i'm in north padre island.nd of the 130-mile long warier island between here and south padre to the east of brownsville. that's where don will come ashore. here north padre we're going to see waves increase awem as rain. the heaviest rains will be south of us. and definitely the south padre island, brownsville seeing the bulk of that rain. as everyone knows texas in a long-term drought. it extends from 2010 they do need the rain. this one not packing as much rain as we would like. it's going to have some rain, but down towards the valley, south texas, that's where the bulk of the rain will be also across the border into mexico. here in corpus, north padre island we might see an inch or so of rain. we need the rain in texas. a tropical system would be beneficial. the bad news is it's not a drought buster and we're concerned with the wave and potential wind damage as well. >> thank you very much for the update. >>> you have a lot of americans asking why things are so bad in washington. is this the worst congress

cnn's rob marciano is live on padre island, texas.come sort of outweighing the fact it's a tropical storm? >> reporter: at this point, yeah. the winds aren't going to be much greater than tropical storm strength, if at all. if it gets to a category 1 hurricane this coastline will absorb that fairly well. still, the gulf of mexico behind me. you know, that's a potent force. at about high tide now. the storm itself about 250 miles south and east of me and we are now beginning to see the cloud canopy or leading edge of that coming towards us. the oil industry taking precaution. exxonmobil evacuated all nonessential personnel from some of their offshore drilling sites. they estimate they are shutting down 50,000 cubic feet of natural gas production and 8,000 barrels per day of liquid resources that are being tapped. that will stop until the storm passes. so precautions are being taken. some of the local community colleges have evacuated actually and some businesses are shutting down in spots here. here is the satellite picture. 50-mile-an

that's what padre island looks like.t south padre island where all the college kids go crazy every spring break. this is a pristine section of beach, there are deer here, it's a lovely place, if you've never been, it's a great place to vacation someday. winds only about 60 even as it makes landfall. it will spread rain throughout south texas, a 60 mile per hour storm, making winds in the dunes, but not knocking anything down, not injurying anybody, just making great rainfall for a place that really needs it. >>> a muslim army soldier arrested before he can make his attack made an appearance in court today. but what he did might surprise you. ♪ [ female announcer ] sweet honey taste. 80 calories per serving. 40% daily value of fiber. i'm here in the downtown area where the crowd is growing. [ female announcer ] watching calories at breakfast never tasted this sweet... i'll go get my bowl. [ female announcer ] ...or this huge. new fiber one 80 calories. yes, you can actually love breakfast. unlike fish oil, megared softgel

saturday morning it's right off the coast near padre island, south padre island. and think it will move into texas. capable of producing a good, avy 6 inches of rain, not enough for problems going on. and it's weak enough it shouldn't be a real big coastal system. we'll talk about all of that in a second. george? >> okay, sam. >>> now to the showdown over the debt ceiling. a little over four days and counting before the limit is hit. the financial world beginning to react with the dow dropping every day this week, foreign markets following overnight. but democrats and republicans seem no closer to a deal. as the house prepares for a key vote later today. abc's jon karl is covering it from capitol hill. jon, we are seeing fire from the house speaker. >> reporter: we sure are. this vote today on his debt ceiling plan is the highest-stakes vote of his term as speaker of the house. and he is doing everything he can to get those tea partyers in line. john boehner is now demanding republicans stand with their party. in a closed-door meeting, he had a stern message for t

weather channel meteorologist mike seidel joins me now from north padre island. mike? >> reporter: hey, lester. this evening very few have left the south texas coast ahead of tropical storm don as it is set to make landfall this evening between brownsville and corpus christi. the only evacuations so far have been a couple of beachfront campgrounds on the coast. look at don on the satellite radar composite. a 50-mile-an-hour tropical storm moving west/northwest at 16 but wind shear, strong winds aloft and dry air have kept it from strengthening so coastal impacts will be minimal. texas needs the rain badly as you mentioned, but most of it is south of don's center and will fall across deep south texas. that means no relief for most of the state that is in its worst drought in almost 50 years. 75% of texas in the worst drought category, exceptional, and those areas need at least 15 inches of rain just to put a dent in the drought. ranchers are sending their livestock to market early because they lack grass, rain and water for feed. the drought has been so severe that the

rob marciano is in padre island. rob, can you tell us how it was received by the people?rter: to keep this in realm with the current events. people want to know how fast the storm died. it died faster than the first boehner debt ceiling plan. it came onshore and completely pooped the pillows. you saw it, reynoldreynolds, i e completely fizzled. the much-needed rain did not materialize. you know, in an effort to bring you tv this morning, we set out to do what is called a tick-tock in the business. take some video and time stamp it and give you a flavor of what happened as it came onshore. >> reporter: tropical storm don is 40 miles south of here making landfall on the padre island. the winds have picked up. some rain has fallen to the south, but the widespread rainfall that the state desperately needs has been elusive. don has made landfall getting a lot of wind and sand in our face, but no rain. look at the pocket radar here. the storm is dead. radar empty. rain non-existent. that has a lot of folks disappointed. >> reporter: it does. i have never been involved in a trop

this is padre island, not a building in sight. there are no condos, no hotels, there are signs every once in awhile that says don't get stuck in the sand if you're driving because it will cost a couple hundred bucks to get out of there. this is not the way to south padre. corpus christi down to brownsville, total rainfall, some areas in the yellow, that's a couple of inches, but like you said, you need 15 inches, not one or two to save the crops. the crops, at this point, are not saveable. >> growing up in georgia, i know what it means when it's hot and humid, but in terms of dry conditions, they are having to water their homes, grabbing the hoses. >> yes, you do. >> watering their homes. >> you water the foundations to keep the foundations wet. >> never heard of this. >> stop them from cracking. >> crazy, chad, thank you so much. quick reminder to you, do not forget. come on over here, mark abernathy. the point is, you have no excuse not to watch cnn 24/7 here. we are the first to do this, to stream cnn online. you can watch cnn,

right now making landfall on the padre island national seashore. we have felt little more than a few sprinkles here but the winds have picked up. some rain has fallen down to the south but the widespread rainfall that this state so desperately needs has so far been elusive. don's made landfall about 20 miles to our south. getting a lot of wind, sand in our face, but no rain. check out the pocket radar here. this storm is dead. radar empty. rain nonexistent. that has at love folks disappoint -- has a lot of folks disappointed. it was unreal to watch this thing make its way here. there was dry air ahead of it, but maybe the ground here and resulting air has been so dry, that that's one of the reasons. regardless, this storm just soiled the sheets when it hit the shoreline. but there's some good news here. because a lot of farmers have planted cotton this year because cotton is drought resistant. the harvest is coming in now and they don't want rain when the harvest -- when trying to harvest the cotton. diminishing the quality and yield. ironically en

sandy south padre island in texas will offer a 1-hour sand castle making lessons. lessons start at $20 an hour. here's something for the little ones, your life guard lessons on bethany beach. $85 a child. they learn how to rescue someone and perform cpr. >> that seems expensive but what a child could learn and keep could save a life. >> absolutely. it's better than video games. >> yes, get them away from that. >> it's 6:09. >> we have 75 degrees. up next, howard has another check of the forecast. >> more places to check out fireworks today. in virginia, head to greedy park. that's on ferndale avenue. there's music at 6:30 be the fireworks at 9:30. >>> in bowie, maryland, the fireworks begin at 5:30. music, food, and the fireworks begin at 9:15. >> gaithersburg holding its annual independence day celebration. it begins at 7:00. the fireworks going off at 9:25. >>> 61:00 on this monday morning. independence day 2011. it's quiet and 74. upper 90s at noon a few thunderstorms with unhealthy percentages on the air qualify. -- quality. kris sneed, what is it looking like

we're live from south padre island. >>> and next hour, chaka khan struggled with addiction for year, but now she is back on track. she wants to give back. hear my one-on-one interview with the queen of soul. this past year alone there was a 93% increase in cyber attacks. in financial transactions... on devices... in social interactions... and applications in the cloud. some companies are worried. some, not so much. thanks to a network that secures it all and knows what to keep in, and what to keep out. outsmart the threats. see how at cisco.com cisco. unlike fish oil, megared softgels are small and easy to swallow with no fishy smell or aftertaste. try megared today. >>> cnnmoney.com lead sorry now. the economy grinding to a halt here. we're talking with growth in the first quarter slower than expected. dow jones down about 14 points or so. wall street as more to water about today than just the debt crisis. we're talking about a new report that shows that the economy grew at a sluggish pace during the second quarter this year and growth in the first quarter was even slower than folks

weather channel's jim cantore has more from north padre island for us in texas. >> reporter: nobody can complain about what don left for us here on the beach. we were thinking even by this time yesterday we would now be dealing with leftover rain and drizzle. not the case. don collapsed as it made its way jn shore. nobody got over an inch of rain at all. we were hoping for a big relief from the drought, at least for south texas. that didn't come to fruition. there are probably two groups this helped out. the kite boarders and cotton farmers. kite boarders yesterday out here. wind picking up 20 to 30 miles per hour with some of the gusts out here. that allowed them to catch huge air an what little wave set-up we had compliments of don moving in. it was a fun show for everybody to watch. a lot of people out here because don not evacuating the beaches. other folks were the cotton farmers. 80,000 acres of cotton. they got about 60% of that picked. they were concerned about the other 40%. that would mean more losses to this multibillion dollar drought already. when you get cotton wet, it's n

through the next several hours making landfall somewhere between corpus christi and brownsville, and padre islandot of drought, will this help? all necessity were praying for the tropical storm in texas because 75 percent of the state into exceptional drought, the worst detroit they verve seen in texas history, exceptional drought. but the storm making landfall across south texas they need it across central texas and toward the southeast texas coastline so, unfortunately, they need several more storms to move into the region to put a dent in the drought. >> are there a lot of them out there to watch out? >> so glad you asked, because, of course, as we head into the height of the tropical season we look out here in the atlantic off the coast of africa, and this area of concern, the computer models are picking up on this and it could become a tropical storm by this week, and, perhaps, even a hurricane, as we head into next week. so we will keep an eye on that. >> if it becomes one, send it to texas, okay? >> it will be a weak storm bringing a lot of rain. >> a nice wet hurricane. thank you. the pol

jason wheeler from keye in austin is at portis abe isabel, south padre island. did it bring rain relief? >> reporter: good morning, rebecca. no rain relief really at all. it we have starry skies and unexpectedly dry morning. the people who showed up rods and reels in hand last night expected a good drenching as they did their fishing but the tropical storm that was supposed to deliver that deluge turned out to be the big one that got away. the storm sort of fizzled out north of here as it was about to make landfall in a sparsely populated area. the scattered showers that doused vacationers on south padre island were gone about as fast as they arrived. some places got an inch, maybe a couple of inches in other spots. this certainly was not enough to overcome the stubborn drought choking the state since much of last year. farmers many plowing their fields in a hurry to get a deep soaking. didn't come. probably a lot of disappointment and the dud that was don is making a hasty retreat to the west, folks looking further out into the tropics for something that might

>> yes, we are on north padre island and we would like to get the rain and in fact, 75% of the state, thomas, is in the exceptional drought category which is the worst category in 92% of the state in extreme or exceptional and it has been extremely dry and hot. dallas today, 28 days above 100 in a row. many areas have had triple-digit heat and we'd like some water. first, the satellite loop, and this is the system that for the main fact that most of the convection or rain is south of the center. we are expecting the center to make landfall this evening between here and south padre and between brownsville and corpus, and that means that most of the rain will avoid the corpus christi area, and sure scattered showers and thunderstorms, but the rainfall totals of two to three inches up to harlingen, and brownsville, and most of the state will not get the rain they need with unrelenting heat. and some evacuations, believe it or not. the texas a&m campus in corpus christi decided to be safe, they closed down to campus until monday morning so that is the students had to get out of the dorms

actually hit about 166 miles south of where i'm standing right now in brownsville, texas near south padre island people up and down the southeast coast of this state have been getting ready. they have been securing their boats and they have been buying supplies. >> in the past several days we have seen a great increase in plywood, generators, cleaning supplies, trash cans, safety equipment. everything from weather radios to bottled water. >> don is suspected to pack sustained winds of 50 miles per hour and dump anywhere of 3 to 5 inches of badly needed rain on this state, harris. >> harris: yeah, with the storms that move through there, casey, nobody takes this likely. people prepare no matter what. i understand it's so serious it's apparently affecting oil production down there. >> it is. in fact, approximately 12% of oil production from the gulf of mexico has come to a screeching halt because of evacuations. we understand that 56 production flat forms out of the middle of the gulf have been evacuated and also four rigs. that is all according to the bureau of ocean energy management regulation

left behind a beautiful day, as testified by the weather channel's kan kan who is live in north padre islands. can you believe the calm after the storm. the beautiful calm. >> you are missing a great beach day. i have been honest with you. >> i wish. >> i know you do, darling. this is my 69th storm that i have covered for the weather channel. i want to show you this thing. i have never seen a storm come in like this and basically just go poof. if you notice how the infra-red, you lose all those colors there. that's the storm pretty much dissipating right before our very eyes. nobody got a little over half inch of rain with this. nobody. everybody got about a trace, 200ths of an inch. it was a great dry run for us. can you see behind me, they've taken the chairs off the beached in through here and gotten those ready. you know, there's a few other folks that were out here doing broadcasts as a result of this. there's not much laying around that could have been blown around, but, again, it's all about the beach today. we've had a young family out here frolicking in the water a little bit. somet

the weather channel's kan kan is live in north padre island, and with another good saturday morning toou, jim. it is a beautiful day. like a postcard. in houston, though, janet shamliyan had rain behind her about half hour ago. that's good news for folks there. >> yeah. it's really weird. they're going to get more of kind of an off chute, a renegade rain than we're going to get here where the landfall point was. that can happen. when you have a system that falls apart like that, they get very lopsided. sometimes the moisture focuses as much as 200 miles, 300 miles away from the center of circulation that's come in, and that is the case. of course, they were just hoping for rain all over texas. we knew we weren't going to get that, but we even got less than what we expected, alex, and that was worse. look at this. just an absolutely gorgeous beach day here. typically behind the storm you get the big waves coming in. there's a rip current risk. a lot of people out this morning enjoying what was an absolutely gorgeous, gorgeous sunrise. now, what is in the pipeline here as we look down th

south padre island could get tropical storm force winds and heavy downpours. the water is warm so we could see additional strengthening before it makes landfall sometime during the overnight hours. back to you. >> thank you, janice. keep us posted, thank you. you heard janice saying that dangerous weather civil is unlikely to ease one. worst droughts ever seen across the south. fox's john roberts is live in atlanta. >> reporter: alisyn seems rather incongruous to talk about a drought at the same time a tropical storm is hitting. let's bring up the drought monitor from the university of nebraska and give you data. look at that. state of texas 75% in absolute worse drought conditions. oklahoma, half of the state in same conditions. further east, 82% in louisiana. slightly below that next dream conditions and in georgia, more than 2/3 of the state in the same extreme drought conditions. what does this mean on the ground? state of texas means parched land, withered crops. ranchers are having to liquidate the herds because they can't afford to sell them. irrigation

make landfall between corpus christi where we are or about 166 miles south of here near south padre islandolks are getting ready. jon: casey stegall on the coast of texas. looks like a nice day right now. thanks. jenna: let's check in with our meteorologist janice dean who is taking a look at the radar that was just mentioned. does that sound like where it's going to hit. >> reporter: i hope he has a fox news rain slicker. it's going to start to get a little messy over the next few hours. let's take a look eight. he was pretty right. we have tropical warnings from matagor to texas all the way down to the mouth of the rio grand. this is tropical storm dawn, 50-mile an hour sustained winds. waters are warm we could see additional strengthening over the next couple of hours. we don't have a lot of time before the store makes landfall sometime tonight. there is the big orange blob we are talking about. starting to see outer bands moving across texas into louisiana. they need the rain, they need so much rain from this tropical storm, unfortunately they are not going to get the bulk of the rainf

rob marciano is live on padre island. what do you think? still a midnight eta? right. and, you know, this is one of the few times we got a positive spin on a landfall tropical storm cyclone because we do need the rain, as you mentioned. tourists here, sun is out. just gives you an idea of how strong the storm is going to be. not very as far as winds are concerned. these are people who are on vacation. nobody has evacuated the beaches if they have come here to soak in the gulf and the clouds have yet to arrive here. they will be coming in this afternoon as will the rainfall. the beneficial rainfall. take a look at the satellite picture and somehow the whereabouts of tropical storm don which has winds now currently at 50 miles an hour. slow to organize. has things working against it but it's over warm water now. we expect it to strengthen somewhat but should remain below hurricane status. right now about 250 miles away from the coast where i stand and moving in this direction. here is the eta, the forecast from the national hurricane center. the track brings it so

. >> reporter: so does anyone on the beach at padre island scared about the forecast?ot going to hit, period. >> reporter: is the castro family at least making preparations? >> not at all. >> there we go, right there. >> reporter: but we did find sailboat owners in corpus christi preparing just in case. >> supposed to be a nonevent but you don't want to wait until it's blowing 40 knots to try and get your boat ready. >> reporter: the lousy forecast may be scaring some tourists away. >> we're leaving. we've got to go. >> reporter: but maybe it will cool things off. it's beginning to look like malachi's bark. maybe worse than don's bite. >> i haven't done anything. nothing. i probably won't even pull things off my porch. >> reporter: in corpus christi, abc news. >>> as texas suffers through one of its worst droughts on record, tropical storm don's drenching rain could bring a bit of relief. but the storm is not expected to be a drought-buster. some areas are so dry, the cracks in the soil are 30 inches deep. ananher benefit, don could also break a heat wave thth's grippe

again at the nathan's hot dog eating contest in coney island and the kung fu panda continues his streak for the >>> all right. the giants and padres will see a lot of each other, three more times this week, four more to start the second half of the break. today they got together. oh, yes. the red, white, blue, all over the place. tim lincecum, going to hit the break with a losing record for the first time in his career. the padres are on the board. 3-0, lincecum touched for three runs and in 5 innings. sandoval got a smash, right into the lake. that closed the lead from 3-2. guy swims and gets the ball and gets run over. anyway. 4-2 padres in the 8th. will venable a solo home run. padres win it by a final of 5- 3. three more times this week. cody ross left the game with soreness. the a's another one run set back. mariners in town for this one. this meeting. the american flag right there. scoreless in the second. curt suzuki gets through. matsui scores and the a's led 1- 0. in the 6th, though, here came the mariners. brandon making his first start since coming off the disabled list. a home run by josh bard to make it 1-1 and it sta

padres look to rain on the giants holiday parade. every dog has its da4t is joey chestnut's day on coney island.ant to crush more cars. ♪ i want to sell more tea cups. ♪ i need help selling bread. ♪ i want to sell more crabs. [ male announcer ] you know where you want to take your business. i want to design more buildings. [ male announcer ] in here, small business solutions from at&t can get you there. starting with the at&t all for less package -- just $70 per month, voice plus broadband. it's the at&t network. helping you do what you do... even better. >>> good evening and happy independence day, i'm jim kozimor. on the 4th of july, we need mom, apple pie, some hot dogs. anything to make us feel good. the baseball in the bay area monday could not go the way we wanted it to. giants and the padres, tim lincecum in early trouble in this one. already, 1-0 in san diego. that scores jason bartlett, 2-0 padres, lincecum four innings. pablo sandoval, a two-run shot. and panda extends his hitting streak to 15 games. top of the ninth, padres get some insurance. marin county's venable takes guillermo. g

padres look to rain on the giants' holiday parade. ev> plus, let the gorging hery dog has its day. but july fourth is joey chesnutt's day on coney islandgood eats, just ahead. >>> and welcome back. we're going to turn it over to jeff ranieri in just a minute to give us a fourth of july forecast. jeff, your color palette on the maps, i'm loving reds and fuchsias. >> blue coming in. you're right. it is a lot of orange. a lot of reds coming our way. the thing we're monitoring right now is the fog. we always seem to have it rolling this time of the year right during the fireworks. what you'll notice is this marine layer is pretty compressed as we look right out toward the golden gate bridge. that should help bring us some of the best visibility we've had in a couple of years at this point. 62 in san francisco. winds out of the northwest at 22 miles per hour. should help to scour out any kind of fog that tries to develop throughout our bay side community. looks great for the peninsula. 90 in livermore. dropping off to 79 in san jose. remember to drink a lot of water if you're still planning on heading out. it's going to be a mild night for