sheriff sarasota county, thank you so much for joining us. we very much appreciate it. >> thank you, have a good evening. >> trace: is the sheriff was talking about, we talk about hurricanes and historic hurricanes in terms of that. what we often don't do is revisit history. hurricane michael eating near panama city in the panhandle in florida. category four, category five hurricane. hurricane andrew back in 1992 hitting south florida, homestead, category five. a en, category four but when you go back and review this, there is a possibility this could also be considered a category five hurricane. when they are just some of the numbers and they look in review at these things as it happens a lot. ian barreled across and came ashore just where hurricane charley came ashore in 2,000 for taking the similar path up toward orlando and now as we've been telling you it's about to sit over orlando for hours and hours and droplet could be feet of rain. much more live coverage ahead as hurricane ian barrels across central florida. if "fox news @ night" s

sarasota, charlotte, and northern lee county.ng problems now or still at home. they need to get to a shelter. sarasota county alone has 1 shelters. seller of them are medical ready shelters. if you need oxygen tanks, if you need all of these things, they are prepared. there is one near my house at tatum ridge that is fully prepared for those type of scenarios for especially the elderly and those that need medical needs. so they need go online on their phone, however they can get online if their power is out and make sure they get to a shelter immediately. >> when do you expect the worst to be? >> the worst is late this afternoon, kind of early evening. like 3:00 to 7:00 i think is going to be the worst as the eye wall comes over. look at the size of the eye north port down to cape coral. significant breath. we are witching you and everyone else in florida the very best. thank you very much for joining us this morning. "fox & friends" starts right now. ♪ >> brian: all right. here we go. fox weather is tracking hurricane ian. the p

now, we have been bringing in search and rescue teams, our sarasota county sheriff's office jail, hasthey need to evacuate that facility, apparently, and spread those out. and we're taking 28. we're also trying to establish a field hospital outside, because we lost an e.r., and a hospital in the south county, and charlotte county lost one as well. so those are the types of things that happen here, where the federal and state government assets really support us. there have been search and rescue teams that are here, and the disaster, medical assistance teams will be here as well. so you know, this is day one. we're not seeing a lot of damage, north of where we are, but in the south part of the county, and into the charlotte county and lee county, devastated. >> the hospital system, i'm reading about the florida hospital system, and the concerns that the hospitals themselves are not adequately equipped to handle this sort of flooding, this sort of storm surge, is that something that needs to be reconsidered going forward? >> well, i think it's a matter of planning, and design, and under

right now multiple evacuation alerts across sarasota county.ut down in the next 30 minutes. county officials are sandbagging as much as they can. joining me is the mayor of sarasota. the governor was at sarasota county emergency offices a short time ago for a press conference. bridges are set to close in half an hour why do you feel that these evacuation orders have been heeded? >> yes. yes. by and large, yes they have. our number one priority in city of sarasota is the safety of residents so that's why we ordered a state and local state of emergency. we have activated the emergency operations center meaning that utilities is making sure that the generators are up and running. they are. public works to clear out the storm drains last week. fortified the city buildings. parks and rec clearing out. fuel farms are ready. florida power & light have individuals ready. the grid is likely to go down. police officers are redirecting traffic and websites updated to show you the latest. we ask everyone to be proactive. take the measures. we are in this t

i bet it's 90 to 100 miles per hour in sarasota county.ou are seeing that all throughout the state. they are probably not going to be able to get out until early tomorrow morning to be able restore some of those things. it's going to take a while. just here on my property we have trees down everywhere. that's going to be the situation throughout the state. they have to send push crews through to be able to clear the roads. to be able to send those crews down. and some of the hardest hit areas they may not have power for weeks. cell phone connectivity may be also challenging. but, all of those resources are staged throughout the state. we have power companies staged throughout the state and ready to respond as soon as the ability for them to be able to come out is available for them to do that. but good morning that's going to be until tomorrow morning. we could have floridians without power for weeks here in southwest florida. >> jesse: oh my god. all right, well, congressman, thanks so much for joining us, you know, we are thinking about

winds are causing those to make as the wind increases here in this area of florida and southern a sarasota county on the charlotte county line. that's where landfall is expected in just a little while in sarasota county, florida. jack royer, back to you. >> that rain out on the page. it's always, chris, want to see it. you know, reporter there. yeah, because they're governor was on tv just like a couple hours ago saying you can no longer it is too late. yeah, you have to get inside and treated like a tornado is coming your way, which by the way, there were what they think were tornadoes already. yeah, that will be the thread even after the storm moves inland. >> there's a bit of good news for tampa just because it's making its way a bit further south. but for pulls in fort myers, actually really bad news right in the line of right in the line of it. and the storm is keeping a lot of its energy as it moves its way right up right along the coastline. there. it's only 5 miles per hour below, becoming a category 5 storm. so this is a very, very strong category 4 hurricane, the strongest of storm surg

they could be without power for a couple of days and sarasota county, the entire county has about 400 thousand plus people. so we're talking about maybe three hundred thousand people who were without power, who are without power right now. and i'm sure pretty anxious to get service restored. but again, patience is key because when these crews are able to get out there, they're going to have to prioritize public health and public safety facilities like, you know, police. but police headquarters or hospitals, things of that sort. if they've lost power. and then you also want to consider because it rained so much here, that the ground is really wet, really saturated, so you've got these trees that could possibly topple over at some point while crews are out trying to restore service. and , you know, it could make things a whole lot more difficult for them to get around and navigate as well. as , you know, it could take power lines down again. so, again, folks are going to have to be patient. we've already seen some of these crews out here maybe surveying some of the damage. so there is w

we were at the bottom of the bottom of sarasota county. and because of the reading program that our principal implemented into the school, our scores sort, they made the highest reading gains in sarasota county. ah, one particular thing that i remember from that day is how beautiful today was to i never forget the september to doing the entire day. was sony. it was a special day actually on that day was like getting ready for the proper outs, ease and everything. like you just knew you were going to be famous. she's like, today's the day i'm gonna be to president. and as like, yes, you are a, do you need me to be there with you? she let me now, mom's now, you know, i got this. my grandmother pressed or uniforms, our extra heart that day. my mom cut my hair. so that was a nice old treat. well my grandmothers were very crazy and protected and very loving of me. so in preparation for that reading, it had spring spray me down with lot of perfume. okay. i remember we had to wake up extra early, only gets to school and i just remember pulling up

if we've got flash flood warnings from coast-to-coast through the peninsula from sarasota county intoola counties. that's where hurricane ian continues to move through. we have landfall 3:00 p.m. and i can't believe i'm saying it it's 12:35 on the east coast in the morning. we are talking about a hurricane here. the forecast has it continuing to weekend and the feel that the hurricanes get from the warm ocean waters. when you've got a storm over land, it will be weakening but still a lot of rain. that's been the biggest threat since the storm surge and the destructive winds moving through. some of the top when reports cape coral 140 miles per hour, that's category four winds. 123 miles per hour with ten different locations in more than ten that saw more than 100 miles per hour regarding some of the gusts and some of the stations that keep track of these went off-line as the winds were so strong through southwestern florida p.r. company that's a concerning thing that we have is debris coming tomorrow. look at some of the current wind gusts. in the middle of the night 12:35 and folks or

so we actually have sarasota county's tactical team sheltering at the food bank.oads. as soon as our tactical team clears the road, the food bank is right behind them with food trucks, trucks full of water and food going out to six specific agencies that are designated as emergency feeding organizations. food is already there. we delivered generators to them. they've got food and water and they're prepared as soon as the roads open to provide food. there are six agencies, go to our website to find out who they are and the locations and dates that they will be opening. and we stand ready -- i'm sorry. >> i just wanted to -- give us that address, give us that link. where do we get more information? >> yes. allfaithsfoodbank.org is where sarasota county residents can go to find out what agencies will be open and the food and water that will be available to them. and we are also prepared to do mass distributions. we did those during covid. meaning 500 and 600 families we can serve at a time. we're ready to do the pop-ups which go into the neighborhoods that have been

that's in sarasota county. so, carlos, are there still rescues going on?> there's a rescue happening right now. an airboat just pulled up a few minutes ago with some folks that have been stranded in their home the better part of this day. a search and rescue team from florida is work alongside the army as well as firefighters and folks from who just live in this neighborhood trying to reach folks who have been stranded at home because of the severe flooding we've seen the better part of the last two days. theirselves using any kind of equipment they can. and to give you a sense of the type of flooding that we're talking about, this is a canal. you can't see the bottom of that bridge there, that crossing over into this part of charlotte county. we are in the city of northport, on the other side of this neighborhood, we found family that has been stuck at home for two days, included in that family are 4-month-old twins. they were rescued this afternoon after they began calling after they have been stuck inside of their home without power for the better part

everybody wants to get electricity back, but as it is right now, in this county, charlotte county, sarasota county, and parts of collier county, they just don't have power, they don't have water, and so they have already rescued about 700 people on the hard hit barrier islands, but the governor said today that 3,000 have been contacted, however they are not waving for help, please rescue me, they are good, they have enough supplies. they rode out the storm, they will ride it out further, and all of this is going to take forever to klein, it's going to be a long, long time before fort myers beach, the proper beach with the white sand that the tourists and honeymooners come to is said to be perhaps the most devastated one of all these barrier islands. john and gillian. >> gillian: phil, stand by for us, thanks very much. >> john: i mean -- what an impressive demonstration the power of the storms with phil on top of the 50 ton boat, it's up on dry land, basically on the roadway there. let me show you where phil is. here is the area around fort myers. this is fort myers beach down here, and that's whe

sarasota county emergency management chief and u.s. army veteran. so many of our former military in these positions to help people deal with these natural disasters. thanks, ed. tell us about what you're experiencing and what you're seeing where you are. >> thank you. thanks for the opportunity to get the word out to the folks. right now we can't do anything else. this morning when the winds started to pick up, about two hours ago, we went to 45 miles an hour sustained. i don't know if you can see out of my window. the trees are really getting tossed around. our emergency vehicles cannot go anywhere. so we've been sending out those warnings, using our emergency alert system to the residents saying at this point you're on your own until the storm is over. please shelter in place. seek safety. we have units in place, nine tactical teams in place before the storm immediately to deploy to clear roadways. we have 12 evacuation centers, two medical centers that are operating with about three or 400 people. we have over 4,200 in our shelters, which is a lo

, sarasota county, are still without power. bradenton, a lot of areas without power. yesterday the governor of florida said that there were 42,000 people ready to step in and different -- 30 different locations in the state of florida waiting to immediately come into the area that have suffered power outages as soon as possible. and it's already starting to get possible for areas like sarasota, bradenton when we see strong winds. but certainly not as strong as we were seeing just an hour or so ago. i want to turn to someone who has flown into the eye of the storm. nick, i was struck by video that had gone viral that you put up. and it is something you wrote. when i say this was the roughest flight of my career so far, i mean it. another thing you said, i have never seen so much lightning in the eye of the storm. describe like what you saw and what you experienced. >> yes. so we flew through hurricane ian yesterday morning as it was intensifying up to its peak category four strength. it was the longest eyewall penetration i ever

the wind extremely powerful.er severely damaged. 80 plus% of sarasota county was withoutta power. we have seen since then a lot of powern coming back. and you can't yale see it. right behind me is the bay of sarasota. and behind that is the gulf of mexico. sarasota is around there. and we're seeing a lot of lights coming back. but still more than 2.5 million households in this state are still withoutth power. >> yeah. that's reassuring to know the power isg coming back on. it is also what that will reveal when the power comes back on, when theom sun comes up as well. that will be telling. jose, always great to have your perspective. thank you so much. we'll check in with you in a little bit. >> we're back in just a minute. we have continuing coverage on this storm. you tlouf an area where tornado warnings were triggered by this hurricane. triggered by this hurricane. plan b helps prevent pregnancy before it starts, and it won't impact your ability to get pregnant in the future. find it yourself in the family planning aisle no prescription, no id. i've got this. ♪♪ >>> we're back in

another factor that they're forecasting now as it makes landfall, somewhere, let's say, sarasota countyng down to almost a crawl. and what that means is it's going to dump an inordinate amount of rain. so that could be sarasota, could be a little inland. obviously the impact could be somewhere down this coast in different ways. there's still time for it to wobble. i think most of the forecasts are anticipating a landfall, then a slow to almost a crawl which is going to put a lot, a lot of saturation in the ground. this is going to be a major water event, both in terms of the storm surge and in terms of the flooding. evacuation orders have been issued up and down the gulf coast of florida including here in sarasota county. the issue with this is, if you are in one of these low lying areas and you have the potential for 10, 15 feet of storm surge, that can absolutely be life-threatening. those orders i think are not taken lightly. i think that's what is the best to keep you safe. you don't need to evacuate to another state. you don't need to evacuate hundreds of miles away. the key is to

john: ed has run sarasota county emergency services for 17 years. >> you will notice the signs of logisticsthis is the worst type of storm i have seen in my career and i have been through katrina, ivan. this one was intense. i think they will end up classifying this as one of the most dangerous and largest in the history. john: the work of his team did not end when ian moved on. >> we transition from responding to recovery. we are still responding because we areringing in food and water. we are doing search and rescue operations. john: before and after photos dramatically illustrate the destruction ian caused in fort myers, leveling homes and wiping out entire communities. the residents returning to the city, the loss is palpable. >> we just got here and ts is what we found. we've only been here for six months. we pulled all of our money to buy it and it is gone. john: tyler placed his waterlogged family photo albums in the sun to dry. >> everything was submerged. we had three or four feet of water inside the house. john: at the white house, president biden expressed the nation's sympathies

coming ashore in the next couple of hours here, and the projections have it leaving the counties, sarasota countyave, as of right now, 3800 individuals in shelters across our 12 shelters we have in the county. at the moment, there is approximately 22,000 individuals without power and we have thousands of individuals that where florida power and light is actively working to restore that. and they've been great partners so far. >> you have folks there, including someone i will speak to in a couple of minutes, who did not heed the evacuation orders. what do you say to them right now? >> like we've heard, an evacuation order is not really an other, an evacuation, you know, it's not really mandatory, even throw it, even though it is a mandatory evacuation, and that means you won't have the resources of the emergency personnel and the emergency response, if something should happen while you're in one of these evacuation zones. it is extremely dangerous. we need to take this seriously. and we're in this together. but we provided so many services to everyone in sarasota county that there really should be

things do seem to be getting better, but they are not out of the woods just yet here in sarasota countysean? >> sean: all right, thanks for that charles, we appreciate it. >>> tonight also at this hour as millions from florida are suffering from the devastating impact of hurricane ian, the president of the united states, well, he's enjoying a lavish democratic fundraiser. he pretty much ignored the hurricane all day and instead earlier he spoke at a pre scheduled white house conference on hunger and nutrition. now the conference honored the late congresswoman, jackie walarski who helped organize the event. she died in a tragic car crash in august. at the time of her death biden ordered flags to be lowered at half mast, released a heart felt tribute to the long serving lawmaker and is even meeting with her family tomorrow. but today apparently biden thought she was still alive. you can't make it up. >> i want to thank all of you here for -- club bipartisan elected officials like representative governor brawn, senator booker, representative jackie -- jackie you here? where's jackie. i don

sarasota, collier, and manatee county also 50% without power. so that's a huge hit. that's a swath of area that is unusable until they can get people back online and get the power grid restored or get something temporary in place. again, we'll be monitoring this news conference. there are bridge inspections happening across the state right now. and as the governor said, rescuers are going door to door to see if there's anybody that still needs to be saved or is trapped or stranded. so that all is happening right now in southwest florida. the focus of course lee county, charlotte county, ft. myers being really the epicenter here when you can see many homes are just simply demolished. it will be a long time to come for many communities in southwest florida. the power being the main issue right now. let's go to the president of duke energy florida, and melissa, tell me about your customers, where are they, and how many of them are still without power. >> sure. so duke energy florida serves about 35 counties, 2 million customers across the state of florida. in our hardes

life-threatening storm surge in the highest risk areas are ranging from collier county up to sarasota countyif you are in those counties, it's no longer possible to safely evacuate. it's time to hunker down. >> ainsley: that happened hour and a half ago. that was press conference this morning. florida's governor ron desantis warning residents if you haven't evacuated now, it's too late. you need to hunker down. the intensifying hurricane is closing in. >> todd: florida senator marco rubio join us now. miami seems okay. but the rest of florida, what has you worried most? >> the water. the flooding. we talk about storm surge. we talk about flooding. we're talking about people drowning to death, dying because of water is way too high. they had to redo the numbers last night. storm surge map, they didn't have a color for 12 to 15 feet storm surge. as i'm looking at it now, you saw the governor's comment. i worry and now we pray for people who didn't heed the evacuation warnings. this is one the reasons why the warnings come out so early in such a wide area. you don't know the area. if you're on

sarasota county also one of the areas with the most power outages. of the customers there are in the dark. some say they fear they may not have a home to come back to. >> no way out of florida at the moment and i'll probably stay here at the airport for the next two days and then make my way back to sarasota. hopefully still have a home. >> harris: not a lot of activity at the airport. they have generators. sarasota mayor is in "focus" now and this -- when you look at it, is it what you thought it would be or is it worse, are there any silver linings in any of this? >> there was. it's unfortunate that it was such a powerful hurricane and -- but it did not hit our community directly. we got -- we definitely experienced the 100 plus mile-per-hour winds. there have been no reports of injuries or loss of life at this time. our number one priority continues to be the safety of our residents. we have over 200 instances of trees that came down or power lines that were toppled over. a dozen other instances of homes and cars being destroyed. some flooding. th

the gulf coast of florida and the highest risk areas are ranging from collier county up to sh sarasota countyack has the storm making landfall in charlotte county. if you are in any of those counties, it's no longer possible to safely evacuate. it's time to hunker down and prepare tor for the storm. this is a powerful storm that should be treated like you would treat if a tornado was aapproaching your home. if you're out on the roads, get to a safe place as soon as possible. there's more than 200 shelters open in just the southwest florida region alone. we're already seeing bridge closures. the skyway bridge is closed now going from manatee to pinellas counties. there's 40,000 power outages reported but outside of southwest florida, crews are responding to those power outages. don't go outside in the eye of the storm. cheryl: i'm going to to keep monitoring the comments from the governor for you and we want to let our viewers know you can stay with fox weather, there's 24/7 coverage on fox weather, get the app, go to foxweather.com. we'll stay on it for you. back over to you. the big concern

it could be anywhere in the tampa bay area, sarasota county, the landfall probably about 28 hours away from now, so there still is time. we do expect the rains to begin here really soon, though, and it really is going to be a miserable day for pretty much the entire region all day long, tomorrow and into thursday. pt -- all right, back to you guys. >> john: that means your time is up, phil. thank you very much, time to go. >> exactly what it means. >> john: phil keating what it means, thank you. >> aishah: tallahassee, emergency officials are getting ready as we speak. fox weather is live for us there. the what are officials doing to get ready there? >> hey, good afternoon, aishah. even though we are 200 miles north of where we are anticipating hurricane ian to make the biggest impact, the message from state and local officials here is to not let your guard down. so, currently we are at the emergency operations center where there are a ton of federal and state agencies really watching the situation unfold here across the state. we see the u.s. coast guard, we see the national guard, we

it's looking like ian is on track to strike, sarasota county, biggest concerns at this hour? >> don, thank you for this opportunity. my biggest concern is enough people are taking this seriously in our area. i have about 150,000 people that encompass at the level of any of the evacuation areas, that we called for four this emergency. and just this moment with my 12 evacuation salters by they tell me that we have about 3000 people. so i don't know where all these people bent, i hope that they left the area. but we are putting out messages, we put out one of those ipods messages, basically like an amber alert. they want to every cell phone. and we are hoping to tell people that you don't have as much time as you think you do. i think people look to the track and said, oh we got monday, tuesday, wednesday, thursday. well that was going when it was straight north. once it made that shift, and is coming towards us in the land, that wednesday, thursday, friday, across florida, we can see this tomorrow afternoon, making landfall, like the gentleman said, shrubbery harbor area. so my

now, you talk about the entire sarasota county, about a 100,000 customers at this point, probably more, are without power. something they'll have to live with at least possibly for a couple of days until utility crews get weather favorable enough for them to get out and fix some of these utilities and get power restored. for folks who decided to stick around, didn't decide to evacuate, they're essentially on their own right now. we got several alerts throughout the day from county officials saying, look, the wind gusts, the sustained winds rather, are at 45 miles per hour. that is dangerous. we're not going to send first responders out in that weather. so if you find yourself in an emergency situation, you're going to have to deal with it on your own. you can still call 9-1-1, and 9-1-1 dispatchers will try to help you through the emergency situations, but for the most part there will be no physical presence in the way of emergency help. now, were expecting a storm surge up to 8 feet here. we're further inland, so we haven't been able to get out to the sarasota bay to see what's been g

north and into sarasota county. very high population, very high storm surge is occurring there. they're getting around the community, but fema's role is not to get ahead of the state. it's disappoint the state, be there, have the resources ready to go. and start thinking about next steps. if this moves through response, we will start getting to the issue of, what assistance will we need to four people they did not have insurance? what kind of rebuilding assurance are we going to need to help communities pay the bills, pay for that response, the cleanup. that will be -- they'll be working on that over the next couple of days. but everybody has to stay focused on right now, and don't detract from certain rescue parties. we still have flooding going. you heard from your people in orlando. in this part of the world, where a pretty flat state. our flash flooding can turn into ponding, where communities that were high and dry earlier in the evening, they may be a lake with all of that route water rushing in. those rescues will have to take place as well. >> let's talk more about the w

is giving an update as the storm is tracking more south towards the border of charlotte and sarasota countieshen you look at storm surge of this nature that is a very life-threatening hazard talking about 10 feet, 12 feet of storm surge which you could see in certain parts of this when it makes landfall. we know this thing is going to be hitting the state directly, sometime tomorrow evening. you still have some time. but that time is rapidly running out. reporter: now orlando is becoming a bit after safe haven for those people who are evacuating because we're more inland here. i'm told hotels selling out. the one in the airport is already sold out. some people in the airport extending business trips here or their vacations. what is interesting is, those hurricane warnings are expanding more inland within the last hour. if you were in this airport with me all of our phones were going off because we all got the hurricane warning in effect for orlando as well. elizabeth: interesting. katie byrne, thank you for your reporting stay safe. jason smith from house ways and means and former white house

it's about 80% of the people in sarasota county., i got to refresh the power outages u.s., port charlotte where that landfall occurred, 96.7% of customers with no power. then you think about the other things so important in the midst of a hurricane and how we cover it, health care, hospitals, people's access to help. i was on the phone with sarasota memorial hospital's ceo today who said some facilities that are six months old, some that are 60 years old, and maybe not capable of bearing the brunt of this kind of an attack. what they did earlier today was actually move some of the patients on the flight before the storm arrived to get them out of harm's way. it included an entire icu to safer ground. as we see more of this wind come through, some of the staffing has been prepping to stay camped out at the hospital for days or weeks, whatever it takes. you hear vinyl and alumni siding flying around right now. obviously dangerous conditions. health care is key and also help from emergency sponsors who have said we're not going out in

there were 20 inches of rain in southern sarasota county in a span of 12 hours. recurrence year event or in other words it's an event with a 0.1% chance of occurring in any single year. that event was 14 inches in 12 hours and we got 20. we absolutely destroyed the record rainfall. not to mention additional rain rates that have brought some serious flash flood emergencies in many spots of the state. and these winds that yur seeing here ripping homes apart and structures, the winds measured at least at 135 miles an hour. you know you have to get lucky to happen to have an anemometer or weather instrument in the path of the worst winds. so the mere fact that we were able to measure 135 mile per hour winds, it's a combination of luck and the sturdiness of that instrument. >> john, among the many things i have been able to learn from you the last couple days is history and the uniqueness of this storm, but also the recurring aspect of more and more powerful storms because of the world that we live in. i was just struck by the fact that this tropical storm is certainl

i want to bring in chief of emergency services in sarasota county. thank you for -- what's your biggest concern -- can you hear me? can you hear me? >> yes, i can hear you now. yes, sir. i can hear you now. >> sorry. what's your biggest concern with this storm right now? >> well, i believe that many people underestimated this and did not take it seriously. that's my concern. but we're at a point now where i'm looking out my window, i can see the winds are probably up there in 45 sustained. we don't send emergency vehicles out there anymore. if they're not there, we're getting really close. whoever did not go to an evacuation center, that's my concern. if they have power and they're watching this, they need to find a safe location in their home, a safe room to move to if things start going bad. if they didn't leave, i'm very concerned about folks that did that. >> yeah, let's talk to those people who still have power and they're watching us here on msnbc and saying, all right, i stayed behind, i didn't think it was going to be this intense. if it does

we had charlie come up not too long ago, but like i said, florida in sarasota county we've had numerousady. we've been preparing for the last couple of days that cone of uncertainty has always had us in the model, so people tend to follow the evacuation orders and i think most people went for safety. i'm actually inland in sarasota so not in an evacuation zone but even around my house you could hear the wind whirling around me , it's a scary storm. stuart: yes, it is and for those people who have never been in a serious storm, i'll tell you, it's really frightening and that's a fact. joe gruter, thanks for joining us we appreciate it and good luck. >> thanks, stuart. stuart: all right lauren, we've got disney closing both of their theme parks, or they are closing theme parks in florida. how long are they staying closed lauren: in orlando. they will be closed today and tomorrow very rare for disney. a lot of people when there's a hurricane seek shelter in the parks and hotels so going back to their opening in 1971 they have only closed eight times for a hurricane. it's also a big busines

we're locked down right now in the emergency operations center for sarasota county. this is honestly the hardest part of the storm for us. we've been preparing for the past week. we've been in this facility for several days. this is the time where we're very much in the dark. we're waiting through the worst part of the storm over the next two hours. we're ready and poised to take action. but at this point in time, we're seeing a lot of the same things that you're seeing. a lot of cameras have gone dark and we are monitoring, hoping for the best and then being prepared to response as soon as it's safe to do so. >> neil: clearly is not safe right now and might not be for a while. the winds are in excess of 100 miles an hour. that's not ceased. are you getting a better idea the time line on this? or is it just hurry up and wait and wait and wait? >> yeah, i mean, as you sade, we're getting hit by multiple sides of the storm. it's not a fast-moving storm and very large. so unfortunately, the timeline is very slow compared to other events. we have not experienced somethin

the most recent guidance for the national hurricane center's arrival at charlotte county and sarasota county border basically. but there's going to be another update at 11:00. we will see if that trend to the east continues. sean, you know that part of the state very well. the further south it hits on the peninsula that starts to bring in more major impacts for places like fort myers and naples and those communities and another thing i think that is going to be challenging is it is going to hit and then it is basically going to win across the state and likely exit on the atlantic coast sometime someplace in central or northeastern florida and that is going to be basically a tropical storm going across the entire state of florida. you're going to talk about power outages. you are going to talk about a lot of rain and flooding so this is not just going to be limited to that wherever the storm makes landfall. >> sean: governor, let me ask ask you this. and i think you are sympathetic like i am. no one wants to be inconvenienced like this. but i think you agree with me. people who generally don'

let's head north of fort myers up into sarasota county, florida, in the town of north port.cnn's carlos suarez is there live. are the flood waters there, have they receded? >> no, jake, they haven't. in fact, in this one neighborhood just south of i-75, the flooding has gotten worse. this is how things look right now. just a few minutes ago, several boats went out, trying to go ahead and rescue some folks that have been stranded in their homes. several of them for several days now. there's one boat that's about to come in. just a few minutes ago, anywhere between six to nine people were brought in three boats, the effort out here has been going on for the better part of the entire day. we're talking about folks with the army. we're also talking about north port police. we're also including in this neighbors, also just showed up because they heard what was happening, and they brought out their jet skis, they brought out their kayaks, airboats, all in an effort to try to get all of these folks stuck in their homes to a safe place. jake. >> have rescue crews been able to get to

there are barrier islands along lee county and sarasota county.they are in the path of this hurricane, juan. juan: the landfall is expected now around fort myers. inland from that is immokalee, where many migrate farmworkers, who often live in substandard housing, live. any since were idea what those migrant workers might be exposed to, what can of shelter or even support from the state they would be getting? >> a lot of the evacuation orders are ordered by zone, which essentially is how close you are to the coast and rivers and how low-lying you are. it also the evacuation orders include substandard structures. if you are far inland and on high ground, you have been asked to evacuate if you live in a bile home or manufactud home or something that might not withstand strong nds. the immokalee workers, the woers in mokalee, florida, certnly living in those kinds of conditions. many of them,everalamilies living under one roof and it might even be a stretch to call it a roof. oftentimes i live in substandard housing, which might be completely devasta

. >>> sarasota county was spared the brunt of hurricane ian.e is still suffering intense rain and dangerous winds until just about two hours ago. right now, city officials still out assessing the damage, trying to get a sense of how many homes and businesses were badly damaged. i want to bring in one of the small businessowners. his family owns multiple restaurants in the area, including owen's. thanks for being with us. how did your restaurants do? >> you know, remarkably well. downtown sarasota, we seem to be a little insulated here. lots of debris. my crew is cleaning up right now as we speak. potentially, we will get open tomorrow night. honestly, our thoughts and prayers are with the people south of us. serious devastation down there. it's hard to feel good up here about being kind of missed again. sarasota seems historically to take these -- we always get missed. they go north, south, but we are thinking about the people down south here. some horrible stories down there. hoping for the best. >> yeah, just thinking of the areas around sara

one area hit particularly hard is southern sarasota county, where 14 inches of rain fell in 12 hours for what's being classified as a thousand-year rainfall event. joining us now, the mayor of sarasota, erik arroyo. thank you for joining us. i guess first the very latest, please, from your city. what do you know? >> power just came back on for our region, and we know that it's scattered, so not everyone has their powers back on. our number-one priority remains the safety of our residents. there's 200 instances of downed trees or power lines that came down. there's phone number that will be provided in our social media report of new instances, if anybody needs to report a tree or a power line that came down. our barrier islands are still closed off. we've brought water back to the barrier islands. the next phase is to conduct an inspection to check if the water is adequate. we'll hold the bridges closed until there's an assessment to make sure we can open them back up safely. there are no reports of injuries or loss of life at this time, which is great news. there's 100 individuals fr

i want to go to sarasota county where more than 150,000 pe people -- think about that -- they're under mandatory evacuation orders. just two hours ago, water to the city of of sarasota was turned off as the area is bracing for what will be, they believe, widespread flooding. joining me now is the mayor of sarasota, eric arroyo. thank you for joining us this evening. this wasn't supposed to happen to your city, but florida was obviously under a watch. water has been shut off, but the bridges have also been closed. i'm wondering, mayor, how are you feeling about all the preparations thus far. will it be enough? >> you know, our main priority at the city of sarasota is the safety of our residence. we called a local state of emergency and activated emergency operations center, meaning we have all the staff necessary for any type of disaster on call. we evacuated zone a, which is the barrier islands and people living on boats and mobile homes. when we started closely monitoring the situation last week, we received full briefings three times a day. o our utilities department made sure everyt

. >> the sun will come up on south, sarasota county, florida, to reveal the catastrophic effects of hurricane ian as it made landfall not far from here where we've been reporting from for the last 24 hours is now a parking lot filled with water only up to my ankles. and this is just the beginning of what this storm has done in our small corner of the world. if you walk over here, you'll notice this strip mall where we've been reporting from to bring you images of the winds and the rains from this powerful storm has been powerful enough to rip off a corner of the building. we've been reporting from right here to give you an idea of how powerful these winds are as they came around the back of the structure, powerful enough to rip the awning and the wooden frame in the metal sheet metal that was used on the front of this building. clear off of it. yesterday we watched as it through debris down in front of us winds so powerful our crew here who's covered many hurricanes saying this is the most powerful storm we've ever encountered. we agree that this morning as we assess the damage, the sun is st

the highest risk areas are ranging from collier county up to sarasota county. storm making landfall in charlotte, county. if you are in any of those counties, it's no longer possible to safely evacuate. it's time to hunker down and prepare for this storm. this is a powerful storm that should be treated like you would treat if a tornado was approaching your home. if you are out on the roads, get to a safe place as soon as possible. there is more than 200 shelters open in just the southwest florida region alone. we are already seeing bridge closures, the bridge is closed now from manatee to pinellas county. there are 40,000 power outages reported. outside of southwest florida crews are responding to those power outages. don't go outside in the eye of the storm. it's still dangerous. there's actually a calmness. if the center of the hurricane is right over you. you think maybe the storm has passed. that is not the case. it's still very discuss dangerous. there is possibility of tornadoes. it would also be very difficult to potentially get back into your home. so ev

most recent guidancenti from the national hurricane centerda is arrival at charlotte county and sarasota county border. basically, there's going to be another update at 11:00. we'll see if that trend to thata the east continues. but, sean, you know, that part of the state very well. hits one the further south it hits on st the peninsula, that starts to bring in more major impacts for places like fortr im myers and naples and those communities. anotheher thing i think it's going to be challenging is itg o is going to hit and it's basically going to go across the state and likely exit on the atlantic coast sometime someplace in central or i northeastern florida. and that's going tosicall be basically a tropical storm going across the entire state of florida. so you're going to talk abou ttk power outage s. ain an you're going to talk about a lot of rain and flooding. so thiuss is not just going to be limited to wherever the storm makes landfall. governor , let me ask you this.y and i think you're sympathetic like i am. nobodymp wants tot i th be inconvenienced like this.inu i think you agree with

want to have to clean this up pretty quickly because when you consider the amount of people in sarasota county that are without power, three quarters of this county currently in the dark, we're talking about tens of thousands of people who do not have power and are anxiously waiting to get power back . they're going to have to wait for these crews to get out and get to those power lines. and those crews are going to have to navigate a lot of the debris that's been tossed into the street right now. this is something that's been expected and something that governor rhonda santurce dress alison, not only there are forty two thousand linemen, they positioned all across the state of florida. as soon as it's safe to go , those power, those personnel are going to go in to to resume power. yeah, and folks are certainly going to have to be patient. this could be a process that takes days because, again, utility crews have to get around, have to navigate through just debris. and once they're able to, they're going to prioritize public health and public safety facilities. we're talking about hospitals, p

state and this includes 67 high priority bridges affected and reopened in lee, charlotte, sarasota and manatee counties . pine island, sanibel, those will be rebuild efforts. the sanibel bridge has breaks in multiple parts. most held up well. it was where you had it on some of the sandbars and those basically got washed out from underneath. in the meantime kevin can talk about this. they're going to be running barges to bring more heavy equipment on to the islands to help with the response so first responders that have been there by and large coming into error, you have some equipment but their traveling light or just to be able to go and get people as quickly as possible. there have been six healthcare facilities evacuated in southwest florida . they were having problems with water or albums with power for an extended period of time. we're prioritizing getting power and running potable water to the rest of the areas healthcare facilities. there have been 117 facilities that lost power that now have power restored. sports, tampa bay, everglades are reopened for fueling and i think between today and tom