people forget about these rifles, colt designed that rifle for the military. it was made to be lightweight. made to have a handle on top for the soldier to be able to carry it through the jungle and desert, made to load fast and take big magazines and made to be reliable. there were a lot things made for t wasn't made for sport. it was made for war. like dynamite explosives, c-4, made for the soldier to be bullest resistant, work in higher temperatures, be pliable. dynamite not made like that, different purposes. and that's what the ar was made for, military. >> jim cavanaugh, former special agent in chargest atf. i'm ali velshi starting off noenkl hour for you. we continue to follow hurricane dorian as it pummels the bahamas with life-threatening storms and catastrophic winds. surge storm warnings are all

along florida's coast with more than 20 million americans possibly going to feel the effects of this storm. florida, georgia, south carolina have mandatory evacuations. at least a million ordered to evacuate. dorian's track is still unpredictable. residents being urged to prepare for the worst. >> it creeps up on you. you will be standing there and then all of a sudden, boom, it's like somebody dropped a drum full of water on you. >> anybody in the storm surge areas along the coast or up into the carolinas needs to listen to any advice they're getting about evacuating and heed that and use the time they have left to get themselves ready for the storm. >> high intensity of it, the winds, i have never seen them this high. i have been through other hurricanes which were a lot less in all of the hotels on the beach were gone. >> let's talk about grand bahama island. people who stayed there are

posting video on social media showing the storm surge almost at the roof of some buildings with violent winds. help is on the way, however. chef row day andre and his relief organization world central kitchen is on the ground in the bahamas preparing to cook and serve meals for people affected by the storm. chef jose andres joins us from the bahamas. jose, where are you now? >> i am right now in nassau. i'm in one of the kitchens that we've been able to use from one of the big hotels in the island. and here you see a lot of volunteers already helping us. many of them are people that were here on vacation and they decided, you know, to come and to start helping us get ready because as soon as we can we hope by tomorrow to be in amoco and grand bahamas to start feeding people there as soon as

we can. >> that's where it really got hit, the storm was sitting on top of abaco with winds up to 180 miles an hour, sitting on top of grand bahama, still riding about 1 miles an hour. the destruction will be pretty severe. have you figured out the infrastructure, the ability you got? you're there, i can see behind you there's a lot of food being prepared. how are you going to get it out to these folks? >> yes, obviously, if you read what's going on, the two airports are covered in water as we speak so we're waiting for the hurricane to leave the island, and for some of the water to go down and the idea we had first is to try to reach abaco by helicopter. we already have boats in ft. lauderdale getting ready here in nassau too. i was able to go to the hurricane center of the bahamas and i was able to briefly meet the prime minister and many of

his secretaries. listen, i think they have a plan, they're ready. but this is being so slow, people going through the damage so long, people are willing to go but we have to wait until the hurricane go as way and get close to the islands. >> as authorities tell us, winds have to be very low until you can even start with the most basic of rescue. one of the things you focus on is in the after-effect of the hurricane it's not the littbig things that affect people but little things like power and water and food. what do people need to do to get the food, do they come to a central place? do you take it to them? what happens? >> these are the central questions we're asking ourselves. some of the shelters have been overrun by water so we still

need to land and see the situation in terms of the shelters. we know people will have to stay in some of the shelters for a while. we know many homes have been completely overrun by water. some of the homes are literally under water. so as soon as we arrive, we already have partners in both islands that they are telling us that their kitchens and hotels are safe, that we're going to be able to use them so we need these used to make sure we get more food, water, some containers, kitchen equipment like knives and cutting boards, start bringing some of the teams we have here in nassau and get some of the volunteers we know that you want to be helping us in those two islands and immediately start cooking and then start doing the solution one shelter at a time. but parts of the island are difficult to get to, roads totally covered in water so we have to go slowly. as soon as we can, we will be

getting there, i hope by midday tomorrow. and then start solving one problem at a time. >> jose, i hope good fortune smiles on you because when ill fortune hits people, you don't wait. you just get out there and you take people with you and you inspire people and we appreciate that. the bahamas is having a very, very, very difficult time right now. jose andres in the bahamas, out there getting ready to feed people. i'm sure he's going to get to florida soon after that. >> my father's family is from the southern bahamas, and we all feel his pain. >> the connection to the bahamas you will know more than a lot of people will that most people in the bahamas are descendant from people in america. when the loyalists fled, they went there and took their slaves with them. so pretty much everybody there, while it was a british colony, british commonwealth state, it's actually a very strong ties to america. >> lord thomas roker was my an esther slave -- ancestor slave

owner. >> it's getting hit very hard. >> yes, as you can see now tropical force winds extending out 150 miles. the next update will be at 5:00. the forward speed, it's just sitting and spinning. right now winds at 145 miles per hour. so down another 10 from the last hour or another five i should say, moving west-northwest at 1 miles per hour. hurricane warnings extending wa. in fact even theme parts have all shut down, because, of course, they're really concerned about this. the path as we've been seeing and showing continues to just hug the coast until we get that steering mechanism going. it's going to continue to just meander up along the coast. we see maybe landfall along the north carolina coast as a category two possibly, possibly cape hatteras, a model

suggesting it might go in here. >> this is where we saw it last year. >> yes. and pushed out and in boston almost within the cone of uncertainty. ali, as you know, these tropical storms continue to cause storm surge and that will be the problem. here you look, you can see right now this is by tomorrow afternoon, hurricane-force winds are just 20 miles offshore so when you get a wobble of 10 or 15 miles to the west, all of a sudden those hurricane-force winds are on shore and inland a little bit. that's also something we have to be watching. storm surge potential from wilmington to fort pierce could be six to nine feed on top of king tides around lunchtime. that could add another three to five feet on top of that storm surge as that counterclockwise flow continues to pile up the water right along the shore. and again, you've got almost

like a bowl-like kind of situation there. so this just continues to push in. three feet of storm surge can cut you off from rescue. six feet of storm sturj with a good wind of 20, 30 miles per hour will destroy a home. >> very little water. break your car up. >> literally, two feet of water moving six miles per hour will float a car. >> so people have to be very careful. the danger in our business generally is we're not cheering for storms or hoping that they're bad but we also have to make sure people think we're out of danger. >> it's offshore. >> this remains a big, big danger. al, thank you. >> you bet. >> joining me on the phone is scott bushman, commander for the u.s. coast guard. scott, what are your preparations looking like right now? >> good afternoon, and thank you very much for having me. we prepared for the arrival of hurricane dorian for over a week

now. there's a number of things we've been doing. we are working with our port partners to make sure the ports are open as long as possible to commodities such as fuel continue to come in. we're looking at our assets and getting them to safety, getting them out of harm's way, out of the immediate path of the storm so they're able to come in and assist folk that's may need assistance after the storm. working this really hard for about a week now and working really hard with all of our partners, including fema, including the impacted states. >> the term you used very interesting, partners. when the storm passes, as soon as it is safe for people to begin rescues, it really is, having covered many of these, i'm always fascinated by the degree of partnership in the national guard, coast guard, urban search and rescue, what does your main objective become after a storm? >> after a storm, certainly one

of our main objectives becomes search and rescue. we search for anyone who needs assistance. you use the term partnership. it truly is a partnership. i like to say the super preparedness in response is a team sport. folks work extremely well together, federal government, states, tribes, and everyone involved in this. and aside from search and rescue, we're very much focused in on the ports. so much of our commodities, things we use every day including fuel for your car, come into ports. we're focused on getting those ports restored and open as soon as possible. >> how do you do that? you're dealing by definition the hurricane comes in off the water so everything you're dealing with is a place where things come in. i was in savannah yesterday, which was one of the biggest ports coming in, for things coming in to the united states. what do you do to prepare ports for the least amount of damage

in becoming operable once the storm has passed? >> make sure anything loose is tied down, get the ships out to sea so there's nothing loose in the harbor and take surveys of the ports so we know exactly what the water look like ahead of time. and after the storm clears we work very closely with the industry, work very closely with noaa, army corps of engineers to see if anything would obstruct navigation, things may need to be restored. once again it's very much a team effort between coast guard, noaa, army corps of engineers and local core partners and the industry. >> scott, thank you for the work you're doing and your teams have been doing and the work you're going to do in the next few days. scott buschmann from the atlantic area coast guard.

maria atencio, what is the situation where you are? >> the wind has picked up. i can barely make you out. the waves behind me getting higher and higher. when you hear al roker, cocoa beach now sitting between palm and daytona, these are some of the vulnerable seaside communities that could get pummels if this storm moves a little bit west. this is where the water will come in and you get the danger flooding and storm surge. i want to bring in the city manager of cocoa beach. jim, i know you're busy and i appreciate the time you're giving us. what concerns you about this area and mandatory evacuation right now? >> we have three areas we're concerned about, storm surge as you see, it will rise and how far will it go up? our dunes are in very good shape but at the same time it depends on the height of the storm surge. our second is flooding. however, we're getting better

reports on the amount of rain we're going to get so we're hopeful that will not be a big issue to deal with. finally the wind is such an unknown we don't know if we will be tropical storm or into some kind of hurricane-force winds. all three of those elements have impacts orn what is going on here in cocoa beach. >> one of the things that has concerned me, ali, is the fact i have spoken to so many locals who are staying put. does that concern you? and when could it be too late? >> obviously when the winds get to a certain level, we're not going to respond to people that have decided to stay. we're not going to put our own firefighters and police officers in harm's way. however, we will respond to that point in time. people who decide to stay need to stay inside their structures and remain there. they've made the decision to stay, that's their personal decision. however, we will not respond when it gets to a certain level. >> what is the messaging if people do decide to stay, what should they take into

consideration to protect their homes and families? >> they have shutters, i'm sure they have them up. they need to make hour they are able to sand bag if they're in a low-lying area. they need to make sure they have food and water and batteries or thing need. hopefully they did that because it's getting late and there's not much open at this point in time. >> jim, thank you very much for your time. it is getting late and our team has been caught in some of the rain bands. the weather can change so fast. it looks like a beautiful day but we ourselves already got pounded with rain. so, again, it is getting late for people to make those last-minute decisions and heed the evacuation warnings. ali? >> stay safe, because i know you have done this several times, mariana atencio live in cocoa beach, florida. we continue to track hurricane dorian, which remains very powerful and dangerous category 4 storm. lens look at jensen beach, where the storm is making its presence felt. also breaking news out of

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of california, the coast guard tells knbc more than 40 people are dead and 40 missing after a diving boat caught fire and sank off the coast of santa barbara this morning.

five crew member were rescued, two were hurt. we're about an hour north now of los angeles. jennifer, what's the latest? >> ali, you nailed it right on the head. they're still looking for 30 people. fire on a boat at 3:30 in the morning when all of those people were sleeping below decks, that is the worst-case scenario, they were unable to get out and then it sank with all of those people on board. they called the guard from san diego to come meet in the middle where this distress call was called out. unfortunately it was so foggy helicopters could not get a good route in and couldn't see anything even if they had. the rescue boats had to come and do some firefighting effort. in that time in the interim, the hope is some of those passengers who were sleeping below deck when the crew made that distress

call and were able to get off the boat without making any rescues, the hope is some of those people were able to make it clear of the boat and get to the shortline, which is about 20 yards off santa cruz island is where they were dropping anchor for the night. that shore continues along the shoreline. we're expecting an update from the coast guard about 2 1/2, 3 hours from now. they expect to have more information to how the search is going. but again, what we've heard is not encouraging news. four bodies pulled from the water, five crew members are okay. but 30 are still missing. >> what a story, jennifer. thank you very much. we will get updates from you, jennifer bourque lund in oxford, california. coming up -- hurricane dorian is pummeling the bahamas and residents from florida to the carolinas are on alert. you're watching msnbc. it's going ok?

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we're keeping a close watch on hurricane dorian for you. the storm's eye wall continues to lash the grand bahama island. it's going to make its way up

the east coast of the united states. we're not clear whether or not it's going to go on shore or not but we do know some of those winds are already on shore. dorian is a dangerous category 4 storm. its winds are topping 150 miles an hour a time, sustained winds of about 145, which is why it's a category 4 now. governor desantis said 32 nursing homes and assisted living hospitals evacuated. we will get more information on the storm's track in the national hurricane center's next advisory. >> if anyone has decided to stay home, i don't know, it will be very difficult, hard to imagine them being able to leave with lives intact.

>> you really need to heed the advice of your local and state emergency management. you need to take action now if you're at risk, given mandatory evacuation orders, you should not try to tough it out, you should get out. >> joining me now from about 50 miles north of west palm beach is nbc's jgabe gutierrez. he's in jensen beach, where you can start to see the effects of the winds that are getting close. >> hello, ali, we've seen it all day but as you reported this has stalled out over the bahamas so there hasn't been a whole lot of change in the condition we are seeing from this morning. occasionally we will get a rain band that comes in and dumps rain on us, wind picked up.

sush behi surf behind me, as you can see, looks angry and expected to get worse over the next 24 hours here. as you mentioned, ali, florida's governor said dozens of nursing homes an sifted living facilities have been evacuated. some 85 emergency shelters are opening in the state of florida. we spoke to an evacuee, one woman and her husband who decided they didn't want to tough it out. they lived in a low-lying area and said better to be safe than sorry and went to an emergency shelter. a lot of people are taking this threat extremely seriously. a category 5 storm will do that, even though it's weakened to a category 4, there's still a lot of concern here. what a lot of people are waiting for, ali, that northerly turn everybody seems to be waiting on

has not happened yet. we heard the last hour from the national hurricane center thinking it might happen later tonight perhaps. but right now we just don't know. many people here in florida not taking any chances. mandatory evacuation orders further to the north as well, volusia county, brevard county. not just florida, of course. georgia, south carolina. many communities there are also on alert for this and some of those coastal communities are also be issuing mandatory evacuation orders. in all more than a million people, the race is on to get out. ali? >> gabe, as always, stay safe out there. i know you know how to do that but stay safe out there because this is going to get more serious regardless of whether or not that hurricane comes on shore. thank you, gabe gutierrez in jensen beach. i want to talk to al about this. al, this is the strange part about this storm, right, it may never -- the eye of the storm

may never hit america. >> right. >> but that's not the problem that a lot of people are going to face. >> no, it really isn't. the problem is that as this cone starts to push up and you will see again it stays here and what's been keeping it -- what's been mind-boggling, ali, this is moving -- it's forward speed has been 1 mile per hour since 5:00 a.m. >> very little in nature moves closer than i do. >> you and me both. so it's expected to break down and as it pushes up and makes its way along the coast, around that ridge, gets caught up by that trough and pulled out. but if this doesn't break down as much as we with think, it's slowed down. it's going to slow down. again, as we've said, there are tropical force winds extending out 140 miles here. >> right. >> the hurricane-force winds are 40, 45 miles. all you need is a jog to the

west of about 50 miles and you're going to have all of that storm surge issues we've been talking about. >> why is it so difficult to predict the forward movement of this one? >> because there's nothing steering it. there's no upper level winds pushing this right now. so there's high pressure just kind of blocking it and there's nothing -- so until it gets caught up, until this breaks down, it's just going to do the glacial crawl that it's been doing. the longer it does that, unfortunately, as we see on the radar for our friends in the bahamas, it's going to be brutal. but as we put the radar in motion, you will see that look at this, all of the way to the west coast of florida, fm -- >> naples, fm, amazing. >> heavy thunderstorms, a lot of lightning and pinwheel effect of spinning off and that's going to be the problem. this could be a death by a thousand cuts, moving slowly up the coast and storm surge, heavy

rains, strong winds, a lot of damage out of this thing. >> al roker, thank you very much. we will have another update in a half hour or so. >> 5:00. >> we will keep you up to date on that. >> bill karins is picking it up. >> very g thank you very much. and on the radio now from hot 97, thank you for joining us. tell us what you're hearing around there. >> hello? >> hi, it's ali from msnbc. i think just disconnected from you. what are you hearing where you are? >> thank you. >> we will reconnect with him in a moment. this storm is stalled over the bahamas. it is moving, stalled and almost no movement, 1 mile an hour movement and that's the issue here, we don't know where it's going to go but there's been a lot of damage already in the bahamas.

most of it in abaco and grand bahama island. joining us from tallahassee, florida, brian con, former director of the emergency management during hurricane irma's landfall and he's had a lot of experience with this. brian, you and i talked about two days ago or something like that that this will be hard for people to plan for because mind. if they know things are barreling right for them, it makes the decision easy fer they're not sure if this is skirting off the side of the coast. how does that affect emergency management? >> that's right. we spend a lot of time trying to help them understand they need to err on the side of caution in these situations. government officials who are issuing mandatory and voluntary evacuations are doing that, doing everything they can to protect as many lives as possible. that's what we need floridians to do, err on the side of caution. if you're in an area with storm surge and in a home that's not

going to potentially survive of the stronger winds or tornadoes that may spawn off of this, get to a place of safety. get to a place of safety now. don't wait until dark and the storm hits you, take those precautions right now. >> one of the things we learned during your tenure at the florida emergency management and covering hurricanes the last 10, 15 years is the devastating after-effects of a hurricane. it's not that you succeeded if you didn't lose your roof or house didn't collapse, it's flooding, amount of time you might be without electricity, the idea you may not be able to get out of your place as soon as you would have liked and rescuers cannot come and get you until it's safe for them to do so. how will that improve the ability we have to respond to this one? >> that will affect us quite a bit. you saw the storm is moving slowly. when we start losing power, and we will lose power, it's going to take longer to restore. it will take a while to get the

roads clear because there will be downed power lines and storm surges out there. first responders will take a while to get to everywhere there might be a need. that means we need people to get somewhere safe where they can ride it out for three to seven days because the aftermath of the storm, as you said, can oftentimes be more deadly than the storm itself. >> what we've seen over the last few hurricanes is that florida is a hard place to plan where you're supposed to be or go to, to escape a storm. we had storms coming on the east coast, leaving the west coast, gulf coast, look what happened in jacksonville. how do you stage for this type of thing in a place like florida? how do you prepare for something you don't quite know where it's going to end up or where it's going to come onshore, if it comes onshore at all? >> sure. this one is actually an easier one to evacuate from. move inland or west or if you're in palm beach, go south to

miami. as far as staging goes, i think they will use a lot of facilities in the western part of the state or the orlando area. you can get across in an hour and a half or two. this one because of the proximity and nature or path of the storm, this goes for evacuating yourself and prepositioning the material that will be used to help support survivors, just go inland. go slightly to the west, get out of that area that can potentially have the hurricane-force winds and minimize the tropical storm-force winds and come in as quickly as possible in the hour or two after the storm passes. >> who coordinates once this all happens? we were talking to the national guard. we've been talking to fema. we've been talking to local officials. where does the coordination come from once we've had a storm like this? >> a lot of it is coming from right here in tallahassee where i am. of course, every county has a terrific emergency management agency and they will be doing a lot of the local efforts there. as far as coordinating statewide

efforts, that will be coming out of tallahassee. feelia has personnel in tallahassee. all of the utilities, private sector, charitable organizations are all together there with the leadership, governor, state agencies. they will be able to take a statewide view of where all of the resources are, where all of the needs are apply it appropriately. get it to where it needs to be as quickly as possible, as effectively as possible. >> bryan, thank you for joining me again, former director of the florida division of emergency management. up next, i will talk to a hurricane hunter to find out what those hurricanes look like on the inside where very few people go. this is rick blomquist.

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alright who wants to go again? i do! i do! i have a really good feeling about this. powerful storm and it is still battering the bahamas. the national hurricane center said dorian is now a category 4 storm with maximum sustained winds of 145 miles per hour. however, it is still creeping along at just 1 mile per hour. forecasters say it will move dangerously close to florida's east coast over the next couple of days. hurricane watches and warnings are in place up and down the florida coast. president trump approved disaster declarations for florida, georgia and south carolina. mand towardy evacuations are now in effect through coastal areas in georgia and south carolina and vulnerable coastal areas in florida. several major airports in florida, including orlando, ft.

lauderdale or palm beach are closing or will shut down later today. and the u.s. geological service said dorian can cause beach erosion all the way from florida to north carolina. and now a director of meteorology for underground weather.com. thank you for being with us. you're more familiar than most people about hurricanes. what stands out to you as the most unusual about this one? >> this storm was the strongest category 5 we had ever seen make landfall. 185 miles per hour winds is very rare in intensity. and the fact it stayed in place so long is almost impossible, it stayed in bahamas over 12 hours. >> and that is one of the things we never have. what do we need to worry about

with that? >> you see more stress and failure of structure when's you have hour and hour of wind plus you have a long time for the storm surge to build up and move to shore. >> let's talk about what could happen to this storm. al was saying there's nothing obviously pushing it. there's nothing obviously he propelling it, which is why this is becoming hard to forecast as to where it's going. it is sitting there, we're hoping it kind of starts to dismantle but in fact something can happen for these hurricanes which as they start to dismantle, they regenerate themselves. >> it's suffering now. in fact part of the eye wall is missing. it's collapsed to some degree because of the cold water the storm up-welled by sitting in place for so long so that will generate unpredictability in its path potentially and we expect it to start moving to the northwest, paralleling the coast of florida over the next 12 or so hours. >> what is our best bet about how this weakens?

what is our best-case scenario for this storm? >> i think it will weaken for category 3 later today or category 2 mostly as it passes along the coast of florida heading up to south carolina. that's still strong enough to generate a large storm surge and expect a multibillion dollar damage event from storm surge. >> let's talk about being a hurricane hunter, a lot of people think that's the stupid job in the entire world but it's helped us understand these storms better and helped us in our prediction abilities and preparation abilities. >> if you want to find out what the storm is doing you have to go into it and take the measurements. the trick is do it at the lowest safe altitudes and as hurricane hunters, we've had wild rides. >> what does that involve? i see pictures of one of planes up there. but normally we think when there's bad weather we don't want to fly. what does it involve, flying into a hurricane? >> you go in about 10,000 feet when you fly through the eye wall. you can't penetrate overland because you have worries about

extreme turbulence due to tornadoes could be embedded in there. you only do it over water so you hilt sometimes two, three, types the force of gravity. but when you pop in the eye it's calm. you're terrified and exhilarated because it's a spectacular sight but you look down and you see the ocean all whipped into a white froth by the 170-mile-per-hour winds, it's quite the awesome spectacle of nature. >> how are you measuring it when you're in that storm? is it all stuff the plane is equipped with? are you deploying things outside of the plane to get the measurements you need? >> you take two sets of measurements, one based on the plane itself and you also launch probes that fall via parachute down into the storm and radio back information. >> that's amazing. jeff, thank you for joining me. we will keep track of this together. jeff masters, former hurricane hunter and working for geology

underground.com. joining me is the chief science officer from popular science magazine. thank you for being with us. >> thank you for having me. >> i think people want to know what the relationship is between the warming of the planet, the warming of the world's oceans and these storms. >> sure, and that's a question people have increasingly as we seem to have increasingly severe hurricane seasons, what is the kerks between this and climate change? for a lot of weather, it's difficult to make that direct connection to climate but with hurricanes there is a pretty clear connection. they're fueled by warm water. so warmer seawater means more powerful hurricanes. did climate change cause this hurricane? no. hurricanes happen periodically and that won't change. it was that way before humans existed. but they are getting worse. and another thing to keep in mind with climate change and this particular storm is that slow movement that we've been talking about so much.

there is some evidence that the kinds of wind circulation that normally would be pushing a hurricane like this to move on are stalled by climate change because of the decreasing difference in temperature between arctic winds and those air patterns from elsewhere, the arctic is warming at a faster rate than the rest of the planet. >> seven times or something like that. >> exactly. so there's this evening out that does chac does change the way it circulates. >> and there's a third problem in a coastal area. the waters rise. the hurricane is staying longer because there isn't wind to blow it but you're in a place like miami getting sunny day floods, where water is coming through the things on the street, grates on the street on a day when it's not raining. water levels rising, more intense hurricanes and greater dangers to people in their dwellings. >> that's absolutely true.

and you know, of course, this was a really superlative hurricane on the scale. it was a category 5 and huge category 5. but something i have come up against in covering hurricanes a lot is people don't realize that scale only deals in wind speeds and so many of the most devastating hurricanes in recent years have not been devastating because of their wind but because of flood and storm surge. and so that's another area where climate change becomes a huge factor. because sea levels are rising and dheeftzal areas are having higher tides and they're more prone to flooding and inland areas are more prone to flooding as well. so we will probably see some ongoing inland flooding long after the storm itself has passed. >> often when these storms come in, we're always dealing with certain places in america that are experiencing flooding or higher rivers because of this already. so it complicates an issue because this is a country where

we have built in flood plains, we have built mostly in coastal areas because i guess we figured out we nailed this stuff, we had not planned for water levels rising in and on coasts. >> yes, incoming hurricane seasons we're definitely going to see coastal areas getting hit again and again. obviously, it's unfortunate this storm was able to grow so strong because it missed puerto rico but thank goodness it did miss puerto rico. >> right. >> and i think we're going to see that kind of scenario more often where areas that have really just gotten themselves back up from the devastation of a previous hurricane season are going to have another historic storm barreling towards them. >> rachel, thank you. i appreciate it. rachel feldman is the chief science officer at "popular science" magazine. msnbc is keeping up on climate change with georgetown university and our daily planet, an independent environmental news organization september 19 and 20th, chris hayes and i will moderate a two-day climate forum with these candidates, 2020 presidential candidates that you

see on your screen. our dorian continues. and millions brace for impact from florida to the carolinas. the 5:00 advisory is out. the hurricane is stationary over the grand bahama island. it is not moving. first we turn our attention to the mass shooting that left several people dead in texas over the weekend. new information about what the suspect did before going on his rampage next. you're watching msnbc. severely active crohn's disease, stelara® works differently. studies showed relief and remission, with dosing every 8 weeks. stelara® may lower your ability to fight infections and may increase your risk of infections and cancer. some serious infections require hospitalization. before treatment, get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you have an infection or flu-like symptoms or sores, have had cancer, or develop new skin growths, or if anyone in your house needs or recently had a vaccine. alert your doctor of new or worsening problems, including headaches, seizures, confusion and vision problems. these may be signs of a rare,

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we are continuing to monitor hurricane doctor na. but first we've got new information about that mass shooting in texas that left several people dead and injured # 2 this weekend. police in odessa now say the suspect kouled them hours after being fired from his job at an oil field. then he called the fbi national tip line just 15 minutes before he shot the police officer who pulled him over for a minor traffic violation. take a listen. >> saturday morning our suspect went to work at journey oil field service. he was there for a short time and was terminated by his employer. right after that firing, he called 9-1-1 odessa police

department's 9-1-1 and so did his employer. basically they were complaining on each other because they had a disagreement over the firing. a short time before he makes contact with the bps trooper, he actually calls the fbi national tip line. but makes no threats of any type of violence. >> we're also learning investigators are still unsure about how the suspect was able to obtain his firearm. the suspect has been identified by police as seth ator, a 36-year-old man from the city of odessa who had a criminal record. witnesses who feared for their lives captured the terrifying moment. i want to warn viewers at home this video is hard to watch.

and just hours after the shooting new gun laws went into effect in texas yesterday. joining us now from odessa is garrett haake. you learn someday information from the suspect's background. >> reporter: he was not able to pass a background check. one of the opening questions that we still have here at this point is how did he get his hands on what we know is an ar-style weapon. it's also become increasingly clear from all the reporting that our team has been able to do here on the ground that this is someone that while it appears the approximate cause may have something to do with losing his job, he was spirlg down for quite a bit of time. that was one of the phrases used by the fbi. one of our producers went to his neighborhood and spoke to the suspect's neighbor. one of the neighbors said that the suspect had threatened her with his rifle sometime ago that she had called the police on him, that he was known to stand on his roof and shoot small

animals, that that was what he was eating were animals that he could shoot from his home. these are obviously not activities of a well mental person. so i think as this continues to be investigated further, one of the things that authorities are going to be looking into were what other signs were there? >> last week we were reporting that a lot of people thought it was strange that in the wake of el paso there were some planned gun law changes in texas that were going to go into effect. but nobody included the governor suggested they might delay those. they were all laws in which it was going to make it easier to carry a gun, in some cases, without a permit in texas. >> reporter: yeah. that's right, ali. look, texas is at the forefront of this debate in this country about whether or not more guns in the hands of the right people would potentially make a society safer versus less safe. what you saw in texas were expansions of the rights for law-abiding citizens to carry their weapons where they see

fit. that includes things like being allowed to store your weapon in your car while you're on school property. things like carrying a gun into church would now be allowed. things like being allowed for anyone to carry in the aftermath of a declared disaster. this was all part of the laws that were passed back in june signed by the governor over the summer session and then brought into effect on september 1st. again, no discussion of delay there. and if texans are interested in changing those laws, it's important to note for the r of the country, texas's legislature only meets every ot calls a special session wouldn't be till 2021. >> beto o'rourke headed to odessa, is he there? >> reporter: he was here this morning. this is interesting though. o'rourke drove up from el paso this morning. he went to the main hospital where most of the shooting victims were, met with victims and their families there, and then visited an afl-cio labor picnic event. essentially he was invited to drop by this picnic event and

talk a little bit about what he saw here in odessa. he talked about meeting with these victims. he talked about talking to folks. he even told me who met a man at the hospital who doesn't agree with anything that he is running on as a candidate. but he was thankful that o'rourke came to odessa. shootings used to be one of the sort of rituals of this were politicians even those in favor of stricter gun laws saying it's too early to talk about legislative changes. i asked o'rourke about this. he is obviously doing the exact opposite of that essentially aggressively looking for opportunities to politicize this issue, to fight for tighter gun laws. here's what he told me about that. >> my answers to this are pretty clear. we have too many guns. there are 330 million americans, 390 million guns in this country. we sell to one another weapons of war that were designed to kill people on a battlefield,

that are used to kill people in a walmart or on the side of a street or in a church or in a synagogue or in a mosque. at the hospital we met a family that just lost a 15-year-old daughter, you know, who is suppose to be going to school tomorrow morning. now will not. so, yes, let's act now or let's accept that this is our fate and our future and we will only see more of this. >> reporter: pushing the envelope here, ali, on when it's too soon or perhaps now too late to talk about what we're going to do about gun violence in this country. >> garrett, thank you for your reporting, sir. stay with msnbc for breaking coverage of hurricane dorian. right now my colleague stephanie ruhle picks it up. too