. >> john: live with phil keating near st. petersburg, seeing the early stages of the storm? >> not at all, south florida for certain, broward, miami-dade and the keys, the keys are under a tornado warning to 5:00 tonight. soon enough the first outer bands will get here. now, about 3 million floridians live in what is now a mandatory evacuation zone in ten different counties up and down the state. and what you see here is exactly what state and local leaders want to see. a nearly empty ghost town. everybody being smart, getting inland, higher ground and potentially saving their lives. the storm surge from the gulf as well as in tampa bay is the biggest threat. 10 to 15 feet of surge, that would put it up all the way to the second floor here of world famous brass monkey bar and grill. those are some of the few people that are still in town. last-minute shuttering went up this morning to protect these businesses in that quaint beach town, well aware today is the last chance before the deluge of rain and winds intensify all day wednesday. >> we are trying to do what we can do, y

phil keating is live for us in tampa with fox weather, your hurricane headquarters. orlando, but from what we're seeing and i just talked to the mayor of clear water the storm is having a nasty habit of picking up bay water and pulling it out into the storm. it's becoming much more powerful in its ability to do that, which puts everybody in storm surge peril. >> yes, all due to the big counter clockwise circular motion of a hurricane. that's why that happens this morning. we have cool pictures of that in a second. we're just now receiving our latest band of gusty winds and rain. but really for the tampa bay region the worst is yet to come probably hours away with the most water and wind happening then. as for landfall of cat four hurricane ian, it could be happening within the next two hours, likely in charlotte county, that is north of fort myers toward charlotte and punta gorda. this is exactly where in 2004 the destructive hurricane charley went ashore. those people remember those that were there then and still there now the damage that the flying debris could cer

phil keating has the latest. rning, we are right next to enormous multi-ton deep sea fishing charter boat called captain tony's. the storm surge here at this spot was estimated to be roughly 12 to 15 feet, essentially this huge boat lifted out from the dock where it was tied up and deposited here on san carlos boulevard, that happened to every boat in the marina and we are in a total blackout. there is no power, cell phone activity here is minimal and sketchy at best. here is another house here, just clearly completely wrecked, as was the person's truck. it is wreckage and wreckage and wreckage. we don't know if anybody was staying in there and riding it out, but hopefully they got out before this happened. as you mentioned, 10 confirmed fatalities, but as the sheriff said of lee county, he is expecting ultimate death toll to be "excessive." there is three guys sleeping in that little house down there right now, the best they can do. it is wide open, not protected from the elements, so fortunately the hurricane is

let's get latest right now from phil keating who is in tampa. ' bullseye on it. what is the latest there, phil? reporter: absolutely. the well the bands, outer bands from hurricane ian have been arriving over the past several hours. they come in waves. you get a lot of wind, a lot of rain, steady rain. it kind of gets like this right now where it is not too bad. but, give us some time here, maybe 20 minutes, 30 minutes, and it is going to ramp up yet again. for the tampa bay region this is really just the beginning of the worst. it is going to be and all day, into the night affair dealing with category 4 hurricane ian and as the hours progress conditions will absolutely get worse. now over in st. petersburg heading south out of town, on the peninsula, very tall skyway bridge, it has been closed and will remain closed to traffic until the storm passes out, passes through the area and moves out east because the winds at the top where the cars and truck was be driving across, far too dangerous, 70 mile-an-hour winds. here inland in tampa bay, which

phil keating on the ground in fort myers beach this morning. thank you, fill. coming up, markets looking for a rebound ahead of important economic data, we have the august pce number coming out. we'll bring you those numbers in 90 minutes' time, we'll preview the numbers coming up in the word on wall street. then governor kathy hochul takes cues from gavin newsom on electric vehicles. we'll tell you more about it in the hot top theic buzz. don't miss that. you're watching "mornings with maria" live on fox business. (vo) the fully electric audi e-tron family is here. with models that fit any lifestyle. and innovative ways to make your e-tron your own. through elegant design and progressive technology. all the exhilaration, none of the compromise. the audi e-tron family. progress that moves you. who's on it with jardiance? we're managing type 2 diabetes and heart risk. we're hittin' the trails between meetings. and putting the brakes on fried foods. jardiance is a once-daily pill that...not only lowers a1c, it goes beyond to reduce the risk of cardiovascular deat

phil keating is down at the beach with more. >> search and rescue operations, and other top priority., first responders all heading o out. fort myers beach. here it's either total destruction or extremely heavy damage. these are 50-10 boats. two hotel boats, one deep fishing boat, and mike owns the two on the left. you actually lived in it. you didn't evacuate. do you regret it? >>> no. >> why? speak i didn't feel that unsafe in this boat. it was a heck of a ride. >> and the boat came up all over the pylons? >> higher than the pylons. all of our lines came off the top and we floated over. >> i going to make do? >> we going to make do. >> that's the spirit. good luck, mike. all the boats back behind us and the marina were all on these pylons tied up, though in the storm surge was 10-15 feet in this area, everything lifted off the pylons in the boats were floating freely. so it's just wreckage everywhere. these were all businesses, there was a restaurant down there with the green that is now being occupied by three guys who have a roof, but there are no walls. just totally destroyed. up

phil keating, fox news. well. new updates continue to come in as hurricane ian approaches our meteorologist mark tamayo is tracking the storm. you have been now for several days and marketing the size of this. it is just such a massive storm. yeah, and unfortunately the big concern is continues to strengthen so already a major hurricane in the forecast does call for strengthening. that's why you're hearing about the potential. in fact, the lightly clothed the likelihood for life threatening storm surge. here is a satellite and once again that well defined eye you can see moving over. portions of cuba earlier today, and there is that well defined eye moving up to the north and approaching florida. here is the latest information from the hurricane center coming up for you right now. and as you can see, first, we'll show you the radar, the radar beams detecting this circulation as well as you can see, that was the satellite. but the radar detecting the rainfall in most areas, picking up a good 12 to 18 inches with th

phil keating live in tampa with the very latest. >> good morning, now we are dealing with a very, veryne with winds of 155 miles per hour. according to the satisfy simpson scale 1 159 miles per hour makes it a category 5. florida is on the threshold of what is going to be catastrophic if not historic hurricane. a torpedo warning also in effect for florida keys to tampa. very dangerous. hurricane does spawn tornadoes and we saw a couple last night. take a look at the streets behind me. downtown tampa should be rush hour and full of cars and vehicles. it is dead. that's good news in that people are taking all of the warnings pretty seriously. most businesses are not open today. restaurants clearly not open. so, it looks like a lot of people got their supplies in the past few days and are sheltering in place at home right now plane right into the storm and into the eye of what they saw very well formed eye and a massive storm inside 4 to 500 miles wide end to end. i will toss it back to you guys but things are starting to deteriorate. >> todd: all right, phil keating live for us this morn

. >> sandra: head to tampa, phil keating is standing by. what's the report from there? >> we are in a lull in between big bands. we have certainly had some very, very strong wind gusts today, and bands of heavy rain. we have been out here since about 5:00 in the morning and the conditions as of the past hour definitely the worst they have been and everybody who has been looking at the satellite and radar loop can clearly see, i mean, if jacksonville and atlantic beach where jonathan is, getting an outer band and the bulk of the intensity of the storm is where our teams are, steve and robert ray down south, but me in port charlotte as well as fort myers, that area, i mean -- all of that still has to come north and then meander east and eventually it's going to impact severely as far as rain and flooding the orlando metro area and move south of jacksonville and then through jacksonville and up into georgia. so i think everybody here is aware and the streets have been quiet all day, so seems a lot of people have been heeding the advice of the emergency managers, from the g

. >> todd: phil keating, where we begin our coverage in st. petersburg, we got the latest update the hurricane has been downgraded to a tropical storm, what are you seeing right now? >> good morning, had u.s. coast guard helicopter land across the water at tampa general, now flying off, they have a real busy day doing search and rescue operations all day, still unknown whether they have numerous people that need to be rescued or whether the day will actually be better than they feared. here in tampa right now issue most people are still sleeping after a night of heavy pounding rain and wind, but for the most part, the bulk of the storm right now, not raining here issue mostly moved east by now, slamming around orlando and the east coast along i-95 corridor and the winds here, you can see, not too blustery, only maybe in the 20s. category four hurricane ian made landfall 3 p.m. north of fort myers on cayo costa, near sanibel, that entire region is dealing with power outages, toppled trees, that makes it treachuous and challenging, in florida, i

. >> carley: let's go to phil phil keating, what are you seeing right now? >> it is finally raining steadily here, not quite yet the deluge issue but as janice was pointing out, last three hours have seen massive intenseification, it went from cat three 120 mile per hour winds to category four, that can be catastrophic. take a look at live radar, the center of the storm, 75 miles southwest of naples, florida, still offshore, marching north and trackers believe the eye of the storm will come and make landfall a little south of tampa bay, maybe in sarasota county, that could mean less storm surge, but 10 mile per hour rate of speed of this monster storm could mean bad news as in a lot and a lot of rain all day long rain. that is what is anticipated for most of the state of florida, especially south and central florida as the day progresss. in perry airplane, a private airplane in broward county, not far from miami, between fort lauderdale, sirens went off and warnings out last night and two tornados did touchdown at the perry airplane, flipping over a couple o

fox news correspondent fill keating is live in tampa, phil?t the fatalities would be in the hundreds. they said that this morning on another network's morning show. we do know that part of the sanibel causeway did collapse. not sure if that is directly connected. but, there is still with the hurricane and that is now a tropical storm ian, still a major rain, window, and storm surge threat. primarily now along the i-95 corridor along daytona beach, jacksonville area before the storm system moves north. here in tampa, you know, it's pretty calm a little chilly about 70 degrees surprisingly. the rain has moved out east but it was a pounding night of window and rain here last night. category 4 hurricane ian made landfall at 3:00ish just north of fort myers on kia costa a barrier island on sanibel fort myers that entire region is dealing with power outages. in fact 2.5 million statewide without electricity right now. and as one would expect most of that is where the category 4 hurricane slammed ashore. this is the website power outage u.s. which tr

want to go to phil keating right now. in fort myers, what is the latest. >> reporter: absolute record, total destruction on almost everything, boats like this one and this is not a little center console small craft you would expect to easily get blown around by hurricane or storm surge. this is a 50 ton deep-sea fishing trawler. all came up with 12 to 15 feet of storm surge, two boats behind it used as hotel boats, airbnbs. everything pushed off of the marina destroying all these boats. this was the opposite marina. now that is a complete loss totally destroyed. it was a restaurant, that is demolished. delay roof but all the walls are completely gone. it is a devastating day. these trucks are taking search and rescue and debris clearing equipment to fort myers beach where the beautiful white sand bizarre and it is just the wasteland important to those who had been there, wiped off the map. for search and rescue operations, the second full day of it. they pulled 700 people and rescued them via helicopter and on all the bar

correspondent phil keating is in that area tonight. good evening, phil. >> bret, this is exactly what state and local leaders want to see. a beach town nearly empty now a ghost town from here on out. showing that many, if not most of the 3 million floridians up and down the coast ordered to evacuate are following that. and heading inland to higher ground and potentially saving their lives. >> hurricane ian made landfall early this morning in western cuba as a category 3. pump ming the island with heavy rain and winds causing damage. pass a grill. protective shutters and plywood is today. >> trying to do what we can do. do you know what i'm saying? get stuff in here to protect our building and go from there. only god is in control with what happens with request this storm. >> last-minute grocery store runs for food and water? good luck. shelves have been depleteds in many cases as floridians fully expect to lose power poor days. governor ron desantis activated 5,000 national guard troops. some on loan from out of state and predeploying s

. >> dana: phil keating, thank you so much. >> bill: this is pine island that the governor referred to in the sound bite. it has to be entirely rebuilt and sanibel island has to be rebuilt as well. sanibel island here. this is where you see that road where it just fell in. during the last briefing they heard there is a lot of road damage. it is in several locations. what the mayor of sanibel said a moment ago the operations they have now to bring boats out and help people bring them supplies, 200 homes she believes it's 200 homes. she continues to get text messages. that number could change. 200 homes decided to stay there on sanibel island. you have to think the boats have to come out and get everybody out of the homes. if you won't have power or electricity a tough way to live. this is fort myers beach here south of downtown. the reason why we point this island out is because this image here. this was fort myers beach before wednesday afternoon and this is largely what looks to me a pretty fancy rv park. a lot of structures are made of aluminum. you see what happens when a cat four s

. >> dana: first we'll go to phil keating. he is in a beach community a half hour southwest of tampa. sounds like a good place. >> it is. it is old, classic florida. the time to get out of town is now. no joking around at this point. most of the people in this town have evacuated already leaving it a ghost town. there is hardly any humans within the eye can see. the brass monkey over here, a famous restaurant bar and grill boarded up yesterday and sandbags on the ground. across tampa bay mandatory evacuations began yesterday for all neighborhoods along the coast. the real issue is the bay itself and the gulf of mexico. so much water. storm surge could bring it up to as high as the second floor here. about 10 or 15 feet and the rainfall totals will be any where between 10, 15, possibly two feet in some places. it all depends on whether the storm stalls out and starts moving more slowly, dumping more rain or whether it speeds up quick. sandbagging operations have been going on all week long up and down the state. a lot of places

. >> john: phil keating live in fort myers beach, florida. rick was saying, phil, we will deal with the storm to come, the aftermath of the storm is much longer and you are really kind of demonstrating the impact of this storm because you are standing on a boat that used to be moored up on the estero bay side of fort myers. how did it get where you are now? >> hurricane winds combined with most importantly, storm surge. this is a 50 ton boat, captain mike owns this one and another one behind it. he an uses them as air b and b's for tourists. all of them were in the water, all of them tied to the pylons. used to be docks here. the storm surge was 12 to 15 feet, raising the boats and the ropes tying them together so then they became untied at the mercy of the storm surge. we went walking around the boat with captain mike earlier today. he said really did not suffer all that much damage. he thinks this boat in particular is salvageable, he's been doing this for years down here, but he's from ohio, been through hurricanes before, but suddenly he's

phil keating. we have not spoken to him in an hour. how are things now? >> the steady rains have increased the last several minutes as these bands really counter clockwise whip around and up the state. it will be happening all day long. the governor's team, emergency management team, they believe that landfall likely in charlotte county later this afternoon. charlotte, punta gorda exactly where hurricane charley slammed into it in 2004 causing widespread damage. this hurricane, category 4 ian that could become a cat five is a lot larger and it is moving a lot more slowly than charley was. this is only moving north/northeast at ten miles an hour. with the size of it, that's why the mayor of tampa this morning is forecasting and warning everybody we could get up to 20 inches of rain because the storm is going so slowly. it will sit over the area. speaking of tampa bay, this happened five years ago during hurricane ir ma. the bay waters are now receding getting sucked out in the gulf of mexico because of the counter clockwise rotation of the still-approachin

we have begin in fort myers beach with phil keating. it's been quite a morning. >> yeah, one full of destruction and devastation and lives changed forever. this is a boulevard, half of which is blocked by three boats this size. these are 50-ton boats. this is captain tony's deep sea fishing charter boat. the two behind it are house boats. airbnb boats. they washed onshore. the storm surge was so high they lifted up, became untied from the pilings and ended up right here in the street and on the shoulder. this was the marina office and that's a total disaster now, a total loss. next door was a restaurant that had been here for a number of years. it still has a roof but that's just about it. three people have been sleeping there overnight. at least they could get a little protection from the rain and sun. i tell you what, not only did boats surge into the streets, the storm surge 12 to 15 feet here also swept away houses. take a look at this dramatic, dramatic hurricane ian video. a house swept away from the storm surge. just amazing pict

phil keating joins us from the ground there. phil, what are you seeing this hour? >> absolute devastation and destruction. we are on half of the very busy san carlos boulevard. but as you can see, it is now strewn with sail boats and huge charter fishing boats like captain tony's this takes tourists out for deep sea fishing, this is trashed. storm surge, 12 to 15 feet here, so it and other boats of the same size, you cannot see them, they all lifted up, untied themselves from the wind and the surge, and ended up right here on the boulevard. everywhere you look, damage and destruction. take a look across the street. that is the san carlos rv resort. there is one mobile home you see in there, that's 1 of 2 left that belongs to gary and rita israel. fortunately for them, they did evacuate, but first take a look at the video from inside we shot about an hour ago. the whole place is a waste land. nothing but shrapnel and debris and where did they all go? they ended up across the water in the trees just to the east. i mean, they are mangled. here is what the israels said

that's where phil keating is now.eeing a lot of damage. >> yeah, we're at adaline in punta gorda. one of the many neighborhoods ag on top of the charlotte rv storage. you can see the power line there. it's stuck in the standing water, this is a place where people would store their rvs when they're not on vacation. the whole rooftop was this aluminum. during hurricane ian, it turned into projectiles. this whole street is litters and blocked off down the street. at this house, a house belonging to angela nunez. she lives her with her mom and brother. they rode the storm out here. you can see the aluminum projectile crashed into the roof. that led to a water leak inside their home. clearly they'll need some roof repair. there's several holes on the roof as well. here's angela. so you rode out the storm. how intense was it? >> it was pretty intense to the point that we could sleep for two days. >> the wind and the rain, loud? >> yes. >> plus nerves. >> yes. >> well, you made it. are you regretting that you didn't evacuate