that it's a problem. the migrants are treated fairly, as far as within the law, transporting the migrants from texas to the sanctuary cities and getting good treatment once they get to the sanctuary cities, but again, you cannot compare apples and oranges, as far as what we're doing and el paso is doing, if we're going to criticize one party we're going to criticize one, we'll criticize as a whole. neil: again, you and i tried to skew the whole politics, but this is coming from a mayor pro tem in eagle pass talking about this problem. this is from the democrat. >> i can tell you one thing, you're not being lied to. you run into them at the gas station and they tell you, i want to go further up north. they don't know where they'll at. they'll say how far is san antonio, how far is houston. how far is new york. neil: it's a crisis, bottom line, it's a crisis and you've been saying that and now of course, we have the dea wanting

to get to the bottom of the fentanyl problem because it's a crisis, but what's happening at the border that's creating the fentanyl crisis is not a border or a crisis. i'm at a loss. >> well, i mean, we have to look at everything we've been doing as far as the state of if texas and what governor abbott is doing signing an order for the mexican cartel, and now we're waiting for the federal government to see what they're going to do, as far as if they're going to acknowledge if they're terrorist organizations and manufacturing the daily poison that is killing tens of thousands of americans every single year and not only that, now the rainbow colored fentanyl coming across the border, as halloween approaches, one thing that we have to do is parents is educate and spread awareness to our children because, again, this poison that's plaguing our country and not doing anything about it. we can do what we can as a state to go after the organizations in the state of texas. the federal government needs to

go in and put pressure on mexico to stop the poison from entering our country. neil: lieutenant chris olivarez, it's a 24-7 job and headache and the same for florida trying to recover ian, a major interstate highway close you had down and dealing with the ramifications of that and flood waters in some parts of the state they're receding, but in other parts closing down a 14-mile chunk after road and difficult closed in both directions because of surging waters after this. income, today's rising prices are a big problem. but as a veteran, you already have a solution. it's your powerful va home loan benefit. it lets you borrow up to a full 100% of your home's value, not just 80%. with home values near record highs, that could mean a lot more cash than you imagined. and at newday,

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>> all right, 1.3 million floridians are without meyer and a they're without power in the for the meyer area. >> we're at the distribution center at fort myers area. and there is a constant stream of cars here and the long li lines. i just moved here from colorado and i'm not feeling well at all. no water, no electricity, it's been very difficult. >> we just got power about 6:00 this morning, but we still don't have water. >> let me tell you it wasn't

fun. it was nerve wracking, but thank god we're alive all the time. >> and it's a clear expression of gratitude from serious about everyone we spoke with and makes sense, you look at the video like this, taken over to san carlos beach to fort myers and the maxer images put it into perspective. and the recovery efforts continued via water and helicopters we've heard coming in and out of the base where we're at right now. and the hospital at port charlotte, and the water has impact on the hospitals and then damaged boats littering the harbor and another maxar image, you see it above and from ground level and we met brian down there at ground level and he sorted what remained of his mobile home at

fort myers beach and he said he felt bad leaving his elderly neighbors also doing so. >> and it wasn't bad until like i said the storm surge came in and the water rose so quickly that i ran for higher ground and then, some guy picked me up in a vehicle, and we stopped at the publix and got stranded up there in the vehicle. >> if it wasn't for the guy where would you go? >> anywhere, but here because i was stuck in a trailer and water was rising. must have raised at least 12 feet inside. >> and he told us he could not swim, making it a frightening ordeal. and people are handed water, ice, volunteer efforts taking place pt bryant when we were interviewing him received a large package of goods from a person in a truck who drove up

from miami. neil: just to show you the damage done. no particular community than sanibel island seemed to suffer the most disproportionately, some of the priciest real estate in the country. two-thirds of the home there, we're told have been destroyed. responsible for two injuries and at least a dozen deaths. passageways in and out of sanibel including cause ways that were ruptured and a pier that were destroyed have made getting back there next to impossible, if anyone is there at all. we'll keep you posted on that and some second guessing going on. a lot of, maybe newcomers to florida are saying, well, you know, it's a beautiful state, low taxes, certainly low crime, but i forgot about the storm thing. gary, one of those who went to the state years and years ago, decades ago when his kids were just little. now, with maybe some words to pick up here for those who are

thinking that florida is not worth it. you've heard that, a lot of people saying, woiment wait a minute, i love everything about the state, but this happens. >> i would say, people, business and capital will flow where it's best even with the hurricanes and we've experienced some doozies and i think i told you yesterday i was down there helping out with andrew, when south miami was leveled and you think to yourself, how is this ever come back? boy, it came back in droves. the same thing with the for the fort myers and the sanibel area. and we have everything in the state good for it, the low taxes, weather the beaches, great people, great diversity of people and the heroics and the volunteers have no bias on helping and you're seeing it everywhere. the first thing i did when i

thought it was safe, i went out in my car and all i saw was a bunch of people getting out of their cars and moving, helping to moving trees, moving things and helping other people. so, it's at work and it's going to get better hopefully quickly. >> in the orlando area, you've seen it built up tremendously with disney world, lego world, sea world. i don't see that changing anytime soon, but they were disrupted this week. that's what a storm will do. they're gradually coming back, i believe that disney is coming back. does it give people pause? does it give guys like you pause? >> it doesn't give me pause and every time i fly back into orlando international airport from anywhere around the globe, neil, there are parents and children wearing mouse ears or harry potter shirts, i don't think that it's going to change.

we are a magnet for tourism, a magnet for business and a magnet for people looking for just a great place to be. and i can tell you for the next-- we're already 85 and sunny right now. the good news, it's going to be that way for the next week and that's going to help with what's happening, especially in southwest florida and here in orlando, which we got hit decently in some places, again, there will be people that think for a second, but i just don't think it's going to change and we've seen it before. i remember '04 we got three hurricanes in a row in central florida and you think it's going to change, but it didn't, we just got stronger and better and bigger as we move forward. neil: all right. gary, i think that people needed to hear that. and to echo some things of the dislocating going on in florida. and we're following closely the surge in the myakk river, and

it's closed down a portion of i-75 an hour south of tampa. it's in both directions. if you're trying to get in or through that area, they'll reroute you. and especially if it's a levee. it does not appear to be. the governor's office says it does not appear to be the case. it doesn't matter if you're driving there and realize, oh, i have to get off the road. it doesn't matter the cause, it's terribly inconvenience. we're passing down to the residents in both directions, got to find another way if your trying to get to the naples area or fort myers points north and south for the time being. we want to look at how the state is handled at a state level. the governor's getting high marks and so is the president of the united states working with the governor. as you know, they're from two, very, very different parties and they might be challenging each other. a couple of years for the the white house. don't want to get ahead of

others there. and alex, i'm hearing the president wants to visit florida presumably sometime next week. what are you hearing on that front? >> yeah, that's right. president biden says he intends to visit the state when he's not in the way of the federal and state response effort. so that could be as early as next week and we'll see when he does do that, those images of him and governor desantis working together. you know, the optics of that will be really interesting, as you mentioned, because they could be the 2024 political match-up. they're already kind of political rivals going into this situation. we did see them working together after the awful surfside, florida building collapse and they appeared on the ground together there. this is another opportunity for them to appear together. so far their coordination has been good. they've been speaking on the phone multiple times so i think they'll be able to put their

political differences aside for this in-person visit as well. neil: i wonder, as well, you know, alex, if we've learned a lot from katrina and that experience, where you had a republican president and a democratic governor, democratic mayor and they were at each other's throats and all of that. we learned a lot there that there's little time for sniping and fighting and for everyone to get on the same page. so far that appears to be the case, how long? >> it's so interesting, because a week ago, ron desantis was getting criticized by the white house for migrant flights and leaned into culture wars that the white house has been critical of him for. so now, within days, put their political differences aside to handle this situation, and i think it shows real leadership from desantis to want to work with the white house. real leadership from the white house to not care about the rivalry that they have going on, but i think time will tell

if voters, how they respond to this. if they like to see this kind of leadership and putting aside differences or if they think that, you know, desantis should be ignoring the president in that kind of a situation or what? we saw with governor chris christie and new jersey in 2012. neil: right. >> he really felt the ire from republicans when he was photographed with former president obama on the ground after hurricane sandy and it came up during the presidential primary. and he was really criticized and questioned about it. so we'll see if desantis faces that situation. neil: i thought it was unfair to governor christy, the great hug they called it, there was never a hug, but they were looking as this case in sandy, how that could politically boomerang is beyond me. but we live in an environment that's more divisive today, that's why i was asking if the

common nicety stops and soon and finger pointing if there is problem with the rebuilding and regrouping in georgia. >> i think if there's problems, if there's issues with how much federal funding is coming in versus state funding and if there's power grab one way or another, rebuilding, there's plenty of room for the rivalry to sneak back in there and also, immigration, abortion, everything these culture wars are still on the forefront, that when will desantis kind of snap back and want to talk about that again and get the response out from the white house again. so, all of those issues aren't going away. it's a matter of how long can this kind of moment of calm and cooperation last for? >> to rise above it to your point. alex, good seeing you again. all right. >> thank you. neil: we're focused on florida here, but of course south carolina m a lot to deal with itself, including charleston

which was originally supposed to be the ground zero for this thing. it wasn't. but that didn't mean it completely escaped the wrap of ian, let's go to doug lousader in charleston, south carolina. hey, doug. >> the boat behind me fared pretty well in charleston. the boat owners were fortunate though because to your point, if ian had held the track we initially thought it would, the scene would look much different this morning and they seemed to have weathered the storm fairly well. it's rougher up the coast of south carolina. let's take you to north myrtle beach. we saw significant flooding and significant wind as well. a number of piers, four piers were taken out there along the coast and for folks that went through the storm here, it felt like an eternity. >> just didn't move. it seemed to be stuck on us for

a while and blowing and blowing and moved on. it was a scary deal. >> back here in charleston, we saw power crews out almost immediately and by all indications, they have moved heaven and earth to get power restored to a lot of folks today. and as far as the roads are concerned, they're all pretty passable. now, the city charleston said 66 road closures and almost all have been resolved and about an hour ago, neil, the airport reopened as well. things are returning to normal. i think it's fair to say that charleston, even though there was some damage, there was some flooding in some areas, they feel like they dodged the bullet here. neil: indeed they did. doug, thank you, very, very much. here, doug luzader. >> and in florida, max, you know, when you look behind you, of course, it could have been a lot worse, but it was still

pretty bad. >> yeah, you know, this storm coming ashore as a category 4 hurricane on the coast of florida, scenes of devastation all over fort myers area where we are. we're standing at the food and water distribution center by the cajun navy, they take their personal watercraft out to help people. they're trying to help people, a lot of folks in need and there's a big need for food and water, there isn't enough of it. so i want to bring in a volunteer here with the cajun navy, elizabeth. thank you for being here and thank you so much for the work you're doing. you're a college student and you decided to come down and help, why? >> i honestly heard that they needed help and i was seeing pictures and hearing about the things going ton and i just, my heart felt tugged and i wanted to help as much as i could, so when my friend chandler said hey, come with me, i did.

>> what are the scenes and what is it like. >> i've been seeing heartbreaking scenes and devastation, trees on houses and in the middle of the road cars and boats flipped over and gut wrenching to see. >> when you see the need, how many people are lined up? we've seen hundreds of cars lined up here to get food and water. what's that like for you? >> yeah, it's just, i mean, it's been so cool to see everybody just come together to help this community, being an outsider, i've been completely awed at the support we've gotten, seeing the hundreds of people in line that need food and water and being able to help them has been so amazing. i look at the team that we have and i'm proud of everyone. >> a volunteer with the cajun navy here in the fort myers area. if you want to help, go cajun november navy.org. and a scene of need in the fort myers area,

so many people without power and basic supplies, rule is hard to come by. a long road. neil: you've been reported that just getting water has proven difficult and certainly not enough to go around. >> yes, absolutely, i mean, store shelves have been stripped of water, that's a big need for a lot of folks here, and you know, they need that donation supply. the i-75 closure has been a real hindrance to getting those supplies because well, it's a main artery along the west coast of florida and haven't been able to get the trucks in here. there's a lot of need here, neil. neil: there is indeed. thank you, very very much. max gordon in florida. he's referring to i-75 closed in a 14-mile zone both ways because of surging of the myakka river. it's an hour south of tampa, but it's a major artery to get to key locals there, closed both ways as long as the surging of water.

some say because of a water main break, and others say a levee break. there's no indication of that, but flooding and surging water, it's easing now because of sunny conditions we're told. and we hope that continues and the ceo of the whole state of florida, jimmy, good to have you back. how are things looking for florida collectively right now? >> so, neil, i'm going to be very frank with you. this is about my seventh year in this type of a capacity dealing with disasters in the state. this is going to be the biggest disaster in the history of the state of florida. we've sent unprecedented resources in over 11 urban search and rescue teams. the state of florida has eight times which are bringing in resources from other states. fema has been very supportive, met with the administrator yesterday, but we've got over a thousand skilled urban search and rescue team members on the

job working in 12-hour shifts. it's the most massive effort we've ever been a part of. neil: what we're hearing, jimmy, while it might not be the biggest storm ever. it will easily be the most expensive, i don't know in inflation adjusted terms, but related damages that are obligated are approaching $50 billion. could be a lot more. what can you tell us? >> so, again, right now 100% of my energy has been focused on urban search of rescue in my office. neil: understood. >> we're setting up-- what's been great, we'll start our insurance villages this week and the initial role they're going to play and remember, hurricane michael hit my hometown of panama city and this is fresh on my mind and we'll see set up insurance villages where typically a carrier will write a quick check, a limited expense check

and 10 grand, 15 grand, a place to get yourself settled until we can get out and adjust the claim, so the carriers, there's a reason why they call these disasters. the carriers, we're setting up in car dealership parking lots, and we've got a number of the employers on the phones with insurance insurance companies all the day today and mobilizing because they want to help people, too. we're all in this together and they've got a huge role to play in the fiscal recovery, but right now, 100% of my energy is on the humanitarian recovery. >> you've got your priorities right. let me tell you about the people whose homes were destroyed and they can't get to them and get the information to their insurance. what do they do? >> so, here is some. problems that we've got. you know, verizon, t-mobile, at&t, their networks have just-- it's been catastrophic, in some cases fatally hit. we saw this with michael, so i've been leaning forward with the carriers, my expectations,

i want on my desk every hour update statuses on where your tower recoveries are. what's happened, these diesel generators at the bases of the towers, they are running out of gas. if i can't get gas to the generators because of them needing to make this, we're clearing roads to make sure they can get gas to generators and allows my urban search and rescue teams to report back on every house they've checked on. so it's a pretty amazing information sharing as they will go from house to house, but again, this is the-- this is a hurricane michael by about times two, times three. fort myers beach is probably one of the most devastating sights of catastrophic buildings i've seen in my life, again, this is why we need-- with the best part of talking with one of our team leaders, i don't mean to be emotional, but worry about what they're going

through, jimmy, you forget about the upside, we're pulling off people that survived. they feed off the success of the lives they're saving now. neil: you've said it beautifully, jimmy. nothing i can say to top it. good luck to my friend and the people of florida putting up with this, they'll get through this and inspire the nation as they speak. fox news continues. living with type 2 diabetes, i want to keep it real and talk about some risks. with type 2 diabetes you have up to 4 times greater risk of stroke, heart attack, or death. even at your a1c goal, you're still at risk ...which if ignored could bring you here... ...may put you in one of those... ...or even worse. too much? that's the point. get real about your risks and do something about it. talk to your health care provider about ways to lower your risk of stroke, heart attack, or death. learn more at getrealaboutdiabetes.com i'm william shatner. i've been around a long time but i'm truly humbled and i see the real battles our brave, paralyzed veterans have faced

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>> this is a fox weather alert. the sheriff's office in sarasota county, florida, issuing an alert this morning of a possible levee break sending deputies door-to-door in the hidden river community to advise evacuation, in 14 miles of a major interstate in the area, i-75 now shut down and deemed unsafe for travel as water rises from a nearby river. >> and hundreds of thousands now without power across southwestern florida and south carolina as hurricane ian has now weakened t