still be looking at a powerful storm as it looks to the north of florida but we're focussed today on the people in harm's way. the eye of the storm maybe 15 miles from key west and the lower florida keys. already being bat erred by hurricane irma, and it's setting its sights on the rest of the state. our live coverage continues for you in just a moment.

good sunday morning i'm chris jansing, live from new york at msnbc headquarters, 7:33 here on the east coast as we track hurricane irma now thrashing the lower florida keys. it is a dangerous category 4 storm. we saw the first hurricane-force winds there in the keys about 9:30 last night but now the brunt of it.

landfall will be when that eye reaches land. we don't have word of it yet but we know 94 miles an hour wind gusts have been hitting the area. they reached again the keys at the top of the hour with wind gusts maxing out, get this, 130 miles per hour. and if anything has kept emergency management officials up, it's about those storm surges. they're expected to cause major damage. some areas koultd see surges of up to 15 feet. the tampa bay area could be 5 feet of flooding. wind gusts and rain continue to strike the keys, more than 400,000 people don't have power now and that number is expected to rise drastically, possibly reaching into the millions for some people it could be days, if not weeks.

because their entire power grid that they may have to rebuild. that's obviously one of the major concerns here. before we get to that we have the immediate impact of what we're seeing from irma right now in the florida keys. >> it's as bad as it gets right now in the keys. we're looking at winds, storm surge right now and the possibility of tornado-like damage. so that is the concern here for the next couple of hours, too violent with the wind conditions to go outside. let's get you up to spieth speed with the latest conditions. because that northern eye wall is moving ashore of the keys, just south of the seven mile bridge, i'd be interested to know if we have any more of these type of wind gusts because if it gets too much higher you knock some of the sensors off. so the videos i'm seeing are raf vaguing wind and rain and surf battering the lower keys. this is why we wanted people to

evacuate because of the surge. we've passed high tide at least. so the eye wall is going to pass the keys and then the wind switches out of the northwest, so you see a brief wall where things quiet down and then the winds come rocking and rolling back in here and we see the surf come back in from the west. so it's the push now, a break in the keys, and then a secondary push and then the secondary landfall whereby in florida does that occur? we're still debating that and we'll get the latest track from the hurricane center at 11:00 this morning. >> i know they give the interim update at the top of the hour, we're going to stay with that. mariana remains in miami beach. where are you right now?

what are you seeing? >> i lost you, chris. i lost you, chris, but if you can hear me, if we're still on the air, we have taken refuge inside a parking structure in miami beach, because i want to show you why the beach floods so quickly, why that storm surge is so dangerous. our camera man is going to stay underneath the parking structure, i'm going to move over here so you can see just how fast the wind is moving. this is why the storm surge is so dangerous and why this area of miami floods. the wind is barrelling here up miami beach. it's very powerful. we're estimating over 60 miles per hour. police officers cannot be patrolling the streets when the wind goes over 40 miles per

hour. right now they're not out on the streets. the wind is too fast. all this water coming from the beach, which is to my right. already starting to flood the streets of miami beach. as we were talking about power outages, 60% of miami beach, power grid is down according to to miami beach commissioner. he told me the biggest concern is the strength in which the wind is moving the water inward and that's going to pose the biggest threat to the area in the coming hours and days. i've lived here before and it can flood the beach very, very quickly. it's going to be very dangerous and much worse. >> thank you very much. impossible to know exactly what the situation is, but when you look at the parking garage and it's empty. you have to think it's because

people evacuated even though the storm shifted west ward, this could be dangerous to leave your home even on the east side of florida, certainly down south around miami, miami beach, until tomorrow morning. be very aware of those high winds. the beginning of the eye wall starting to affect the keys, those winds whipping up 130, 135 miles per hour potential there. i will repeat what emergency management officials on the keys have said to us. i am terrified for all the people still there right now. we're keeping our eye on it for right now. we're going to take a quick break and we'll be back with more right here on msnbc.

42 minutes past the hour. i want to again get you up to

date. the latest information we have from the hurricane center and that is that the northern eye wall of hurricane irma has reached the florida keys. the full eye 15 miles southeast of key west right now. so we are going to start seeing some of the major impact that is there. if we go north to fort lauderdale, that's where we find nbc's phillip menna. i understand you are seeing some flooding where you are? >> absolutely. this used to be a parking lot when we started earlier this morning. and now you can see the water is almost up to my knees. it's high shin right now. so all the cars we see here are now threatened as the rain and wind is starting to intensify, we are 200 miles north of the florida keys and this is what we're feeling. we're 7, 8 miles inland from the

beach on the east. so we are not really close at all to the beach and we're still feeling these winds and 200 miles of where all of the eye of the storm is. so that gives you an idea of how widespread this is and how powerful some of these bands how quickly the rain can drop. >> thank you, phillip very much. the situation deteriorating there. irma is 50 miles off of key west. so it still has a way to go until it gets to fort lauderdale. we've been watching in naples, florida kerry sanders was on the peer. he's moved out. where are you? >> i'm underneath the peeier. i want to show you the distance from the gulf of mexico, up the

beach. the gulf of mexico is not roy royaling yet and that's because irma has not made its way here. think back to maybe the 1900s thinking it's a rainy day, the fish will be biting and going out, unaware of how big the storms will be. one of the biggest concerns is the storm surge. geological survey has put a sensor here for irma so they can determine how quickly it happened and the extent of the storm surge. we're going to see that for ourselves as well. so if the storm surge comes in as predicted and we're talking about 10 to 15 feet. don't be confused by 10 to 15 over sea level. we're talking 10 to 15 feet above where it is. so as we head in some of those homes 6, 8 above sea level will still see a tremendous amount of

water. understand it's going to be driven by the wind. in napeles we have high tide at 4:00, irma will be around 2:00 meaning we have a high tide with the back winds bringing in the storm surge. so the timing here is perhaps the worst it could be. ideally and we believe, based on what the police are telling us, everybody has evacuated block after block after block inland to the shelters. so it will be a matter of waiting to see, and right now i think there's a lot of anxiety because the predictions are bad, it's dire. >> understandably so. kerry sanders, thank you for that. the mayor is bill barnett, and i wonder, what's your major concern mr. mayor? >> everything. i'm watching it pretty carefully

and, of course, as was just said. the time of high tide for us and when irma is going to hit us does not make for a good storm surge. but we'll have to wait and see. it's pretty nasty here. >> tell us about how you're positioned to handle whatever might come your way. >> well, we have -- you know, as far as -- as far as people on the road, there are zero. our emergency responders are here and checking in and out, they have been out on the road just making sure nobody is out there. and, you know, a lot of palm fronts down, you can see them blowing around and it's only going to get worse as we get into a few more hours. but morale is good. full staff is working. they have our emergency

operations center up and running. we haven't had any emergency calls that i heard of last night at all. which is -- which is a good thing. i shouldn't say it, but we do have power. >> one of the big concerns, obviously, we were talking to the folks over at the power company earlier and they said millions of people could be out, there are areas they will completely have to rebuild. so obviously it's a wait and see situation for a lot of people. but do you feel that everything possible has been done -- >> yes >> -- whether it's on a state level, local level, federal level. >> yes. obviously it's a waiting game because you can say we did as much as we could, and i think we absolutely did plenty of advance preparation, plans for during this hurricane and then the aftermath of how to clean up, what the steps are. and so, i think that as far as

preparation between the county and the city of naples, it's really gone well. but as you said, it's going to be a matter of -- you know, it's the wait and see game. you keep your fingers crossed, say your prayers and we'll just see. i guess irma will be through here probably around 2:00 today and we'll get through it. >> bill barnett, mayor of the beautiful city of naples. home of the governor of florida, rick scott. thank you so much. >> thank you. bye. >> you can hear, it's a nerve wracking waiting game for all the people there. people who are sheltering in place. we're going to speak to someone who chose not to evacuate coming up. stay with msnbc throughout the morning and afternoon, we'll have constant updates. we will be with you throughout irma.

so we have seen what is happening already. we have seen some of the rain, some of the wind, we know that the northern eyewall has already made way to the florida keys. we are expecting that landfall to happen anytime now. but north of that i want to go to nbc's jo ling kent, she's been in ft. lauderdale. i understand we're seeing some debris, seeing some things being whipped around by the winds. >> what you see in front of me are palm tree fronds and these are come off here in broad county. what we see are increasing winds. as you know, we are not in the path of the eye of the storm any longer, but this area really prepared for this and hunkered down. there's still 100,000 people out of power. these fronds that you see here are supposed to sustain a pretty high level of wind and we aren't

even at the highest winds that we are expecting here in the ft. lauderdale area. we're expecting winds of about 60, 70 miles an hour. there is a tornado watch under way right now until noon. there was a tornado warning all night and there were warnings going out to citizens of broward county because a tornado was spotted by a citizen here in the ft. lauderdale area. now, what you should know is this -- and i want to swing around, caesar, and show the street here. we are completely isolated. there's no one on the street out here in ft. lauderdale because the police have issued a curfew as of 4:00 p.m. last night. police cars are able to come down, we have seen a few, the wind continues to pick up, but if it continues to pick up at this pace the police will not be able to respond to 911 calls. folks are hunkered down in hotels and red cross shelters in broward county are completely packed. we have seen hundreds of thousands of people without

power, but they're grateful, optimistic even though they are not in the eye of the storm, though some people say that these bands may be like something they have never seen before. they are bracing for the of irma in ft. lauderdale. >> i know probably like all of our correspondents you are getting little or no sleep. what time did you come out this morning and how many people have you seen on the roads in that period of time? >> yeah, well, there is a lot of people in our hotel, safe and sound. we are lucky we do have power. we were out here about 4:00 or 5:00 this morning and it was completely isolated, then the wind really started to pick up and we're feeling those outer bands, the eye of the storm is about to hit the florida keys and we feel that all the way up here in ft. lauderdale. so -- >> so you've seen nobody on the road at all since 4:00 or 5:00 in the morning? >> reporter: we've seen a couple of emergency vehicles, we have seen an errant family or two driving, but if we swing around this way, caesar, you can see, chris, all the way down here there is nobody on the road because of this curfew that's been imposed and those lights

are green and no one is here. usually on a weekend you see quite a bit of traffic. down that way that's the beach way down across those bridges and those bridges have been closed since yesterday afternoon. >> jo ling kent, that is exactly behind you what officials want to see, that people are heeding their warnings. thank you for that. >> i want to bring in dan noah sr., he is a veteran nbc producer, now lives in sarasota, florida. he produced coverage of hurricane andrew. good to talk to you, dan. i have to ask you what are you doing still home? >> well, i'm not in an evacuation area, i'm pretty high ground and, you know, one of the scariest or worst parts of these storms is really more the high tide, the water than the wind. so as long as i'm dry, you know, i think we can hide from the wind. >> we mentioned you are a veteran producer, you've seen this, you've lived it and obviously now live there, but i know we've been hearing all of these terms from the governor,

from folks at noah, kinds of terms, kinds of warnings i have not heard before. based on your experience what are you looking for? what scares you for your state? >> you know, what scares me about hurricanes, frankly, is the eyewall. i know this is a big hurricane, it's got winds that cover a large area. really the scariest part of the hurricane always has been, as is evidenced from andrew and every other hurricane is that eyewall and unfortunately sarasota right now is scheduled to get that eyewall. so even though it's calm, even though it's okay right now, this is actually a bad time because this is when you are evaluating everything you've done and you said did i do this, did i do that, you start watching the coverage from the people down south. so just knowing what's coming is -- makes the fact that there is no wind right now of little comfort. >> obviously when we saw the track of the storm change and it went up the west coast, then we saw people making last minute

preparations, we saw the long lines at the big box stores, we saw grocery store shelves that were cleaned out, but i wonder up north where you are, up in sarasota, what you saw in, say, the 24 hours prior to where we are now. >> actually, this place started going quite crazy way earlier in the week. i mean, everybody started preparing for this hurricane early and even the evacuation started out quite early. so even -- you know, this thing was supposed to go up the east coast, but people around here took it seriously right from day one. >> dan noa sr., you can tell he is a veteran nbc producer, he is as calm as they come and very experienced. dan, you take good care out there. it's good to talk to you. >> good to talk to you, chris. that's going to do it for me this hour. i'm chris jansing. we are awaiting that new advisory at the top of the hour on the intensity of hurricane

irma. at 11:00 there will be a major update. what i haven't heard yet and maybe we're expecting, we've been getting these regular updates from governor scott. let's see if we get one of those as well today. mostly what we're looking for is landfall in the florida keys. i'm going to hand it over to my good friend ali. >> governor scott has been giving regular updates. we will keep speaking to mayors and chiefs of police. we will see you later. it is sunday morning, let's get started. >> all right. good evening -- good afternoon, good morning. thank you for being here for our special coverage of hurricane irma which is already wreaking havoc on parts of florida. the storm center is about to make landfall, it's closing in on the lower florida keys with a wind speed maxing out at 130 miles an hour gusts. right now the storm is 20 miles

southeast of key west. landfall is expected to happen any moment. surges are expected to cause major damage with some areas seeing storm surges of up to 15 feet. now, we're going to get into that in a little bit. i want you to take a look at this, this is miami right now. the idea here is you look at those trees and you can see the sorts of winds that miami is getting. look at that palm tree, look at them swaying the way they are. now, not just that, tornado warnings are also out as wind gusts and rain continue to strike the southern portion of the state. over 400,000 people do not have power and that number is expected to rise dramatically, possibly reaching into the millions. let's bring in nbc's steve sosna, he is dealing with not just these winds but the fact that there are tornado watches in the area. >> that's right. these warnings pop up as quickly as they are issued. so we had a tornado warning in the miami area with circulation coming on board here, it has