right now we're getting a look at the damage left behind by sandy. right now president obama will tour the damage in new jersey. the storm is to blame for at least 50 deaths, including one in anne arundel koicounty, one montgomery county. sandy is shaping up to be one of the costliest natural disasters in american history. it's estimated to be $20 billion in property damage and another $30 billion in lost business. right now crews continue to work around the clock to restore power to thousands of residents. dominion virginia has more than 33,000 customers still in the dark. pepco is working to get the lights on for more than 1,500 customers. and bge has 24,000 customers in our region without power. more than 22,000 of them are in anne arundel county. it is back to work and school for most folks in our area. the federal government and local jurisdictions are back up this morning, as are most public

schools in the area. there are some exceptions to that, though. in virginia manassas park city schools are closed. there are two-hour delays in culpeper, frederick, fauquier, and shenandoah counties. buses are using emergency routes in shenandoah. loudoun county has a one hour delay. frederick county schools in maryland on a two-hour delay. and in west virginia pendleton county schools are closed. berkeley, hampshire and jefferson counties are on delay. and there are schools in d.c. that are still without power. most schools plan to announce between 5:00 and 6:00 this morning whether they'll be able to open. >> 4:31. chilly start to your day, but no more rain falling, at least for now. let's check in with tom kierein to see if we're going to get wet weather. >> more importantly, can kids go trick or treating? >> i'm glad you asked. right now we have just a few

sprinkles to our north and west. storm team 4 radar showing that. those areas in green just a few sprinkles. still getting a few snow showers in central west virginia. the big snow event has pretty much ended in western maryland and down toward canaan valley. a few sprinkles in western fairfax, loudoun county, northern fauquier, prince william down to culpeper. a few sprinkles there, as well as on the pennsylvania border. many streaks in green the counties running high. also, we'll have tidal flooding. tides will be a foot or two above the average tooitd by later this morning. the time of high tide at alexandria is 10:06. a chilly morning, upper 30s most of the shenandoah valley north and west of washington. south of washington, southern maryland, northern neck, eastern shore low 40s. reagan national 43. here's the storm team 4 hour by hour forecast for today. clouds this morning. a small chance of a sprinkle. by noontime near 50, a little

sun breaking out through midafternoon. mid-50s midafternoon. clouds close in after that. back down to near 50 by sunset at 6:08. sunrise at 6:35. i'll return in ten minutes. danella here with first 4 traffic. good morning. >> good morning. thanks, tom. checking the roadways, still seeing the early morning crash on the beltway. it's involving a tractor-trailer on the inner loop as you approach annapolis road. crews are still working to get the fuels off of the roadway. again, if you're traveling the inner loop, very light volume this time of morning. still dealing with flooding and downed wires. let's head over to upper marlboro. largo road closed at marlboro pike because of flooding in that area. in virginia, if you're making the trip on glebe road. your northbound lanes are blocked at chain bridge road due to downed wires. 95, interstate nice and clear, no issues between the beltway and 14th street bridge. back to you. >> thank you, danella.

this morning waters continue to rise in some areas even with the passing of the storm, and the worst may not be over. news 4's melissa mollet live in old town alexandria, where the water levels seem to be creeping up a bit. melissa? >> reporter: good morning, aaron. we are standing out here at 11:00 in the morning. we are out here again news 4, 11:00 last night. it looks very different from where it does now because we were just after a high tide. you can look as i'm walking at king and union. this whole area was still -- we had a couple feet of water, went down to about six inches. now the water has receded as expected, and high tide expected again at 10:00 this morning, 10:06 to be exact. you can see all of these roads completely shut down for safety. take a look over here. even a lot of the businesses still worried about this water coming through. and, of course, have sandbags there just in case we have another issue, which is expected within the next 24 hours or so, i would say. take a look at how things looked

out here last night. the water stretching to restaurants and businesses here. not the worst they have seen. that worst was in 2003 back with isabel. right now we're at flood stage. tomorrow we're expected to be five feet over flood stage. that's why restaurants, businesses, very nervous here. the other thing we want to think about and something we haven't talked about as much is the situation time has been telling me about. in georgetown, they have to keep an eye on things there. we know the flood a year and a half ago in april. very, very scary for the businesses there. right now the flood gates are up. everyone expected to be okay. they can get up to a high level, about seven feet, at the point where it would crest over. those gates are up. live in old town, alexandria. things are starting to get back to normal today, but we are

still seeing delays and cancellations at local airports this morning. news 4's megan mcgrath is live at reagan national about that. >> reporter: we are seeing a lot of cancellations. 41 cancellations on the board here at reagan airport to be exact. lots of frustrated passengers. more than 16,000 flights cancelled because of sandy, and things still are not back to normal. it still could be some time. in new york area, limited service this morning at kennedy airport and newark. however, laguardia is closed and will remain closed until further notice. as i mentioned, lots of planes, lots of flights being cancelled here still today. of course, you have hundreds of thousands of people who have to make alternate arrangements. they're scrambling to get flights. to be honest, there raren't a lt of flights, aren't a lot of competition to get those flights. lots of people sacked out at

airports. here at reagan national, people out on the benches. they've got their luggage beside them. they're crashed out. lots of people, we presume, have gone back to their hotels. they're crashing out with relatives and friends in the area until they can actually get a flight out. reagan national is open. we are seeing flights on the board, some of which are listed on time. we are still seeing plenty of cancellations. >> megan mcgrath live at reagan national. megan, we'll check in with you in just a bit. >> news this morning from the national guard. devastating blow sandy landed on the new jersey shore. block after block. it appears that some of the houses collapsed as well. in long beach island, some boats are jumbled and stacked on top of each other at the dock. others that were swept away now litter the streets and woods that are nearby. it is not just the shore feeling

sandy's effects in new jersey. hoboken, just across the hudson river from new york city, was hit hard by rising flood waters. wnbc is live with more on the damage. >> reporter: good morning. we are live here in hoboken, and the devastating flooding is definitely taking the city by storm. nearly two feet of flooding taking place op this street going down as far as the eyes can see. cars are under water, and people are still stranded in their homes and apartments. i had an opportunity to speak with the police department here in hoboken, and they were trying desperately to save theese people. also, the military, the national guard has come in, using their special military cars to come in with the flooding. what's so special about the cars, they have the engine on top which prevents them from shutting down dung high water situation. the power shut down.

we had to be escorted to this area by the police so we would not get hurt. meanwhile, they are pumping out millions and millions of gallons of water. right in front of me, you can't see it, they are pumping out a parking garage that has 2 million gallons, and that is supposed to take about 18 hours to get just that garage which comprises the whole block. if you think about all the blocks in hoboken and all the parking garages and areas that are over flooded, it could take days, if not weeks. we are live in downtown hoboken. back to you. millions of dollars on their way to storm ravaged new york and long island. transportation secretary ray lahood has $13 million in emergency funds available immediately to repair the damage caused by hurricane sandy. earlier this week, president obama cleared the way for disaster assistance, including a major disaster declaration for new york. it is 4:39 right now. coming up, a warning in howard

county. how untreated water entered the little paw tuxen river. we'll get an update.

welcome back at 4:42. if you look outside your window, you're going to see there's no rain falling. >> that's good news for us.

we're going to see the chilly weather continue. tom kierein is in the weather center with the latest forecast. >> good morning. a little moon showing through. a few breaks in the clouds. we are getting a few sprinkles. storm team 4 radar showing a few sprinkles in parts of prince william, fauquier, loudoun, and a few more down towards culpeper and around the blue ridge, shenandoah valley, out of the mountains, just a few sprinkles there. and in frederick county along the pennsylvania border. all those areas in dark blue in the 30s. cold in the mountains and all the areas in the light blue in the 40s. much of the metro area now it's going to stay that way through midmorning with a small chance of a sprinkle. sun out early afternoon and clouding up late afternoon. highs mid-50s. i'm back with the seven day outlook in ten minutes. danella with a look at traffic. good morning. >> good morning. i'm here with good news. if you're traveling the inner loop of the pelt wbeltway, had tractor-trailer accident there.

report of an accident inner loop of the beltway at colesville road. if that's your commute, be aware of that. still seeing debris in the roadway md-175, annapolis road. you're closed because of debris there. and over in the district, canal road closed between reservoir road and arizona avenue because of debris in the area. i'm back in ten. aaron and eun, back over to you. 4:44 now. coming up, we check out sandy's impact on the jersey shore in a live report. [ earnest ] out of the blue one day,

we were told to build a 30-foot stage. gathered the guys and we built that 30-foot stage, not knowing what it was for. just days later, all three shifts were told to assemble in the warehouse. a group of people walked out on that stage and told us that the plant is now closed and all of you are fired... i looked both ways, i looked at the crowd, and...we all just lost our jobs. we don't have an income. mitt romney made over 100 million dollars by shutting down our plant and devastated our lives.

turns out that when we built that stage, it was like building my own coffin, and it just made me sick. [ male announcer ] priorities usa action is responsible for the content of this advertising. welcome back at 4:46.

governor christie takes a tour of the new jersey's storm damaged coast. residents are still being rescued after being stranded by washed out roads and bridges. nbc's danielle leigh joins us from toms river with more on the recovery. danielle, good morning. >> reporter: good morning, eun. i'm standing on a road that just yesterday was completely covered in water. this is the road that leads from mainland new jersey to the jersey shore. now we're getting a look at the damage, at the bits and pieces of people's lives that were just washed away. this is a patio that officers tell me should not be in this parking lot where i'm standing. sitting on top of it are decorations from people's homes. officers don't know where many of these items came from. there was a boat that was just washed into the middle of the road. it's not surprising when you look at the scenes of damage, when you look at the video along the jersey shore and places like seaside heights where just the top of homes peek out of sands. when there's amusement parks and boardwalks ripped to shreds and

floating in the water. jersey shore saw the worst of hurricane sandy. hundreds of people have been rescued from those locations, from those towns. the rescue efforts are going to resume today. i actually got to speak to some of the people that were brought off of seaside heights late last night, and they were so tired. they said it was just terrible over there. as you mentioned, president obama will be here later today to see the damage. this damage not isolated to new jersey. new york city also severely devastated by floods and fires. going to take a long time to recover from this storm. reporting live in toms river, new jersey. i'm danielle leigh. eun, back to you. >> just devastating, danielle. thank you. it's a different story in rehoboth beach this morning. the town is coming back to life slowly. it was deserted after sandy, but businesses are reopening and visitors are returning. many say it was not as bad as feared. >> i thought it was going to be a lot worse than that.

i think it fizzled out when it hit land. >> absolutely incredible. that's all i got to say. mother nature at her best. >> rehoboth suffered minor damage, but nothing compared to some of the beaches along the jersey shore. coming up at 4:49, you could be in for a nightmare if you have to drive through parts of prince george's county. several roadways closed due to standing water. news 4's tony tull is live in upper marlboro, which is particularly difficult to reach this morning. tony? >> reporter: aaron, good morning. with the rain and high winds gone, that's the good news. bad news, with the trees and debris clogging up the storm drains, we're still dealing with flooded roads. here in prince george's county, you can see water road blocked off pretty far. you can see the floodwater running across the road down there. not a big deal if you're coming in on pennsylvania avenue because you'll still be able to get off on an exit before water street or after water street. if you're headed through the courthouse or here through water street, you can still make it

around. that is not the only road closed here in prince george's county. if you're headed out this morning, queen ann's road in bowie. governor's bridge road in bowie. 24th avenue at high school also closed. 24th avenue at fair lawn street also closed as well as buck lane in upper marlboro. eun and aaron, still a lot of road closures due to flooding in prince george's county. we're going to keep you updated all morning long. we're going to check out the other spots to let you know how bad or good the commute will be this morning. with those high rains and winds out of the area, we're still dealing with some flooded roads. if you're headed out this morning, at least in prince george's county, make sure you grab a jacket. it is very, very cold out. we're live in prince george's county, tony tull, news 4. the national park service says the monuments and memorials along the national mall were not damaged in sandy's winds. the park service spokeswoman says there is a slight possibility the world war ii memorial experienced some minor flooding as the swollen potomac

river continues to rise. park service says the memorial is designed to withstand flooding and will not be damaged. the little patuxent water treatment plant in howard county is partly operational. it shut down on monday after both power supplies failed. it sent millions of gallons of untreated waste water into the little patuxent river. one of the power supplies has been restored, and howard county's drinking water supply is safe, and there's no reason for residents to boil water. still plenty of flooding around creeks and rivers. yesterday the monocacy river swelled well above its banks in pine creek park, frederick county. pretty much part of the river now. residents say they are used to the river rising quickly, but this is a little different. >> i've seen where it's gotten up to the playground equipment and pavilions. we've had a lot of snow and rain, but this is unusual, to say the least. >> the park is likely to stay

closed for a while as the threat of the rising river -- the river rising even higher does continue in that area. there are still some flood warnings up in different parts of the area. so we still have that concern as we move forward. >> that's right. 4:51. let's check in with meteorologist tom kierein for your weather and traffic on the ones. tom, good morning. >> right now the flood stage of the monocacy is at 15 feet. it's at 25 feet. so it's 10 feet above the flood st stage. it's cresting now and going to be receding. the potomac is running really high. a lot of debris, and it's near flood stage. we'll be at flood stage by early this evening, and then it will recede. storm team 4 radar showing a few sprinkles. little patches of green right now, loudoun county. maybe a few sprinkles in fairfax and arlington, just west of i-95. prince william, fauquier county getting sprinkles down to culpeper and farther west into the shenandoah valley.

they had a lot of snow out of the mountains, up to two feet in western maryland highlands and west virginia yesterday. we do have some river flooding here, small creeks and streams out of their banks and localized flooding as well as tidal flooding, all these areas in green. the tidal potomac around the bay, times of high tide may be two to three feet above the average high tides. as we look at temperatures, it is a chilly morning. just in the upper 30s much of our region. low 40s in washington and southern maryland near the bay and the northern neck of virginia. storm team 4 four-day forecast, we'll have a little sun breaking out this morning and perhaps early afternoon. then cloudy after that. the winds will be still a little breezy, maybe around 15 to 20 mil miles an hour as we climb to mid-50s. tomorrow maybe a little breezy, highs reaching mid-50s. thursday evening into friday, saturday, we'll clear out. a lot of sunshine. friday, saturday afternoon, highs mid-50s. near freezing temperatures,

friday, saturday morning. near 40 on sunday morning. partly cloudy sunday afternoon, highs mid-50s. that pattern continues as we get into next week with chilly mornings and cool afternoons. i'm back in ten minutes. a look at your first 4 traffic this wednesday morning with danella. good morning. >> good morning. still checking on the potential accident, inner loop of the beltway at colesville road. still seeing report of an accident in that area. 50 inbound at the beltway, accident activity. this time just in the left shoulder lane. just a moment ago, it was blocking two of your left lanes. it looked like it moved out of the roadway. if you're traveling inbound 50, very light volume, but stick to your right to avoid the accident in this area. still seeing downed power lines and trees and debris, if you're taking the local roads, that's where most of these incidents are, the beltway, interstate's nice and clear. let's head over to downed wires. this is on holloway road closed at barrett road. please use caution as you're making your commute this

morning. aaron and eun, back over to you. >> thanks, danella. 4:54. in other news, d.c. pliolice ar hoping a security video will help them catch a man suspected in a brutal attack. police say the man knocked on doors handing out flyers for a party. when one woman opened the door, he forced his way inside. the man tried to rape her and beat her and stabbed her several times. at least check the 24-year-old woman is listed in critical condition. >> of all the types of assaults we see, this is one of the ones that's really alarming to all of us because not only did he force his way inside of someone's home, but after trying to sexually assault this woman, he tried to kill her. he's very dangerous. we want to get him off the streets. >> police believe the suspect may have an injury to one of his hands from the attack. if you recognize this man, call the police. the atf is confirming that a stafford county home raided by federal agents is connected to a series of pipe bomb attacks in

northern virginia. these are photos from that home on crater lane. investigators say they're searching for a man who they believe threw pipe bombs at three homes in stafford county in fredericksburg yesterday. the homes belong to a stafford county sheriff's deputy, his girlfriend, and another law enforcement officer. no one was hurt in those attacks. federal agents are not saying who they believe is responsible. right now the coast guard is saying the captain of a tall ship that sank during hurricane sandy is still missing. crews searched overnight with a c-130 and two cutter ships searched over north carolina. the bounty can no longer not seen in the waves of the atlantic ocean, but there was hope 63-year-old robin waldbridge could survive in the mild 77 degree waters. 15 crew members were rescued from the sinking ship, but one was died. in the sports headlines, it was a bit of a rough start from the wizards regular season. they fell 94-84.

the wizards played from behind the spire game. they scored 16 unanswered points in the fourth quarter to get them back in the game, but it was not meant to be. rookie bradley beale struggled in his debut, scoring just eight points. here's a view in the other direction. these are new images of the milky way. astronomers used a combination of advisedible avisible and inm to catalog more than 40 million stars in the milky way. they plan to use the images to learn more about our galaxy. we are just teeny, tiny, miniscule little part of our great universe. it's just humbling. >> so much you don't know. absolutely. glad there are big brains working on it. from flood damage to what's open and closed, more coverage of sandy's impact straight ahead.