it's expected to sit over washington dc for the next 36 hours, dumping up to two and a half feet of wet, heavy snow. official are concerned about 50 mile per hour winds toppling trees on roofs and power lines. >> this is a life-threatening type of storm. >> reporter: with the potential of three inches of snow an hour, district officials are making main roads and snow evacuation routes a priority. >> get off the street, you know, be safe, let us handle our business. >> reporter: air travel has been challenging. a united airlines plane skidded off the runway in o'hare in chicago. no one was injured but others are suspending service as a precaution. along the jersey shore, it's not the snow but a lunar high tide that has residents worried about coastal flooding. while new yorkers are bracing for a foot of snow. >> australian guy, i'm scared of the blizzard. >> reporter: officials say 50 million people are in the storm's path. craig boswell, cbs news,

so right away, 10 weather meteorologist jim checking that, jim? >> now the mid atlantic blizzard, only going to get worse as you take a look at storm tracker 10, look at all the snow reaching portions of alabama, this was earlier today in mississippi, arkansas, louisiana, now you can see as that front flies up, the mid atlantic coast line, pummelling west virginia, commonwealth and even m to dc, the -- even in to dc, possibly jersey as we go saturday as we pull off the coastlines going in to saturday night in to sunday morning. so the amounts of snow that we're talking about, you can see models are deikt p -- depicting the bulls eye, eastern, west virginia, but a little bit of a

mean $20 to $30 inch -- 30 inches from western virginia to dc. that's why people are so on guard, the track has been consistent, not much room for what could be a few inch to a few feet. >> and it crippled them. >> yeah, for us and not to mention severe thunderstorms. >> that's right, we tracked about four thunderstorm warnings in our area, a tornado warning on the east side of the state, coming up i'll take you through that line that went through. and on the horizon, another round of storms in our forecast, tell you when. >> and we were tracking those thunderstorms earlier today, some proved to be dangerous in certain areas, in south tampa on west street, a huge tree came crashing through and -- an engaged couple's house, tammie fields shows you the damage and how to prevent it from happening to you. >> reporter: this is a massive clean up effort, really amazing no one was seriously hurt here. that's because this tree weighs some seven tons! >> that's astonishing, really crazy.

share with his fiancee is a mess. >> i'm also a little afraid there's some structural damage because it looks like it banged the house pretty hard. >> reporter: neighbors heard a streak of lightning, heard a crash, right before the tree slammed in to the family room, leaving several large gameing -- gaping holes behind. the beloved dog olivia thorlly sits there -- normally sits there. >> i think it scared her in to the bedroom, she's fine. >> reporter: the couple has spent time and money keeping their tree trimmed, trying to prevent a thing like this. joel who works in the mid florida forestry says is this can happen sometimes. >> the core of the tree is gone. >> reporter: he says is there are always thing you can look out for. for example, if you see a branch fall off and the tree fails to

>> a hole in the tree, say a squirrel that's made a hole, it's unknown how big the tree is rotted out. >> reporter: it's critical, thank you have trees around your property, get them checked out and you get them checked out before another storm rolls through. in south tampa, tammie fields, studio 10 wtsp. we posted a photo gallery so you can see the pictures for yourself. we also have a guide on how you can tell it your tree is healthy, something you might want to look at right now, go to our website wtsp.com and download our 10 news app, it's free. you will get alerts, we heard from several of you who awoke in the middle of the night by our tornado warning at 3:00 a.m., we only send potentially life saving alerts in the middle of the night. the children's gasparilla parade rolling down tomorrow. the bleachers you see there are

that parade run from 3:30 to 6:00 p.m., bay to bay and ends half an hour before the davis island lights turn off. unlike the adult parade, alcohol is not allowed and hillary joins us now with a look at the road closures. festivities kick off, and all the road closures will be in effect until 9:00 a.m. the main ones from bay shore to platte street and bay to bay, east of mcdale avenue, that will be closed. expect major connestion -- congestion in the tampa area. through downtown tampa, the expressway or kennedy boulevard, but express delays there, all day tomorrow. and don't forget, your bridges across the bay. it will be very, very congested. especially the howard frankland bridge, in to tampa, right at the kennedy exit, especially. make sure you give yourself plenty of time as you're heading

in to tampa, most of your majors will be busier than normal for weekend traffic. all this information, including parking info, as well as cell service information on our website. go to wtsp.com and click on traffic. senator bill nelson is weighing in on the closed bill school that was once the site of a horrific act. they presented their final report on the dozier school for boys. that's where td remains of -- where the remains of more than 50 children were found. the report stops short of any criminal findings but did find suspicious details surrounding those remains. >> they deserve, not only an apology, they deserve the heartfelt, enormous grief that we should feel about a chapter of our florida history. >> survivors of dozier tell stories of beatings at the hands of guards, and they think another cemetery with more bodies may still be on the site.

taking the thunder on the road to win new fans. the team's owner went up against middle school girls in a game of street hockey today. 10 news reporter jonathan tells us about his mission to spread his love of the sport. at the preparatory girls school in tampa, it was a strike for the lightning. >> not only have i never played hockey, i never skated before. but i still love the sport >> reporter: loves it enough to scrimmage against girls that have the same amount of hockey experience. >> many of these girl have never seen a hockey game, much less hold a stick. the goal? is obviously to introduce more fans to the game. >> i feel like part of my mission here is to introduce and share my joy of this game with everybody in the community. >> reporter: since october, the

schools and introduced 12,000 middle school students sto what was -- to what was once marketed as the coolest game on earth. >> [ indiscernible ] when you like, get to a game, it's such, especially with sports, it's a good feeling. >> reporter: then the lightning hope that they score with a new generation of tans. in -- fans. in tampa, 10 news, wtsp. the bucs announced two hours ago, lynch is the next inductee in to the ring of honor. dave wirth now joins us, he was pretty excited today. >> you can imagine, he was excited, honored to be the ninth member of the bucs ring of honor. he was part of the trifecta against defense back then it cull mrinated in to a season, he play -- culminated in to a

he was the dominate safety of his era. the final 12 seasons, he missed eight games. interceptions. football and tampa have always been special to john lynch. >> this was always where my heart was, when i left baseball for football, i did i it for one reason, i loved and had a passion for the game. eventually when you have passion for something and you work hard, it, you know, we always win out. and it did. >> and for the fourth time, he's a finalist for the pro football bowl. more of my discussion with him come. hitting the sports field, what's on the ground? >> just ahead, why lawmakers are calling for a federal study, and what you need to do to protect your kids. plus, parents are clinging to hope, why they cannot give up come home.

live look outside, hey! the howard frankland actually looking kind of decent right now! >> this live! [ laughter ] no, this is true! rrt, thing -- all right, things smoothly! if you can't make it to the big game february 7, hooters and 10 news have teamed up with a watch party at a location, watch for a secret word of the day then enter that word on our

we want you to know it's all about jennifer kessey.

not forgotten. loved ones of jennifer along with the police making a renewed push to find her. >> 10 news roerter garin flowers with -- reporter garin flower with new information. what can you tell us? >> you should know, they haven't stopped searching, this has been a nightmare, they want you to come forward if you can give anything that can help solve the case. tampa native jennifer kessey disappeared without a trace. >> we will never forget her, give us our -- >> reporter: she was just 24 years old when she disappeared in twriks -- 2006, last seen in her condominium at the mall of millennium, it took coworkers only half an hour to realize something was wrong. within two hours, her family and

her father hasn't stopped searching for answers. >> who's ever take ever her, 10 years is a long time. >> reporter: over the years suspects ruled out. but this surveillance video remains a mystery. the person behind the gate. new in the case, investigators pulled up two large searches, one in 2014 and one this past december. they did not find jennifer. they released this age progression photo. hoping it helps lead to finding out what happened to her. >> jennifer needs you. and jennifer needs the public more than any time before, because we know more than one person knows what happened to jennifer 10 years ago. we know that. it's not a secret. >> reporter: garin flowers, 10 news wtsp. >> if you know anything about jennifer, we have the information you need, it's on our website, wtsp.com click seen on tv. make sure to watch 10 news

have your top stories and ashley batey will have your forecast. trend that change how you see a doctor, you'll also get a look what's happening in your community and you'll see how a movie played out in our own backyard! 10 news sunday morning, where we take the time to tell great local stories. we'll see you at 8:30. tracking storms, alerting you, helping your family, it's time for 10 weather. >> all right, we just saw the snow, the ice happening up north, but, down here, maybe not that cold. still, pinellas and pasco counties are opening up shelters. >> it's serious. >> there are parts of this weekend that are going to be quite cool and behind the same system, producing this blizzard will be some of the higher winds we've seen on a weekend in quite some time. i want to show you on storm tracker 10, as this really wientdz up -- winds up over tennessee, virginia, kentucky, north carolina, and of course,

our cold front and this lull has been tracking right what we thought it would. i was expecting it to atlanta, and to swing out over the peninsula, behind it you can see the wrap around and the intensifying storm pulling in clouds and what will be a lot of wind for us in the days ahead. these are storm reports you see pop up, wind gusts around 50 miles per hour, around tampa, all the way down to the keys today. and we had one storm we were tracking, had a little bit of a rotation earlier this afternoon, around just west of brooksville, that ended up being a tornado storm over by new smyrna beach. so thankfully, yes, we had severe weather but it wasn't worse. so we're happy to see that. look at the cold air coming in behind this. 29 in st. louis, nashville right now, 27 in charlotte, 36 and dropping in atlanta, 33 in birmingham and those 30s are extending all the way in to the panhandle right now. so although we do have windy

nothing like what they will be dealing with. just to our north, even around the i-10 corridor. so tonight we start our evening, your friday and your weekend with temperatures around 65 in st. petersburg, also in tampa, 64 sarasota. and the wind should be starting to pick up as we go through tonight and the overnight hours. now, we'll still leave a chance when we see a shower in the forecast, know that i'm not talking about any more thunderstorms, any more dangers, potential out there. this would just be a little bit of a light rain, mist on your windshield and could slick the roads up a little bit late this evening. now, going to be more isolated in nature, but it is a possibility. and since we have so many people starting their weekend and on the roads on a friday night, just want to alert you to that and give you a heads up. so overnight, notice the temperatures, usually we start low and go high, well, that's going to be one of the rare days where we start with our high and we end up with the low at the end of the day.

-- in the afternoon and evening. we'll spend the hours in the 40s, to it, we'll have the wind whipping from the west. we see futurecast, what i'm talking about, no storms but plenty of these light little mists, showers, areas of drizzle, for the first half of the day, should be wrapped up by about midday, we'll see decreasing cloud and clear -- clouds and clearing conditions. look at the winds, sustained winds. that's not a gust. that's sustained. 31, 8:00 a.m., 25 largo, and that stays with us through our saturday. sunday, the winds let up but we have gale force, 37 to 48 knots, i believe. we'll see seas around eight to 14 feet. big heads up, high rip currents for several days because of these winds. low tide's at 8:05, what's on the horizon, chilly mornings, in the half hour, i'll show you

cool mornings we're expecting, forecasting 40 in tampa, going to be a lot colder north and it goes for at least a couple mornings. kind of a chilly weekend both days. meks storm system on the -- next storm system on the horizon is looking to be thursday and that might be a severe weather maker. in fact, we are definitely going to want to watch that very closely, reg. you have the forecast in the weekend any time open up the app. just about everyone has seen a florida woman's fight going viral. i'm reginald roundtree, all new, how this doctor's reputation is now on the line. >> reporter: a transgender student fights for equal rights at his school and wins. but his fight for equality doesn't stop there. >> this is the -- and what would you do if your house was burning with your

how this man's action landed him behind bars. see if you would make the same choice. those stories and much more coming up next on 10 news at 5:30. just ahead, the freezing on

in this line of work only the freshest ingredients make the cut it's important to me to know every dish i serve is the best it can be. food critic. made bread day with pride with some publix. where shopping

tonight on cbs and 10 news, join us at 8:00 an all new "undercover boss" hawaii 50 and "blue bloods" then join reggie and me.

a misoondzunder stood sign. brown and gay employees get half priced lunches this week only. got your attention; right? our news partners khou received angry calls and e-mails for good reason. when the station asked the owners about the wording, they were confused. >> said brown and gay employees get 50% off their lunch. and what that referenced is there's a company one block from here called brown and gay engineering. >> first, i didn't know what to think, and then i actually thought it was hilarious, when i thought about it more. we don't want to offend anybody here, but at the same time, you can't help but laugh at the misconception of the two things. >> so, employees of brown and gay engineering! >> oh! >> they often walk across the street to eat at this restaurant, the owner said no

sign except for khou, i don't believe that. >> no! >> the sign now reads bge employees. >> hilarious! just ahead, armed and ready to battle, why this clerk credits divine intervention for her survival. too toxic for landfills and yet we're putting it on kids' fields. i mean, there's something wrong with that. >> it's on the playground, on the fields, why some are calling for a federal investigation in to the services where your

10 news at 5:30 starts right now. good evening, i'm courtney robinson. >> and i'm reginald roundtree, thank you so much for joining us.