and craig is live in brattleboro.s is not what vermont needs right now. >> reporter: absolutely not, alex. that watch you just mentioned, in effect for brattleboro and points north as well. cloudy and gray all morning. a drizzle a short time ago, if it does rain, the question is, how much and how fast, because it is connecticut river, already swollen, people here in brattleboro and vermont have spent the past six days rebuilding. they have been blessed for the most part, with the exception of thursday, with pretty good weather. two major concerns for vermont. in the short term, the rain. and fall foliage season begins in two weeks and tens of thousands descend on vermont to see leaves change color. there is concern right now about whether tourists will be able to get here and get through all of the roads. some of which are blocked, and whether hotels and restaurants that have been flooded, many of them, whether they are going to be able to open on time. the primary concern right now, bridges. >> the tourists, we can't

craig melvin in brattleboro, thank you very much from vermont. >>> missing in aruba.vidence emerges in the disappearance of american robyn gardner. what different will it make in the case against her jailed companion? we'll take a look at that. >>> also ahead -- great expectations. can president obama deliver on the prom is of something bold in the week's job speech? there's another way to minimize litter box odor: purina tidy cats. our premium litters now work harder to help neutralize odors in multiple cat homes. purina tidy cats. keep your home smelling like home. >>> on thursday, the president will deliver a prime time address to congress, outlining his plan to create jobs. labor secretary sole lease says the president will offer, quote, bold ideas on battling unemploy pln. joining me now, mark murray. another good morning to you. >> good morning, alex. >> expectations are riding very high. is he going to say something big here? does he need to present a major proposal to match all of the hype? >> there's a lot riding on the speech he's going to be giving on thurs

wyatt andrews is in brattleboro. >> reporter: scott, in those 13 towns that were once cut off, the state was able to build one emergency road each, but the roads are emergency only. that still leaves most citizens looking for alternate ways in and out. >> bye. >> reporter: this is how lindsay cone headed back to back to college today. she hiked out on a dirt path. a former member of the u.s. ski team, lindsay has to catch a flight to denver, but the roads in and out of her home in killington, vermont, are still mostly blocked. this is the road north, this is the road south, and the road west to rutland, vermont, is so washed out that, for lindsay, the dirt path it is. did you feel like you had much of a choice? >> no. you know, my flight's in a few hours. i don't... i don't have another way, really, of getting out west. >> reporter: among the other pilgrims on this path was dan peer, a carpenter bringing tools into killington to start repairs on a ski lodge. is there an urgency to all this repair? >> oh, definitely, especially for our economy. killington is a big part of our economy ever

of course, brattleboro, vermont, a week ago, we saw refrigerators and propane tanks moving down the river. the river where the brooks and streams, this is what they dump into. so the concern now is, as you just mentioned, thunderstorms tonight, significant rainfall tomorrow, could spell a lot of trouble for people in vermont who are still trying to clean up from hurricane irene. one of the things that continues to strike us, though, about folks here, their pure, utter resilience. >> i think this is probably the more -- most helpful people, the most resilient people i've ever met, and i'm not from this area. >> they have rallied around each other, people that you've seen walking around, you know, never had any conversation with, armpit deep and doing the most remarkable things. >> reporter: and there have been charity concerts, there have been all sorts of things. this is one of the bridges. this bridge is from 1920, this bridge, as you can see, very much intact but dozens of bridges around vermont are not and that's another huge concern because, again, some of these roads and highways, th

in brattleboro, more rain was forecasted, even as cleanup continued from the mess irene left behind.roads and bridges will take time to rebuild, but the spirit of the people here is solid. >> people are not afraid to get dirty. they're going to have a smile while they're doing it. the people are great, and the spirit will triumph. >> yes, it will. >>> meanwhile, hundreds of firefighters are fanning out across texas today for another battle against the raging fires there. a young woman and her toddler died on sunday when flames destroyed their home not far from the louisiana border. it's one of dozens of fires burning in the state right now. jay gray is in bastrop, texas, where thousands of acres have scorched so far. jay, what's the word there? >> reporter: hey, there. the situation in texas still dire right now. crews are working dozens of wildfires across the state. perhaps the worst in this area, the bastrop area, where we are told more than 300 homes have been destroyed. more than 16,000 acres charred. the fire still raging out of control at this point. a big problem for firefigh

i have seen a public housing project for seniors down in brattleboro severely damaged. a lot of seniors there are now having to find new places to live. we have been through the state office complex in waterbury, the largest state office building in the state housing 1,700 vermont workers, the nerve center of the state. devastated. nobody is at work there today. we have seen hundreds of bridges and roads destroyed, and right now as we speak there are rains coming in the southern part of the state, causing more flooding, more damage. we have seen a wonderful gentleman from rutland lose his life because he was doing his job to make sure that the people of that area were protected. so we have seen damage the likes of which we have never seen in our lifetime, and, mr. president, what i would say -- and i know i speak for you as well -- is that the name of our country is the united states of america, the united states of america, and what that means is that we are a nation such that when disaster strikes louisiana or mississippi in terms of hurricane katrina, i know the pres

some trailer parks in berlin in central vermont, i was down on the southern part of the state in brattleboro and it is an incredibly sad sight to see mobile homes where senior citizens were living destroyed, they're now forced to relocate. it was a very, very tragic circumstance. further, the storm has knocked out 135 segments of the state highway system as well as 35 state bridges, completely isolating 13 communities for several days. an unknown number of farms and businesses have been destroyed. i was down in wilmington, a beautiful town in the southern part of the state on route 9. virtually their entire downtown business community has been severely, severely damaged. and that is clearly undermining the fabric not only of the economy of that town but of towns throughout the state. madam president, our amtrak and freight rail services were completely suspended as tracks literally washed into rivers. so we had tracks under water. the state's largest office complex is located in waterbury, vermont, a few miles from our capital, montpelier, and i visited that facility. it had been completely