daylight is expected to bring a scene of heavy damage this morning as hurricane matthew begins to batter parts of the southern atlantic coast. the storm has weakened to a category 3 overnight, but at its peak, packed winds of 130 miles an hour as it approached florida, georgia, and the carolinas. >> it's the most powerful storm in over a decade after killing well over 100 people and by some accounts at least 300 across the caribbean. whipping winds, torrential rain, and a vicious storm surge had governors and law enforcement, the white house, and our friends at the weather channel warning of the worst. >> if you need to evacuate and you haven't, evacuate. the storm will kill you. time is running out. >> storm surges are going to go much further inland than people realize. >> currents and the ocean and

the surge, if people do foolish things, there could be loss of life and that's what we do not want to happen. >> we need to take this situation seriously. it is not something where we should jeopardize anyone's life simply because we don't want to heed the warnings. >> there are those who doubt the intensity or severity of this storm, they need only look at the images that are coming back from haiti. >> this group many of us have dealt with storms in the past, charlie, francis, jean, wilma, this is like none of those. >> i'm not saying this to be theatrical, you all know me, i don't lean towards bravado, i asked my captain today, do you have body bags, are you prepared for mass causalities, because if people do not leave and we get 140 miles an hour wind gusts in mobile home places, we're going to have fatalities.

>> this is like no storm in the record books. we're concerned about people deciding to stay in areas under mandatory evacuation orders. this is a mistake, this is not hype. this is not hyperbole, and i am not kidding. i cannot overstate the danger of the storm. >> well, thousands of people took that advice and made for safer ground, but others decided to stay to ride out that storm and hope matthew weakens as it comes ashore. >> good morning, everybody, it is friday, october 7th. we have a lot to show you with morning, i'm betty nguyen alongside alex witt. the strongest hurricane to hit the u.s. coast in a decade is showing signs of weakening, downgraded overnight to a category 3. the danger, though, has not subsided as the eye wall is just five miles off the coastline. florida residents are bracing for landfall from a storm that is about to push along the i-95 corridor from cape canaveral to jacksonville. after speaking individually from governors along the southern

atlantic coast, president obama signed emergency declarations in florida, georgia, and south carolina as the storm approached. the president also spoke with governor pat mccrory in north carolina, activating federal and local responders, but the most massive action has taken place in florida, where wind gusts have reached 88 miles an hour near satellite beach, 71 miles per hour in vero beach, and 74 miles per hour to the north of bear foot bay, which is the first to reach hurricane strength. florida governor rick scott urged the 1.5 million residents in the storm's path to evacuate, evacuate, evacuate, and many have heeded his calls. . let's go to bill karins who took just a couple of hours off and now you're back. let's check out where matthew is now and how dangerous is it? when you left work to get sleep it was a category 4, now it's a category 3. the word just doesn't belong in there, right? >> no, not when you're talking

majors, category 3s can be devastating blow, still doing significant damage. in terms of how the storm is going to be viewed overall. yesterday morning at this time i was leaning more towards historic. we were thinking category 4 on the coast, moving up the coast, so there has been some good. we have a category 3 major hurricane just off the coast and that's only a difference of about ten to 15 miles and that's fantastic. some people have been spared overnight. there are going to be people waking up this morning from about the melbourne, florida, area, ft. lauderdale, west palm beach, you are thrilled you did not get significant damage and this was a little further off the coast for you. that does not mean the storm cannot be historic for our friends from daytona beach northwards, but we are happy for our friends, a lot still don't have power, but you weren't destroyed. that's what we were fearing with the category 4. currently, this is a new update,

winds at 120 miles per hour. it's 40 miles east/southeast of cape canaveral, florida. just off coast, but still haven't seen any hurricane sustained winds even close to that onshore, so power outages with the tropical storm force winds, but don't get roof damage and significant roof damage with only tropical storm force winds. here's the new path. wilmington, myrtle beach, charleston, savannah, hilton head area, you are still staring at this, very nervous. evacuated, as you should have. if you're still thinking about it, you should. the storm surge is going to be the issue. even though you see it going from a 3 to a 2, it's going to be very close to the coast and because of the angle of approach, it's moving along the florida coast. that's avoided the storm surge to the south of the eye. once it gets up here, those winds are piling onshore. that water is not able to escape. that's why the worst storm surge is going to be later today, into tonight.

he's the radar image. eye safely off the coast. the hurricane force winds are in this core right in here. as of now we haven't had that onshore, and that has prevented a lot of the horrible damage with that. notice the path it took, this black line. this was the saving grace, this jog it took around yesterday afternoon. that really helped us out. we take the black line, the forecast that's been tracking and we're going to parallel the coast today. as we watch this western eye wall here, it's getting very close to areas around the cape canaveral area. that may rake up to daytona beach. so wind damage, but not catastrophic wind damage. as far as the storm surge goes, i need to change some of these numbers. notice the storm surge is really worse northwards. you get the red coloring in here, that's possibly to a ten-foot storm surge and that's starting to happen right now. brevard county has been okay so

far, a lot less damage. coco beach, melbourne, palm bay, you were thinking you were the epicenter, so far you've avoided that and are looking better by the hour. still could get the storm surge from new smyrna beach, st. augustine, this red in here is very worrisome. as we go through this afternoon and tonight, look at our friends in georgia. if you look closer, see if i can zoom in here, this gets a little bit pink once you get into the back water. as i said, this water is not going to be allowed to escape. some of the worst flooding is going to be in between brunswick and savannah, back bays in here, that's up to a foot of water in the storm surge. yes, it hasn't been historic as it possibly could have overnight areas to the south, but we are not done, not even close. our friends from hilton head northwards, this is the orange, that's seven feet of water that's still going to move in with the storm surge as we go throughout. that won't happen mostly until later on tonight, saturday

morning. north carolina, the forecast still looks improved for you, especially wilmington northwards. of course, 12 million people under hurricane warnings, so i'll let you fire away some questions if you like and i can try to touch on what your concerns are if you heard anything i was talking about. >> bill, i do want to speak on behalf of cocoa beach. you may have heard last hour, the mayor was so concerned because so many residents had not headed the warning to evacuate, yet he had to pull all the first responders off the streets because it's too dangerous to be out there and it's going to be a while before the winds die down to 45 miles an hour. are you saying you're hopeful at least in cocoa beach they've dodged the worst of it? >> when i say dodged the worst of it, they've dodged a catastrophe. they are still going to have a lot of cleanup, power outages a couple days it's possible in that area. my aunt lives down there, and, you know, this is the melbourne area here. they are almost parallel now with the eye.

the conditions you're experiencing and waking up to right now in areas of brevard county is as bad as it's going to get. it really won't get any worse than now. the eye won't get any closer to you. whatever you experienced, the howling you hear now, the winds have been in the 50 to 70 mile per hour range, that's it. maybe if you're lucky, if you haven't lost power yet, you may not lose it. that's still a little hope for some people. that's as close as it's going to get to the area, and they shouldn't be out there in winds like this. this is the peak of the storm for them. come, say, 11:00 a.m. this morning, this eye should be far enough north they should get a good assessment of last night. >> okay, bill karins, thank you for that. gadi schwartz is covering the storm from titusville, florida. what's it like there right now? >> reporter: we're seeing the effects of hurricane matthew as it comes in to titusville. right now this is one of the marinas. you see the docks are just kind of flexing with this water

that's starting to surge up and down, up and down. then over here, that's a bad sign right there, that sailboat. some of its sail has begun to unfurl and it's knocking that boat against the other sailboats here in this marina. if you take a listen, this is the howl of hurricane matthew as it barrels in. absolutely deafening out here. the storm surge is starting to rise. we still haven't seen the worst of hurricane matthew. it's expected to get worse over the next 45 minutes to two or three hours. watch your back here. watch out. let's fall back just a little bit. we're starting to get soaked, the water's definitely coming up. right now this isn't the actual coast, this is the indian river. the marina sits on the

intercoastal highway, so there's an island and then there's a whole river that's protecting us from the ocean proper, but you can still see the effects of hurricane matthew out here, very, very strong. back to you. >> all right, that was nbc's ga tee schwartz there. let's go to st. augustine, florida, now and we see the rains have been pounding you for a lot of the evening. what's the situation there right now? >> reporter: well, the rain is starting to stop a little bit, and i probably spoke too soon, it will pick up again, but the wind is really powerful. i'm really having to steady myself. if you can look out here at the bay front, the water, i know it's a little dark, but the water is coming up on to the sidewalk over there, right under the bridge, if you can see the waves, that is the biggest i have seen it all morning, and this is also the most consistent

that i have felt this wind. it has kind of been coming and going all morning, but as it gets more powerful, it stays that way, and that is exactly why this entire area was under a mandatory evacuation. it's why there's a curfew in place. because of this so close to them and the powerful storm surges and wind that's expected to intensify. >> seems the storm surge is many times the biggest threat there. as far as the evacuations you talked about, did people heed the warning? >> reporter: okay, in st. john's county, st. augustine and the county that surrounds it, there are 1,700 people in shelters in this county and 300 pets. one of the shelters is full

right now with 500 people, so people really filled those up overnight at the last minute really. i would say most of st. augustine has evacuated. st. augustine is the biggest risk right now for st. john's county, however, there are a lot of people who are staying here still, and the reason is, because if you don't know, st. augustine is the oldest city in our nation, and a lot of people are very emotionally tied to st. augustine. their homes have been passed down in their families, they've been here for over 100 years. people are very connected to the city, there's a resiliency in the city, the mayor was talking to me about it yesterday, but because of that people feel they can wait out the storm and trust their homes to protect them. the problem is, the fire chief told me they do not believe there's a single living person in this county who has ever seen

a storm this big, says it's unprecedented, so for people to trust those old structures really made him very emotional to even think about it, because he was just begging everyone to leave. >> yeah, unfortunately, that can be a losing bet depending on the structure. shelby danielson, thank you for that report. alex? >> let's head to jacksonville, florida, where gabe gutierrez is standing by. what's it like? >> reporter: good morning, we're here, starting to see some rain, as well as some wind, wind only about 15 to 20 mile an hour so far, but that will increase throughout the day. here in jacksonville, as in much of the rest of florida, the local officials had urged people to evacuate. the mayor here in jacksonville ordered 450,000 people to evacuate. here's the thing, in florida you would think many communities have dealt with strong hurricanes before, but here in the jacksonville area, this area

has not been impacted by a storm this strong since 1898. definitely concern here. not so much the winds, with the eye staying offshore, the northeast quadrant will stay offshore, but the devastating storage surge, so we expect to see it throughout the day. the winds are expected to pick up here, bringing this water on to the shore and the question will be, how far east will it track off the coast and how devastating will the storm surge be, so, again, right now we're seeing winds about 15, 20 mile an hour and starting to see some of that rain. in the next coming hours there's a lot of concern from local officials about how matthew could impact jacksonville. back to you. >> let me ask you very quickly, how long until you think you're at the worst of it? if i look at a map right here of the coastline and with it right now bearing down on the melbourne, cocoa beach area, there's a way to go and this

thing's tracking pretty slowly. >> reporter: yeah, that's the thing with matthew. we followed him for a long time, alex, i was in haiti a few days ago and this is a stubborn storm, slow moving. so we're not expecting the worst of it to hit until this afternoon, into the evening hours here in the jacksonville area. again, right now just some steady rain. local officials wanted late last night, they said if you had -- didn't want you to leave anymore, stay where you are, they have been urging people to evacuate, now they are urging people to stay where they are and hunker down and ride this thing out. alex? >> at least there's a heads-up. thank you, gabe gutierrez. the official death toll has reached at least 128 this morning, 122 in haiti alone, but by some counts, it is much higher. and the country's embassy expects the numbers to rise because some areas are inaccessible right now. look at this aerial video. it shows the storm left a broad path of devastation.

homes and buildings torn apart, many areas remain flooded at this hour and the damage was quite extensive in other areas of the caribbean. checking out the bahamas, flooding, downed trees, damaged rooftops and according to the hurricane center in miami, nassau was hit with winds of 140 miles an hour yesterday, enough to rip the roof off of this home. look at that. that's pretty terrifying. authorities in the bahamas have not reported any immediate deaths at this hour, but we'll see as the assessments come out what's happened there. let's get more coming up, including the major travel troubles caused by the storm. the latest on the nationwide flight cancellations. the impact is already being felt on the 2016 campaign trail. those stories and weather when we come right back. (vo) stank face.

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hanging in here, but you can get a sense of how this wind is just raking us here in central florida, and this is what's heading up the coast, those of you in savannah and st. simons and up towards charleston, you're all under hurricane warnings. hurricane warning was extended through charleston at 5:00. and with good reason. >> welcome back, everybody. we are watching rain bands from hurricane matthew begin to pummel florida's east coast. while the storm has been downgraded to a category 3, the big concern is the storm surge. it is still very much a threat. sustained winds are still in the neighborhood of 130 miles per hour, and we've seen just how bad it can be, laying waste to haiti. nationwide hurricane matthew has forced airlines to cancel more than 3,000 flights and at this point those cancellations have extended out as far as saturday. the first major airport to close yesterday was in ft. lauderdale

around 10:30 a.m. it's expected to open back up at 11:00 this morning. miami international airport closed at noon yesterday. airport officials there say operations are expected to gradually resume today. let's go to ft. lauderdale, shall we, to get the latest there on the ground is nbc news correspondent blake mccoy. what are you seeing there, blake? >> reporter: well, betty, good morning. the reason the airport here is reopening this morning at 11:00 is because conditions have improved dramatically from where they were last night. the storm was not as bad here as we were expecting, in fact, the last tropical storm warning has now been lifted for ft. lauderdale, so miami and ft. lauderdale at this point are in the clear as that storm has made its way up. the mayor here says there has been very minimal damage, because the eye of the hurricane ended up staying about 100 miles offshore from ft. lauderdale, so while we did see outer bands bring wind and rain, the most severe stayed offshore and that's what they are seeing now

in the central coast of florida. so this morning they are working to restore power to about 11,000 people, but the airports are reopening and we're told that it's going to be start looking like business as usual in south florida as focus now turns to the north. betty? >> looks like you guys definitely dodged a bullet in miami and ft. lauderdale. blake mccoy, thank you, blake. >> betty, there's another big story popping up this morning, being malaysia confirmed debris found came from the missing flight 370. more on that. also more coverage as hurricane matthew begins to make its way up the southeastern coast. back in a moment. when i started designing a bronx tale: the musical, i came up... ...with this idea of four towers that we fire escapes... ...essentially. i'll build a little model in photoshop and add these... ...details in with a pen. i could never do that with a mac. i feel like my job is... ...to put out there just enough detail to spur the audiences... ...imagination to fill in all the blanks.

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hurricane matthew has forced the closure of three of the world's most popular tourist attractions, all closed their doors early yesterday and will be closed all day today, which is a rare move for parks typically open 365 days out of the year. disney closing for only the fourth time ever, encouraged guests staying in their hotels to stay indoors. restaurants will be open and cancellation fees have been waived. universal orlando is a company owned by nbc news. southeastern conference has made schedule changes, as well. the lsu-florida game has been postponed and the saturday night matchup between georgia and south carolina is going to be played sunday afternoon instead.

meanwhile in the acc, miami and florida state will for now be played as scheduled in miami. still ahead, following the latest on hurricane matthew's path up the coast of florida. we're going to have live reports from several areas across the state. and bill karins will join us once again for a check on the storm's path. we'll be right back. my name is barbara and i make dog chow natural. now that i work there, i value the food even more. i feed it to yoshi because there are no artificial colors, preservatives and it's made with real chicken. i'm so proud to make dog chow natural in davenport, iowa.

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people along the coast of the southeastern u.s. are waking up this morning as hurricane

matthew continues to hammer florida with daylight comes some good news, though, as the storm loses some of its punch, but remains a major threat because of storm surge. good morning to all of you, it is friday, october 7th. i'm alex witt alongside betty nguyen and we begin with new information on this breaking news we've been following for you all night long. the national hurricane center says matthew is moving just offshore of the east coast of florida. it has been downgraded to a category 3. the danger is still very real, though. 120 mile per hour winds paralleled the coastline with an 88 mile per hour gust recorded near satellite beach. the western eye wall now approaching cape canaveral, it is pushing along the i-95 corridor into jacksonville. after speaking individually from governors along the southern atlantic coast, president obama signed emergency declarations in florida, georgia, and south carolina. the president also spoke with governor pat mccrory in north carolina, who declared a state

of emergency in all 100 counties of his state, thereby activating federal and local responders. >> as you know, alex, the strongest winds are battering florida. gusts up to 74 miles per hour north the vero beach, close to barefoot bay. florida governor rick scott urged the 1.5 million residents in the storm's path to evacuate, evacuate, evacuate. that was a direct quote, and many have heeded his calls, thankfully, packing into shelters like this one in palm beach county. about 250 people and nearly as many pets hunkered down for the worst effects. others rushed into service. 3500 national guard troops. >> as we check out the latest count for power outages, it stands over 297,000, affecting customers in florida. overnight governor scott asked people to charge all smartphones while they still have power. the national hurricane center

sends push notifications during the storm, do not ignore, it could save your life, according to the governor. let's get the latest on the storm, we bring in meteorologist bill karins. where is it now and how slowly is it moving? >> moving north/northwest at 13 miles per hour. that's a decent clip, not too slow, not too fast. overnight the trend was just a little further off the coast. we've really spared the disaster we were afraid of from the space coast, southwards. we have minor damage, tree damage, roof damage, but not extensive damage, and we avoided that storm surge. that's great. 120 mile per hour winds. major hurricane over the top of cape canaveral, just reported 100 mile per hour wind gusts out there on the space coast, so there are serious winds near the center of the storm. this is the new updated forecast. yesterday at this time this line was at the coast, that's why we were looking at possibly a category 4 right on the coast.

now category 3, makes a world of difference and has so far, but as we go through the rest of today, the possibility of that destruction and damage is not over with yet. i want to show you computer models and one of the things we've been noticing, they've been a little off. if the models start off, the solutions they are going to give us will be off. this is the position of the hurricane right now. all of our computers started their initialization of where they started their equations closer to the coast, so all of these lines like this, these have trended offshore, too. on a hurricane, the strongest winds are on the northeast side. this is keeping all the strongest winds off the coast. we no longer think this is going to be historic for wind damage or major for wind damage. may be a minor to moderate on a hurricane scale as far as wind damage goes. one thing of great concern is approach to the coastal areas here from georgia and all of south carolina, all models still think it's close, even if it is offshore, angle pushes the water towards the coast and storm surge is still a big issue.

here's the center of the storm and you can see the eye. if you're going to get hurricane winds, you have to be in the eye and that is right here, buffeting up now close to the space coast. the winds are as high as they are going to get right now in the melbourne area, cocoa beach. seen gusts 60 to 70 mile per hour range. that's enough to do some damage, but not catastrophic damage. we're going to take this parallel to the coast. this westerly eye, which will have winds from about probably 60 to 80 miles per hour is what's going to be arriving day break and right up the coast throughout the day today. that's the bottom line with that, biggest thing we're watching is going to be the possibility of the storm surge, guys, that's my biggest concern. we think we could get that seven to 12 feet storm surge off the coast. here's the last graphic, the hurricane force winds, that shows you where they are located, tropical storm gusts so far for daytona beach. >> seven to 12 feet. >> you've been talking about this storm surge since the beginning. hasn't backed off.

>> no, this is the latest projecti projections, seven to 12 feet along the coast, this is what's happening shortly. water is already starting to come up. throughout the day it will get higher and higher. we'll see pictures throughout the day. if we're going to get this to be a billion dollar weather disaster, this is what's going to cause it. >> speaking of the live pictures, bill, let's go to jacksonville, florida, where gabe gutierrez is. gabe, what are you experiencing there? >> reporter: hi there, betty, good morning. we have winds now about 20 miles an hour or so. we've been seeing a steady rain over the last hour or so, picks up every few minutes and dies back down. this is the st. johns river behind me. we expect storm surge to be a major issue throughout the day, as bill was saying here, thankfully this is starting to take a bit of a track further to the east by just a bit. the wind damage isn't a concern here. the concern is possibly double digit storm surge here in jacksonville. the mayor ordered 450,000 people

to evacuate from the beaches, several evacuation zones, emergency shelters. right now, thankfully, we have power from the looks of it, city still has power. not expecting the worst of it to come through until the afternoon here in the jacksonville area. that's when we expect the winds in the early afternoon to get up around 70, 80 miles an hour and for the storm surge to really kick into gear. this area had not seen any impact from a category 4 storm since 1898. a lot of people think florida is used to hurricanes. well, not quite this strong, at least not here in this area. we drove down here from the atlanta area yesterday afternoon. we got here around midnight, and the -- we had noticed that there wasn't much rain here at midnight, the winds had started to pick up. only within the last hour or two we've been starting to see the rain start in jacksonville. again, emergency responders are urging people at this point to stay home. if they haven't already gotten

somewhere, they wanted them to hunker down, to charge their devices, and really be prepared for whatever the storm brings. we expect the worst of it later on this afternoon, into this evening, into the nighttime hours. betty, back to you. >> gabe, thank you. alex? >> gadi schwartz is covering the storm from titusville, florida, and filed this report a short time ago. take a look. >> reporter: here in titusville the winds are definitely picking up. you're starting to see debris here on the roads. a lot of these are palm fronts. we're not going to be going further, they are very, very heavy right now. over here, marina there, a lot of boats getting battered by the storm and just down the road there is a mobile home park. down this road there is a senior citizens home that has been evacuated. about 100 senior citizens have been taken to, we believe,

orlando. right now these conditions as you can see are getting much more hairy, so we're going to fall back a bit, have an update in just a bit. >> just a little bit of what's been going on there overnight. in the meantime, the u.s. military has mobilized for hurricane matthew. take a look at this tweet from the florida national guard. it went viral yesterday showing residents on one side of the highway moving out while service members on the other side moving in. the florida national guard has activated 2500 soldiers and airmen, south carolina has activated 2,000 troops and south carolina has 300 so far. the u.s. navy is also in the mix, uss mesa verde, uss george washington is headed to haiti and usns comfort is ready if needed. a senior new york official told nbc news yesterday that new york task force 1 will hit to areas hit today, the same unit

that went to hurricane katrina back in 2005, as well as haiti following the earthquake in 2010. that unit is comprised of members of the new york fires and police departments, trained in disaster response and first aid. and some stunning pictures to show you from nasa. hurricane matthew from the iss, international space station, just barrelling towards the florida coast after hitting the bahamas. the space station also sent back these pictures of its flyover late yesterday. look at this, massive storm there. nasa keeping a close eye on the storm, as are we all. >> just remarkable what it looks like from space. hurricane matthew is bringing damaging wind and rains and irony, as well, with it. gosr, being touted as a game changer in america's weather satellite coverage is in titusville, florida, it is expected to launch november 4th and this week teams were reportedly building tents over the satellite as extra

protection of the storm. the satellite is being held in a building that can withstand up to category 4 hurricane conditions, so that is a bit of good news there. still ahead this morning -- >> before nightfall, highways leading inland from the beaches were jammed. 1 million people were asked to evacuate along florida's heavily populated gold coast, but not everyone left. >> there's a lot of people staying, which is kind of out of this, i don't think anybody should stay in this area. >> reporter: authorities wrn warned residents, seas up to ten feet above normal and the possibility of tornados, as well. >> so you saw those cars on the road there. well, they were preparations from 24 years ago as florida prepared to weather hurricane andrew. >> with that storm came political ramifications, too. we'll talk about the history of that when we continue our coverage of hurricane matthew.

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this morning we're getting

an up-close look at the inner workings of this storm, this thanks to the brave men and women who fly right into the middle of these meteorological monsters. released this new video of the hurricane hunter team on a very turbulent flight right through the eye wall of hurricane matthew into the eye of the storm. teams like this one take on these dangerous missions. they try to help gather critical data and figure out where this storm is headed. the crew collects information that is difficult for satellites to measure, things like wind speed, temperature, air pressure, and other variables. and our hats off to them, because that's one hell of a job there. hurricane matthew is the latest in a long line of storms that have impacted the u.s. presidency. in august 1992, hurricane andrew slammed right into the florida coast, causing nearly $27 billion in damage. soon after, president george h.w. bush toured the impacted region but was criticized by some for reacting too slowly with federal aid.

days later, bill clinton also surveyed the scene and said the federal government's delayed reaction should be looked into. despite the criticism, a new york times/cbs poll say 61% of voters approved of bush's handling of the disaster. bush's son, george w. bush, would not be judged as kindly for his handling of a similar disaster. in 2005, hurricane katrina ravaged the gulf coast and the bush administration's response was widely criticized throughout the country. 54% of americans disapproved and his approval rating dropped to a new low of 42%. bush would later call his infamous flyover a huge mistake. years later, yet another hurricane would impact u.s. politics. days before the 2012 presidential election, hurricane sandy made landfall in the northeast, causing unprecedented damage in the region. many supporters of republican nominee mitt romney were irked when new jersey governor chris christie warmly greeted

president obama upon his arrival to survey all the damage. christie was asked about the encounter as recently as february of this year responding in part, i didn't hug him. bet betty? >> politics have already factored into 2016. president obama was criticized for remaining on vacation in martha's vineyard while louisiana residents were under water. donald trump and mike pence made a trip to baton rouge to survey the flood damage. hillary clinton said she would visit when the presence of a political campaign would not disrupt the response, but seven weeks later, she has still not visited the area. and still ahead, bill karins joins us with the latest on the path of matthew.

we've just got word the outer eye wall is approaching the indian river, situated right next to titusville, where we are right now. you're starting to see the sheeting here, the squall just pushing in, all of this rain is falling at a very alarming rate, a dangerous rate. in fact, we are told that it could be falling five to possibly eight inches. this is radar right here and you see the eye wall right there, and this is where we are. we're that blue dot. we're making our way south right now, so as we drive a little bit further south, it starts to pick

up. we get these pockets, like this one right there, it almost becomes whiteout conditions, then will lessen up. in the next 20, 30, 40 minutes we're going to start seeing consistent wind gusts, sustained hurricane strength wind gusts, as well as rain that is just falling at these incredible rates and possibly some flooding, so we're going to head further south and check in in a little bit. >> that was nbc's gadi schwartz from titusville, florida. bill karins, who's been tracking matthew. where's the storm right now? a lot of people are wondering when is it coming their way. >> just off the space coast. we just had an issue of what we call an extreme wind warning in melbourne out on the space coast. thankfully, no one lives out there. it's all military and the facility has been totally locked down and everyone has been evacuated from there, but they have issued a warning there for brevard county. they are very close to going

through the western eye wall. let me get a closer view here and get into the eye to show you what we're dealing with. there's a good view right there. okay, so here's the eye itself. you can notice, let's get a distance tracker. yesterday we were thinking this eye would be on the coast. it's shifted further off the coast, not by much. it's only about 35 miles, the center of it, off the coastline. we don't really care where the center. we care where the hurricane force winds are. from the cocoa beach, melbourne area, this is the western eye wall, 15 miles away from the cape canaveral area right off the coast, seven miles, from titusville you have further again. but we're going to take this and push it up the coast. this western eye wall is going to be very close, if not onshore throughout the entire day today through daytona beach and the jacksonville area. if that has 100 miles per hour winds in it, that's significant damage. the worst of the storm has spared from areas of melbourne,

southwards. yes, 300,000 people without power, but that should be downed trees and minor roof damage. haven't seen extreme destruction from winds. if we're going to get it, it's that there. that's one of the stories during the day today. this red shows where the gusts are currently located. we're going to take this and move it up the coastline through the morning. also ahead of it, see the red arrows, that's the wind direction. the storm surge is starting to be more of an issue than earlier because the eye is closer to the coast. we look just fine, the storm is parallel to the melbourne area. melbourne southwards we have the water from the indian river pushing up on the backside of the barrier islands. that's where you're seeing the water coming up, but the beaches are fine. to the north, highest concern, this ten to 12 foot of storm surge is starting to occur now from the daytona beach area and will increase and get worse throughout the day right up the coast. if you notice carefully, little

pink in here near hilton head island, back bays, that could be where the worst of it is throughout the night, early tomorrow morning. then we'll go through the same thing on saturday, all the beaches of south carolina. just because we've been spared melbourne southwards, this still has a chance to be a historic storm for florida, georgia, all of south carolina, and we haven't even addressed the potential for a lot of flooding, too. this is not storm surge, this is just from the rain itself. areas of the carolinas were wet throughout the month of september, ground is pretty saturated. they could pick up a foot to foot and a half of rain between now and sunday morning, especially areas right along the coast. that's going to cause a lot of problems. if you live near a river or stream, you may need to evacuate, too. even if you're not right along the coast with a forecast like that. we're not out of the woods. historic, major, moderate, minor, the wind damage may only be in the minor to moderate category when we're done, but

the storm surge still a chance to be major to historic. >> bill karins, thank you so much for that. still ahead, in the wake of hurricane andrew, florida made wholesale changes to its building codes, but this morning it may not be wind gusts that do the most damage as you heard there from bill karins. some of the scenarios the storm surge could play out when our breaking news coverage continues. glasses. yeah. well, we gotta hand it to fedex. ey've helped make our e-commerce so easy, and now wee getting all kinds of new customers. i know. can you believe we're getting orders from canada, ireland... this one's going to new zealand. new zealand? psst. ah, false alarm. hey! you guys are gonna scare away the deer! idiots... providing global access for small business. fedex.

hurricane force winds. 50, 65 miles an hour. it is a stinging horizontal rain whipping around. whoa, whoa. the reason i have to turn away, it's too painful, even with the glasses on. >> the weather channel's mike seidel there from ft. pierce, florida. joining me to talk about the storm surge, the storm surge could be catastrophic in some areas, correct? >> absolutely. this could be the story.

as people wake up, we should remind them there's nothing in existence as just a category 3 storm. let me show you what i'm looking at, especially the jacksonville area, this is going to be the story later today as this storm moves up towards the coast, you're looking at now possible effects of a category 1 storm, you're starting to see the red areas, water greater than nine feet above ground. this is a category 3 and we could see category 4 type surging, and as bill karins was saying, this is not flooding, this is just the storm surge, and what i can't simulate for you is how quickly storm surge happens. it happens in an instant and this is what kills more people in hurricanes than anything else, more than wind, more than the rain, is the storm surge. it was one of the major lessons, betty, that we learned after hurricane katrina. >> absolutely. heed the warnings, be careful out there, cal, thank you so much for that. and that's going to do it for this hour. don't go anywhere, because

msnbc's coverage of hurricane matthew continues right now. daylight is expected to bring a scene of heavy damage this morning as hurricane matthew begins to batter parts . the storm has weakened to a category 3 overnight but at its peak packed winds topping 130-mile-per-hour as it approached florida, georgia, and the carolinas. it's the most powerful storm to threaten the region in more than a decade after killing well over 100 people by some counts at least 300 across the caribbean. the combination of whipping winds, torrential rains and a vicious storm surge had officials warning for the worst. >> this storm will kill you. time is running out. >> storm surges are going to go much further inland than people realize. >> this is like none of thos