range, let's make it clear that it is not for now. here's where leadership and truth telling matters, it was the problem in the pandemic, we did not have donald trump tell the facts or the truth what biden and harris are doing is telling people the facts, it used to be the norm in this country regarding of presidencies and that is what is at stake in the election, do we want to go back to politicizing national crises? >> there are tens of thousands of americans who lost their lives, that shouldn't have, because of misinformation and cynical manipulation and lies around the vaccines, tens of thousands of americans by most estimates so we have been through this before, four years ago and i hope we are not living through another version of this. congressman ro khanna and alencia johnson. that is it for wednesday night. ongoing coverage continues with alex witt. >> we begin with breaking news

out of florida, millions of people under threat from monster size hurricane milton. that powerful category 3 storm with maximum sustained winds of 120 miles an hour has come ashore. the eyewall made landfall half an hour ago in siesta key, which is a barrier island off of the coast of sarasota. right now, the storm with a diameter of 450 miles, is bringing life-threatening winds and potentially devastating storm surge up to 13 feet. earlier today, the national oceanic and atmospheric administration, noaa, took steal drones on the gulf of mexico. they showed 40 nautical miles away from melton's eye, the winds were gusting 76 miles an hour and waves were cresting up at 28 feet high. that powerful storm is hitting land. for those not in the eyewall's direct path, there is reason to

be vigilant as much of florida is under a tropical storm watch or warning. the national weather service also issued warnings in parts of south and central florida, where milton has spawned 10 tornadoes. airports, schools, and businesses closed earlier today as more than 5 million people were urged to leave their homes under mandatory or voluntary evacuation orders. those who heeded the warnings faced shortages at gas stations as they scramble to get to safe the. not everyone has been given the choice to evacuate. according to local reports, some prisons and jails in flood prone areas decided not to evacuate despite orders to do so. the evacuation window closed early this afternoon and the national weather service announced around 2:00 p.m. today it is now time to shelter in place. the national weather service warned that hurricane milton has the potential to be one of

the most destructive hurricanes on record for the state of florida. joining me is nbc news correspondent jesse kirsch, who is in sarasota, florida. what can you tell us about the latest on the ground? we hope you are staying safe. >> reporter: we are doing our best, thanks for asking. five minutes ago it was silent out here, i could hear birds chirping, it was dry, the leaves were not wrestling. he goes what is happening, we are in the eye of milton and losing the eye we are entering what will potentially be the most dangerous phase of the storm in sarasota you can see the leaves blowing more, bands of rain. i want to have our photographer go to the left, you can see had lights moving off barrier island area, that is something we have continued to see throughout the night. there are people on the roads, i'm not seeing anything indicating that as a first responder vehicle, at minimum, the police department suspended having officers on the roads because of the risk.

we were just in the eye, it gives a false sense of security. we had people cheering outside, cars with the engines revving, tires burning rubber, the sense of people driving recklessly in the streets. you don't know when the eye will end. we had no idea when this would start to devolve as it is now so people are putting themselves back into harms way's as these conditions are so unpredictable. what we are waiting for is potential 13 feet of storm surge and sarasota bay is just beyond those buildings. looking at wind gusts close to 100 miles an hour in this area. all of this comes on the heels of hurricane helene, which left mountains of debris all over these communities which is why these goggles are at the ready and we are also in parking garage. typically we would be out reporting from the streets as long as we were far back from where the storm surge was a threat. we're elevated because of the storm surge, inside a garage because of the wind threat, combined with the

debris, not secured in time, talking glass, splintered wood, pieces of furniture, all of that could become lethal projectiles. that is something first responders and these communities are contending with beyond what is typically in mind looking at a major hurricane. at this point, everybody should be hunkering down because you can hear it and see it, conditions are deteriorating rapidly. >> correspondent jesse kirsch, thank you for the update. do what you've got to do to stay safe, we are thinking about you. let's go down meteorologist bill karins, what can you tell us about hurricane milton's path at this hour now that it made landfall? >> the point of the storm that we know destruction is happening, we can't show it because it is too dangerous to be there, everyone is accurate in those areas, hopefully. there is no power anyways, it won't be until the sun comes up and the storm is gone and helicopters are showing the

destruction that we actually realize how bad it is on the ground. unconfirmed reports of 10 foot storm surge south of sarasota, in naples, confirmed five foot storm surge, there will be damage in those areas. those areas for helene, five to seven feet, some of these areas had a second time and some worse. extreme wind warning, wind gusts 90 to 100 miles an hour the last two or three hours from tampa to bradenton to st. petersburg. a lot of population centers here, three-quarter million of people without power, that number is growing quickly with the extreme wins. there is the storm surge going up, onshore flow continues. tampa bay had no storm surge at all, the winds are blowing out, the numbers are negative because the wind is taking the water from the bay and sending it out to sea. going through the current gusts, 90th st. petersburg, 82 in tampa, typically lose power when you hit 50 or 60, having mass power outages. roof damage, trees falling on cars and homes, that sort of thing. we had a 95 mile an hour,

category three hurricane tracking inland. overnight, take it just south of interstate 4, the highest wind and heaviest rain will be from tampa going to the disney complex, universal studios, into orlando and titusville, the melbourne area, palm bay, they will be getting power outages throughout the middle of the night. 10:00 a.m., it is gone and goes out to sea. all of the wind and rain should be done with it. a lot of flash flooding issues, daytona beach, orlando to tampa, expecting catastrophic flooding. not from the storm surge but inland rain, we saw the pictures of the mountains in north carolina, this is not bad, florida is flat. the water will pile up and sit there, it may be in homes but not a rushing river because of the terrain of florida. still predicting 5 to 10 inches of rain. we also had tornadoes earlier today, that we know of, injured, took homes, mobile homes, on the east coast of florida. with a major hurricane like

this, we won't know, like the fog of war type thing, we won't know until tomorrow afternoon how'd bad the damage is occurring right now. >> meteorologist will karen's, thank you for that update. with us is ken welch, mayor of st. petersburg, florida, 45 miles north of where hurricane milton came ashore tonight. thank you for being here, i notice a busy and hectic and chaotic time, we really up appreciate your time. what can you tell us about what you're seeing saint pete? >> we are blessed the storm did not hit 50 miles north of where it did. we were looking at 15 feet of storm surge, catastrophic wins, looking down the barrel of that gun 24 hours where's the community down. we are not out of that yet, really high winds and we are coming off of two weeks ago,

hurricane helene and still trying to recover from that. i think the storm opened a lot of eyes, much better response from our community and we asked about half 1 million people in saint pete and pinellas county to evacuate, overall, we think that they were responsive to that. this is an example of the new normal as our storms are becoming more powerful, moving more quickly, really testing our infrastructure. >> can we talk about that because of the one-two punch between helene and milton? granted not in the direct path of the storm but your close to it, dealing with managing the cleanup from the last, very recent monster storm, what is your expectation how long it will take things back up and running fully after these two storms or do you even have an estimate at this point? >> we don't. just from the debris standpoint from helene, looking at months of debris pick up and one of the problems we ran into is trying to compress six months of debris collection into a few days before hurricane milton

hit us. we also have infrastructure needs. we believe in climate science and have been investing in our cip, the infrastructure for years. the pace of change that we seek and the strength of storms and the impact is outweighing our capital investment so we have to look at everything from the sewer plants to wastewater, seawalls, all of those improved at a more rapid pace because changes becoming that more quickly than we thought it would. >> this might be premature given that we are grappling with this, do you think these two storms are inflection point in terms of how the state things about the climate crisis and how it manages its mitigation? >> i think that everybody sees the impact these storms are making to our economy. we have to rebuild in resilient weight and a way that makes sense given our new realities. we focused on mitigation, not

contributing to the problem of carbon emissions and sea level rise, focus more on adaptation and do that and every thing we do in terms of capital improvement. that needs to happen, i can see across the board people understand the need to change the way we look at our environment and how we build in the state of florida . >> are you talking to other mayors? i would assume you're dealing regionally with the same crisis, the hurricane coming through the area, do you have a sense of what the needs are more broadly in the region where milton is hitting? >> i think mayors from all across the florida are on the same page, i heard from mayors from across the state from tallahassee to south florida, we call each other when we are in the target of these storms. at the local level, mayors, county commissioners, understand the investments we need to make given the realities of these storms and the impact they can have on our community. they are becoming more powerful

and don't give us time to react. one of the issues here is that milton went from a tropical storm to one of the most powerful hurricanes we have ever seen in a matter of 24 hours. that is the new reality, i think local governments get that and we are working well together. hopefully the state and federal government will continue partnering with us to make those investments. >> st. petersburg mayor ken welch, great to hear from you, thank you for taking time in this busy moment, we really appreciate it. >> thank you, have a good one. coming up, we continue to get live reports from nbc reporters on the ground as hurricane milton hits florida. first, republicans are now saying that democrats control the weather. the insanity of climate change denial just got crazier. we will discuss coming up next. at harbor freight, we design and test our own tools... and sell them directly to you. no middleman.

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hurricane milton, category 3 storm, made landfall less than an hour ago in siesta key, florida, just south of tampa bay. joining me where residents are racing for magnitude of a storm unseen there in century is nbc news correspondent stephanie gosk. what can you tell us? i can see from the shot that

the storm is whipping around and a lot of rainfall, what can you tell us about where you are? >> reporter: we are feeling the brunt of hurricane milton right now. while tampa bay may not get the surge that would have made this historic and catastrophic, this will do a lot of damage. what we are experiencing in the city of tampa, we have winds gusting as ferociously as 100 miles an hour. torrential rain falling for hours. we were speaking with meteorolgist bill karins earlier, he said that they are recording two to three inches an hour of rain, right now in tampa that will last another three or four hours. looking at roughly up to a foot of rain falling on a city that already experienced the rain and flooding and surge from hurricane helene. now they have this on top of it. and the wind, you factor in the wind, there will be wind damage, damage from the debris

already in the streets scattered across roads as well as the flooding that is inevitably going to happen. we have been getting flash flood alerts, shelter in place alerts. it seems as though people are heeding the warnings, we don't see people out on the streets. we are in a parking garage and sheltered on all three sides. standing here, i can tell you the wind picks up and i'm getting knocked around. >> what is the expectation of when tampa may be in the clear? >> reporter: there are three or four more hours of this, perhaps the wind will die down in a couple hours. and things will calm down, it still will be, you have emergency officials warning people, incredibly dangerous to go out, in part because you have things like downed power lines, roads that are blocked off, the bridges may not be

open yet that lead to st. petersburg, for instance there won't be any gas. it will be difficult and uncomfortable in this area for many days to come. >> corresponded stephanie gosk, please stay safe where we are. we appreciate the report and update. let's go to mayor liz alpert, thank you for being here. i hope you are safe wherever you are, what can you tell us about how you are managing this moment and what is your top concern at the hour? >> first, the top concern is the safety of all of our residents and i hope that everybody gets through this safely. it looked like the eye came ashore on siesta key, which is right off the coast of sarasota. it was quiet for a little bit because the eye was going over us, now we can see the rain starting to come. the higher

winds. this is the part of the storm that we will see the worst of it and start seeing the storm surge everyone has been predicting. >> you have a sense of how many people were told to evacuate and actually evacuated, how many people stayed behind and are sheltering in place? >> i don't know what the percentages but my sense is the majority of people did evacuate. we feel like 90% or more of the residents of the barrier islands evacuated. the people who stayed felt like that they were at a location where they could ride out the storm and be safe to >> for people that did decide

to shelter in place, they felt like they would be able to ride out the storm, what should they expect in the next 24 hours? >> i think in the next several hours, there will be a lot of rain and a lot of wind and it is going to get a little scary. we are encouraging everybody to stay sheltered, state in place, and wait until the storm passes. once the storm passes, don't go out if there is standing water or trees down, wait until the situation is clear that it is safe to stay where you're sheltered. sorry, we will be out first thing in the morning assessing the damage and letting people know what they can do, whether it is safe to venture out of their homes. >> sarasota mayor liz alpert,

thank you for taking time to talk to us. sending our best wishes to sarasota and florida as they weather this monster storm. stay safe. >> thank you. >> will be back with more coverage of hurricane milton, stay with us. for her. i may not be in perfect health, but i want to stay in my home, where my family visits often and where my memories are. i can do it with help from a prep cook, wardrobe assistant and stylist, someone to help me live right at home. life's good. when you have a plan. ♪ ♪

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all of this with the global

warming, a lot of it is a hoax, it is a hoax, moneymaking industry, a lot of it. >> the climate hysteria hoax, the whole thing is a total, it is so crazy, within 300 years we will gain .001 of an inch and have more beach line property, it will be a terrible thing. the oceans will rise 0.18 over the next few years. more beachfront property, not the worst thing. the oceans will rise 0.8 inches. isn't that a good thing? >> as hurricane milton makes landfall, it is important to remember that that is the republican candidate for president thinks about the forces intensifying these storms. donald trump is so far out on the fringes of time conspiracy, he denies the existence of climate phenomena republicans accepted decades ago. remember in the george h bush administration? the federal government took

bold action to fix hole in the ozone layer caused by cfcs, remember that? decades after that, donald trump continues to rail against ozone reducing regulations because it resulted in a ban on his favorite hairspray. >> you can't use hairspray because hairspray is going to affect the ozone. i want to use hairspray, don't use it, that for the ozone. i'm in this concealed the point -- apartment, concealed unit, really nice apartment, it is sealed, it is beautiful. i don't think anything gets out, i'm not supposed to be using hairspray. >> trump has 1 million of these, windows somehow cause cancer, they don't. he thinks democrats want to replace your regular windows with tiny windows, they do not. trump has been repeating this nonsense for so long, it is

hard not to become wind of numb to it. a decade into the trump era of the republican party, trump acolyte are taking climate conspiracies to rater extremes. for the past week, congresswoman marjorie taylor greene continuously promoted the basis conspiracy that the federal government is secretly controlling the weather. she keeps repeating this claim, doubling and tripling down on it in the past week alone. now it is being amplified on right wing media. >> has the government figured out how to build a storm into a superstore that will destroy everything in its path and aim it right where they want to aim it? it happens to miss south florida, where all the democrats live. >> it just so happens. things have spun so wildly out of control here, even some republicans are feeling the need to push back. florida republican congressman

carlos jimenez posted on x, anyone who thinks they can control the weather needs to have their head examined. republican senator thom tillis told supporters in an email, the last thing the victims of hurricane helene need right now is political posturing, finger- pointing, or conspiracy theories area even florida governor ron, i'm not a global warming person desantis, felt the need to push back. >> we live in an era where if you put out crap online, you can get a lot of people to share it and monetize that, that is the way it is. if you are hearing things, something that is outrageous, just know in the state of florida, none of that whatever fly. >> and yet, none of that has been enough to stop the flood of conspiracies coming out of maga land. republican congressman chuck edwards sent a press release specifically aimed at conspiracies concerning chimney

rock state park, a parked in his district. these are quotes from the actual press release from actual member of congress. hurricane helene was not geo- engineered by the government to seize and access lithium deposits in chimney rock. local officials have confirmed that the government is not seizing chimney rock. local officials are not abandoning search and rescue efforts to bulldoze over chimney rock. it goes on and on and on like that. today, president biden addressed this wave of insane conspiracy theories and directly called out that maga politicians responsible for promoting them. >> these lies are un-american, there is no place for them, not now, not ever. former president donald trump has led this onslaught of lies, the claims are getting more bizarre. marjorie taylor greene, the congresswoman from georgia, the federal government is

controlling the weather. it is beyond ridiculous, it is so stupid. it's got to stop. >> joining me is the only member of the united states congress who is also a meteorologist, representative eric sorensen of illinois. thank you for joining me tonight. i wonder both as u.s. congressman and meteorologist, what you make of the absolutely paranoid and basis conspiracy theories that the government can control the weather? >> it is amazing, it is good to be with you, first things first, i'm thinking of the folks in harm's way in florida today and tonight as it is night, the hurricane made landfall. these are the most dangerous times for people. we have to make sure that we have a country where we look up to the smartest people, the

meteorologists, the national hurricane center, the national weather center because it is essential these remain the authority on such life- threatening events that they don't get pushed aside and force people to make poor decisions. it is unconscionable, to me, who worked as a meteorologist on broadcast television for 23 years, now we have elected leaders that are not just leading americans astray, leading their own constituents astray. >> it reminds me, i know my colleague chris hayes was talking about this on the covid pandemic, the service of political agenda, anti-vax, anti-science agenda, republicans dissuaded supporters, allies, voters from getting life-saving covid vaccines. again, putting politics above humanity. here you have politicians, once again, trying to champion

political agenda over the safety of their own constituents. i have to bring up the fact, congressman, if trump is re- elected, part of the plan here, as outlined in project 2025, is to dismantle now and privatize the national weather service. as a meteorologist, what does that mean to you? >> i serve on the space, science, technology committee in congress. we have some of the brightest minds working at nasa, noaa to make sure that we are learning more about this science than we have in the past to learn from our mistakes. these things go away, one of the things the national weather service, it is so trusted for those folks, especially talking about chimney rock or we think about the folks at bradenton, florida tonight. they have heard from these experts on what to do but what

happens if now, we have a populace that does not understand what to believe? that is, to their point, on the other side, exactly what they want to do because it is the same thing as what you just said about the pandemic, so many people, my own neighbors, that made poor decisions. here's the thing, if i got mad at my neighbors, it would not help solve the problem. they had bad data coming into this equation, it was tucker carlson giving them the bad data and they were making a bad conclusion and it goes over and over again because now they are realizing on the other side that was effective so now they want to do it and politicize the weather. >> the one thing, it is complete moral and ethical lapse, cutting off your own nose to spite your face, to undermine the ability of noaa

and the national weather service to predict historic, monster storms that affect a lot of part of the country where there happened to be republicans, also democrats. florida is a red state, why would you want to put the people of florida in harm's way, to a greater degree but not getting an accurate data for what happens next? defunding these agencies would do that. >> the fact we left washington, d.c. with continuing resolution with a lower projected funding amount for fema, knowing that helene would come into florida, georgia, two weeks later, here we are with another catastrophic hurricane hitting florida. what is next? we need congress to do its job and the folks at fema, doing the lords work tonight and in the days to come, we need to make sure they are supported. instead, we have these great

workers, federal workers, being threatened because of conspiracies on the internet. it is this absolute destruction of the good communication that we need more people to be connected to. >> illinois congressman and the only meteorologist in the house of representatives, eric sorensen, thank you for your time, really appreciate it. we will check back in with nbc news correspondent jesse kirsch on the ground in sarasota, florida. what can you tell us about the latest? >> reporter: conditions have deteriorated rapidly, i will have our photographer come to that edge of the garage, we are three stories up right now, this is why. look at the water, the water level rushing in and continuing to rise. locks from the edge of sarasota bay, you can see the first level of the parking garage across from where we are is

submerged in water to i saw a trash can floating around, even in the last 15 minutes, the eyewall, i have still seen headlights on the road. the wind is whipping the trees, ripping off the tops of the palm trees and the rain is coming in more heavily the biggest concern is the storm surge. we are blocks from sarasota bay and this is the impact of hurricane milton. remember, within the last hour, it was silent, nothing was moving, i could hear birds chirping and now we are contending with the backside of milton as it makes its way inland. this is what we expect to be done our earliest part of the storm and it is living up to expectation. we are in elevator parking garage and elevated because of the storm surge, i will point, you can see the walls to the side, we have fortification on either side of this window where i am, because there's added element of concern with this storm. less than two weeks after

landfall of helene in the same area. up the road from where we are, i saw waist high waterline marks from helene, that means all kinds of stuff was ripped out of the homes, furniture, picture frames, shards of glass, wooden planks, envelopes, food, you name it, it is on people's lawns and it was not cleared in time the governor says only 50% of the debris was cleared from barrier islands despite 24/7 operation to get out of here. in addition to everything else we expect from a major hurricane, we are looking at a variable we don't fully know what the impact will be, that is all of the debris could become projectiles, it could exacerbate the storm impact. look at that, all of the power is going out where we are now, the power is out at the garage where i met too. the lights flickered back on, the only lights in the garage where our lights powered by a

generator, not the electricity. we will see if i go off again. the lights are flickering on and off, we are in the impact now. we have cell signal, able to communicate with you, able to see the lights flickering. there is this eerie sense this will keep continuing right now. a generator has picked on, according to my producer. let's take a look over there, you can see the flickering lights on the building, it may or may not be, it is eerie right now with lights flickering around us, the winds are howling, the rain coming down. i saw a flash of something, i don't know if that is from a transformer or lightning. the water level is continuing to rise around us. >> let me ask you, you've got to do what you got to do, if you need to go somewhere, do that by all means. >> we are good, we have eyes in all directions. >> i really appreciate what

you're doing. in terms of the water level rise, when we talked at the top of the hour, you couldn't see water, it is hard to understand, hard for you to estimate too, it looks like it is rising rapidly. you have a sense of where it is versus where was when we talked to you half an hour ago? >> reporter: yes. i will have david come over to the edge, i will keep my finger in the frame to show you, off to the right of the water level around here in the last 10 or 15 minutes, look where it is, this is a ramp so that is an incline so it is going up a ramp. even with a little bit of rain earlier, the flooding was overwhelming, the storm drain over here with rainfall hours before landfall. the fact this is all happening is by no means surprising. we also heard from people in the area this happened over here with hurricane helene. we were expecting twice as high of a storm surge this time around. because we are to the right of

where the storm made landfall, this is the side of the hurricane that typically sees the powerful winds and most powerful storm surge, right now, we are seeing this in real time. watching the water level, it keeps inching up i know based on what i've seen and what the producers have seen, there is water over here, water on that side of the street and the main road over there, at least three sides and we can't get over to the main road by the marina to see if it is surrounding us completely. we are partially on what appears to be an island right now, i want to stress that we are elevated, multiple stories up for that very reason. there are people that live in one or possibly two story homes on the barrier islands and if they have not evacuated, this is what they are contending with and this is probably not the end of it. >> and i were perspective, really brave reporting, msnbc correspondent jesse kirsch, thank you, safety is paramount and do what you need to do and thanks for the update. still ahead this evening,

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made landfall earlier this evening, the national hurricane center warned that it would become one of the most destructive hurricanes on record scientists and experts are alarmed by milton's historic size and strength and the supercharge rate at which it grew, what is known as extreme rapid intensification. the cause for that is fairly straightforward, unusually hot ocean water, especially on the surface, provides fuel for these storms and this year, the gulf of mexico saul record high temperatures, scientist are clear that a primary reason for that is climate change. according to a recent study, change made the record-breaking water temperatures that fueled hurricane milton up to 800 times more likely. the author of the new york times best selling book, "the heat will kill you first", jeff goodell puts it plainly, hurricane milton is a fossil fuel driven catastrophe. joining me from asheville, north carolina, a city still

reeling from the effects of hurricane helene, jeff goodell, scientist that covered climate change for decades. thank you for being here, i will note that asheville is not a place known to have the need to brace for the impact of these monster storms, it is that testament to climate change, i would say, that your having to grapple with this and our thoughts are with people in your community and those in florida affected by hurricane milton. let me start with the idea climate change is making a storm like milton 800 times more likely, do you concur with that, does that sound right to you? >> yeah, the study you are citing suggested that global warming is making the sea surface temperatures 800 times more likely to reach these temperatures, which is making these hotter temperatures, as he talked about in your introduction more likely. not making the storm itself 800 times more likely, it is making

the hotter waters that are driving these storms much more likely. we do know because of the hotter waters, hurricanes are not only more likely but more intense and more destructive and we have seen it with milton with the rapid intensification with the storm going from tropical depression to category five storm in 48 hours. what we are seeing is a sign of this new climate we are creating by consuming to burn fossil fuels, we are going to see more and more of these kinds of storms, it is not a freak storm, not just a random event. this is the kind of world we are creating for ourselves. ourselves. >> it seems like it is a characteristic of several of the hurricanes that we

weathered in the last two years. hurricane idalia, in 2023, , hurricane ian in 2022. and those are category 4 and 5 storms that intensify rapidly. for people who don't quite understand why that matters, could you explain why this makes the monster storms more perilous? >> the additional heat we are putting into the atmosphere with co2 goes into the ocean. the ocean is like a giant heat sink and it sucks up a lot of the heat so as we get the hotter oceans, hurricanes are like heat engines. they work off the differential. they get oftheir energy from th differential between. that sort

of heat engine spins faster. and faster spinning heat engine is very dangerous. so difficult to predict these things happen very quickly. they come out of nowhere. they spin in a much faster and much larger diameter. because of hotter air, carries more moisture. they r,are wetter which is real important. we are seeing that here with milton. with every one degree of a warmer atmosphere, you get 7% more water in that air so you are getting more intense rainfall we saw in another unlikely place like vermont last summer. we hood these intense rainfalls. it was because of this hotter atmosphere carrying more water. add the final you

thing onto this which makes these more destructive is sea level rise. the gulf coast, sea levels are rising twice as fast as the rest of the united states. we have seen five inches in just the last decade. this is what making the storms much more destructive. >> appreciate your time tonight sir. stay safe. we'll be urright back with more of our coverage of hurricane milton. stay with us. milton. stay with us.

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a flash flood warning has been declared as hurricane milton rages across the state.

multiple fatalities reported in fort pierce after a tornado touched down around 4:30 p.m. over one million floridians are currently without power as hurricane milton gets downgraded to a category 2 storm with winds as high as 110 miles per hour. joining me now from tampa is nbc news correspondent stephanie gosk. it looks bad there. what can you tell us? >> reporter: yeah, alex, it is bad. maybe a category 2. but we are getting the brunt of those winds right now. and. it is why hurricanes like this are so damaging. we were standing here a long time and the wind was going that way. then it started to pick up and not only did it get stronger, it shifted direction and came right at us. that is one of the things about hurricanes that makes them so damaging. the flash flood warning here in tampa. the alert going out to people tells them it is not only a flash flood warning but a life threatening situation and the only reason you should leave where you are is if you

yourself are experiencing those floods and you need to get out of a place to try to escape the water but i can tell you right now, these winds, 70, 80, 90 miles per hour gusts add a bare minimum. we are seeing the intensity in the last half hour ratchet up. the historic surge doesn't look like it is going to happen but the rain we are getting on top of this ferocious wind event means there will be damage tomorrow. on top of hurricane helene as well. >> nbc news correspondent stephanie gosk, please stay safe. do what you need to do. we really appreciate the reporting tonight. that is our show for this evening. our breaking news coverage of hurricane milton continues on the last word with lawrence o'donnell. good evening lawrence. >> good evening alex. we will continue that coverage