Transcripts For FOXNEWSW FOX Friends 20180914

Carolina. Good morning, guys, for our viewers just waking up, its been a long night. The winds whipping more head city, we are on the sea what yowall. We are separated by Atlantic Beach Barrier Island parallel to just a mile that way. Thats where we were yesterday where that pier was really swaying back and forth. We are in inland of Morehead City. See the surge coming in here. Look at the dock behind me the Structural Integrity of the docks in this Fishing Community has really been challenging. We have seen all sorts of debris flowing by and i have talked to the chief of police out over in Atlantic Beach, jeff harvey, he tells me they are hunkered down, they cant go out because of the wind and surge that they are facing over there the fire chief telling me that the bay windows on his firehouse had been totally destroyed. And i can tell you this storm is going to get worse because inland about 40 miles northwest of me in new bern all night long rescues going on. People stranded. I have been talking to the authorities there and they say that people are constantly calling saying they are up to their chest on water and trying to get on their roof and in jacksonville, another nearby inland community saying they the hotel the motor inn on wilmington highway had structural damage. Collapsed rescued 70 people. Infants, pets, elderly people. Now their challenge is trying to get those people to shelters because fire and rescue in jacksonville cant operate under these conditions. But here in morehead we are coastal. And while the eye starts coming over, it is because of florences size, remember, she was the size of both carolinas put together when she was a cat 4 and came down to cat 2 and came on as cat 1. The winds we are feeling some upwards of 80, 90 Miles Per Hour are whipping amount of water has not diminished. Whether you get this amount of water at 60 or 120 its still the same amount. When i walk over to the other side of this building away from this sea wall, its pitch black. But you can see that there are power lines down. There is all sorts of debris in the road, so, it is the four punch. The quadrupled punch that these communities are taking. The wind now, the surge coming in, its the excessive flooding thats already started in inland communities like new bern that suffered catastrophic flooding in a lot of the recent storms including matthew. Matthew came on as a one as well. 28 lives were lost. And it is, of course, excessive rain fall thats going to follow. While we are at this sea wall is so that you can guys can see steve, ainsley and pete. Look how angry this water is when this water starts to move when it comes into Morehead City, its going going to make the conditions even worse. All the local authorities, Law Enforcement, fire, rescue, and whatnot that i have talked to are having absolutely zero movement in these conditions and as we begin to get some light, the sun is not coming up. Of the storm is going to go on for many, many more hours u its going to be difficult to get an assessment of what their problems are and start prioritizing what they need to deal with next. Right now though, those that decided to stay behind, have definitely hunkered down doing the best they can. This is why authorities tell you before storms like, this particularly the size of florence, that dont stay behind, evacuate. Because if you get into trouble, we may not be able to come get you. Its not because they dont want to, its because they literally cant. I couldnt go two miles if i had to where i am now. Its very, very difficult. And its going to be unfortunately a very long day, guys. Steve it will be for you. All right. Griff jenkins live in Morehead City in North Carolina with the very latest. Stay safe. Pete absolutely, griff. Down the coast in Wrightsville Beach seeing 100 mileperhour wind gusts thats where Jonathan Serrie picks up our Live Team Coverage this morning. Jonathan . Good morning and we are experiencing some of those guests right now. This is the worse of the storm that we have seen all evening. We went into the early part of the evening keeping our power line. Souter of amaze you had at that then around 1 30 the lights went out. And we started looking on the horizon trying to survey any damage, couldnt. Pause other than our Battery Powered lights, most of the island is pitch black. You cant see anything. And that creates treacherous conditions. Now, we are very close to the eye and wherever the eye ends up pausing over, its a place of relative calm. After you have been through this the temptation is if you have been hunkered down in your home or shelter. You will want to go out and explore. Officials saying dont do that too much debris on the ground. Downed power lines. They will dont want you walking into that get caught in the other side of the eye. You get hit by the eye wall. Hurricane force winds in the opposite direction and so officials are saying continue to shelter in your home, in your shelters, stay indoors until this storm passes completely. Now, when will the storm pass . The storm is frustratingly slow. So all of these heavy winds were going to be putting up with this for a long time. Structures are going to be bombarded by these heavy winds for many hours. And then these rains are going to continue to fall for hours. And after the storm moves away from the coast, rain is going to continue to fall in some inland communities not used to you this much rain. So, flooding is going to be a huge potential throughout the carolinas, even far inland. This is something thats affecting the entire state of North Carolina, the entire state of South Carolina. In fact, schools in the charlotte area 200 miles away from the coast have cancelled classes today. Many of the School Buildings being used as shelter from people evacuating from the coast. But also city officials and School Officials worry about this storms impact on that city. That far inland. So everyone is in this together. Back to you guys. Steve indeevmentd Jonathan Serrie live. Janice dean the weather machine joins us now. Category 1 off the coast but as jonathan and griff have been talking about its stalling out and moving so slowly and thats where all this rain and all the flooding and all out problems. Janice thats been the message for the last several days. Its not about the category its the fact that this storm is going to stall and bring incredible amounts of rain. Already getting reports of over 20 inches in Atlantic Beach. The storm is just about to make landfall in the next, i would say hour we are going to see the calmest point of the storm, the eye coming ashore. And that is the lowest Pressure Point as it moves on shower. Shore. There is Top Sail Beach. We think the landfill point is going to be Top Sail Beach up toward surf city. North of the wilmington area. Thats where the eye, the calmest part of the storm is going to come to shore probably in the next hour. The worst part of the storm is the eye wall thats on shore right now where they are getting the worse of the Hurricane Force winds. Worse of the rainfall. We have had reports, of course, all morning of over 10 feet of storm surge new bern, hundreds of people having to be else are could you you had and 100 people needing rescue us. Many of these people are on their homes in at least Tropical Storm force winds waiting to be rescued. And thats why we had the evacuations. The National Hurricane center by the way did a great job of forecasting. This we are not done yet. We wont really see the damage until next week. This is going to be a flooding and surge event. A flooding and surge event. Not a wind event. Certainly we will see prolonged winds. Its thought about the category of winds u its going to be like a Hurricane Harvey situation in Southeast Texas where they will get upwards of 20 to 40 inches. Already reports of 20 inches on the ground right now in parts of coastal, South Carolina. This is also going to be a rather North Carolina. This is also going to be a South Carolina event. Its going to be an appalachian events. A virginia event back into the Tennessee River valley. So, here is our track. Again, look at the slow movement of the storm. Still a hurricane. Tomorrow morning as it lumbers in to shore and brings incredible amounts of rain. Incredible amounts of storm surge. We still have the threat of course for tornadoes and, you know, unfortunately this is going to be a story we are going to be covering throughout the weekend. With these storms we have our reporters out there right now. Can you seat winds and rain. We wont be able to assess the damage until next week. It will be catastrophic lifethreatening damage. Ainsley you were reminding people on Fox Friends First that when sandy hit this area it was a category 1 we know the damage that was done there. Brian kilmeade his whole house flooded first floor. Janice janice, listen, i know we focus on categories and when you have 4 and 5 that can do extraordinary damage as far as wind. People arent typically killed by wind event. Its structural damage. The number one killer is storm surge and flooding which is what is happening with this storm right now. Steve thats why we are keeping an eye on it janice, thank you very much. Meanwhile stand by. Jeff flock from Fox Business Network joins us live. This is a fox news alert. Jeff . Yeah, janice makes a great point about the water. At the same time, when you are near the center of circulation, you really do begin to get that wind event. And obviously in a category 1 storm, the wind is not as strong as it potentially could be. Can you imagine if this storm had come ashore at a cat 4 . Im standing in barely category 1 winds right now and can you see how punishinpunishing they are. Fortunately at this point in Carolina Beach as we are able to see out, you see the power has remains on. Although we have seen several transformers blow. I dont know how much longer the power will remain here. The only good news steve and ainsley i can report to you is because we are getting still south of it, because of the angle of the storm, we are getting the wind off the land onto the water, which is pushing back the surf. So even though we have some inland flooding here, we dont have surge flooding. Thats a positive. However, however, when the storm gets past us the winds will be the other way and the surf will come on shore and see if we have a surge event. Right now getting good flow right out of the west. Right on us. So keep watching it. Pete jeff, what you are emphasizing here a lot of this is very local depending on where you are adjacent to the eye wall and the surge, so things can change pretty quickly. Absolutely. People understanding that about hurricanes that they are all little small weather systems within the hurricane. It ebbs and flow as. Right now not as bad and then you get a bad gust so you are absolutely right. Its all local. Steve thats right. Because its hurricane and cyclone nic the winds come out of all four directions which is what he is experiencing. Jeff, for the people watching this program over the next three hours, worried about the personal safety of our correspondents near the actual hurricane would you just explain why we pick these various locations, which side of the building you stand on and how we are transmitting . Exactly. Yeah, steve. Absolutely you know exactly the drill. Evan in every major hurricane since 1985. You pick a building that is strong, steel and concrete construction. One you are certain is not going to get washed away by surge. We all have a lot of experience here. Fox takes a lot of and all the networks in fairness take great care to make sure everyone is safe. Nobody gets sent into a hurricane that doesnt want to be here. I love these displays of nature and thats why i come to hurricanes. I dont feel unsafe because of the experience and because of the steps that we take to keep ourselves safe. If there was any kind of debris flying. Thats my point about this. Can you imagine a cat 4 storm . We wouldnt be standing here in a category 4 storm. We would be hunkered down somewhere. These are barely category 1 winds that we are experiencing right now. You couldnt stand up in a stronger hurricane. Were not get getting any debris at this point and we are watching that very carefully. Im glad you brought that up, steve. We do get that. The twitter verse sometimes can be unkind and wonder about our sanity but we like what we do. Steve if you were to right now you are in the shadow of that building, but if you walked out 15 feet, thats where the Hurricane Force winds are right now and thats why you only do it every once in a while. Just to show how strong the winds are. Ainsley jeff, how does this hurricane compare to the ones you have covered in the past . Its funny i was in hurricane bertha in 1996 which i used to say was my best hurricane experience because, when you get a category 1 storm, you can stand out here. Its reasonably safe. The water event is something totally different. But the wind event is reasonably safe. So i kind of like that. Like i said, if you are in a very strong hurricane you would not be anywhere near out here. It would be crazy. In some ways this is the best of the event that it could be. Pete jeff flock, thank you very much. Be safe we know you are. Steve he is out standing next to a really strong building as we have heard. Ainsley as Hurricane Florence lashing the coast, what are some of the dangers that inland folks are facin facing. Pete congressman, thanks very much for joining us. What ainsley said inland. We see a lot of focus on the coast but the water is what the experts are most concerned about. How are you controlling for that . Its kind of the calm before the storm driving up here is just an eerie feeling. I was on the phone with 11 sheriffs and the Police Chiefs. I guess the best way to describe it is we are preparing for the worst and hoping for the best. They have been on the phone, most of them, most of the sheriffs and Police Chiefs and mayors for that matter meeting some three per day yesterday. Trying to communicate with people and all the agencies the best i can say they are trying to stay in communication. When it hits do what we need tto do. Steve we are looking at image in Top Sail Beach where a canopy blew over and there she goes. 1. 7 Million People we are told in the storm target area to evacuate. That many people did not. Now this morning they are waking up and in some cases there is water inside their houses. They have got to put the lives of the First Responders into peril to have them get out. Thats got to be frustrating. Frustrating and the problems we have the flooding is major. We experienced that three years ago in matthew outside of columbia and the dams broke and water combined with the winds is going to be a problem that were going to have to hopefully get through. Ainsley congressman, im from the state of South Carolina and i know we just experienced a major flood in columbia recently. Damaged a lot of stores. Then there was hurricane hugo which goes down in history. We all remember where we were when that storm went through South Carolina and totally demolished the beaches and people had to totally rebuild their homes. Where are you right now . Are you in columbia . Im from rock hill, ainsley and drove up to charlotte. You know, its about a 20minute drive. But, again, its you feel for the people and like you say, once they are trapped and once you have to rescue them its almost too late. You look for the safety and getting people in and out is going to be a challenge. Ainsley congressman. People are worried about if its going to affect inland. Pete and i were talking about that when we introduced you. People in columbia, people in rock hill. We see the storm, it looks like its going to go from the coast, myrtle beach area and then down through the middle of state where columbia, the capital is. And then it looks like it will go up to clemson and spartanburg area. Do people need to evacuate those areas or are they okay in their houses . At this point it looks like its going to hit tonight. I would say if you are in the low lying areas go to safe places as has been mentioned early in the show you go to structures that are substantial, concrete. Something that you feel safe about. Buff, you know, you really at this point, just trying to do the best you can. Trying to ward off what we are seeing in wilmington and Wrightsville Beach and hopefully the safety is what we have got to look for. I will tell you the police are very concerned about being able to get arranged as the downed power lines that you see that when they hit in wrightsville and the water is not a good thing to maneuver. In thats what they are worried about in talking with them yesterday. Steve sure. Congressman, i was reading in one of the South Carolina papers this morning that of the shelters that had been set up, only about 10 of them were full. Each shelter about 10 . They have plenty of beds still available. Would your advice to people in the low country be, you know what . Tonight is the night have you got to worry, about thinking staying in a shelter . Yeah. I was in a local red cross yesterday. It was buzzing with people, with people getting ready they had water and supplies. There is no wrong answer and particularly those disabled and those that have got issue, health issues. You need to be in touch with them and we are providing all the numbers that they can call but what the unpredictability of this hurricane is what is going to be a problem to try to deal with. But what i would advise people to do is call, have the numbers ready keep their cell phones charged and, again, be ready for the worst. Pete absolutely. Congressman, thank you very much for your time this morning. We will keep in contact with you as things develop in your state. We are certainly thinking of you guys. Ainsley thank you so much, congressman. Kiss that southern soil for us. Pete u. S. Air force not really angle flying into the eye of the hurricane. The man who shot this video right here in the middle of it, i cant imagine. They take us inside the storm coming up next. burke thats what we call a huge drag. Seriously, thats what we call it. Officially. And we covered it. Talk to farmers. We know a thing or two because weve seen a thing or two. We are farmers. Bumpadum, bumbumbumbum if youre waiting patiently for a liver transplant, it could cost you your life. Its time to get out of line with upmc. At upmc, livingdonor transplants put you first. So you dont die waiting. 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Pete we are back. Imagine, flying into the eye of a hurricane. Ainsley sounds dangerous. It looks really pretty though. Thats exactly what our u. S. Air force did the last two days as they helped gather information for people on the ground. Steve lets meet some of the people in that plane right now. Here is air force Tech Sergeant chris himmen with the fourth combat camera squadron who was on that plane and he shot the video. With him is business pilot with the 53rd weather recon squadron. Gentlemen, good morning to you. Good morning. Good morning, sir. Sergeant. Lets start with you, generally, we always hear these stories about the Hurricane Hunters, they group, they take pictures. Explain what sort of data in addition to the video you are trying to gather. During our flights we are looking for wind speed, pressure differences, everything that the weather officer in the back. Their gear measures every meteorological aspect can you imagine and uplinks to the National Hurricane center in miami and from there it gets put out to the public. Pete major, a lot of us cant conceive the idea of flying into a massive hurricane. How do you train for Something Like this . How do you approach a hurricane and what happens once you get inside that beautiful eye that we have seen those images of . The eye is probably the nicest part of the storm once we have broken through the eye wall. Thats where you get all the nice pictures you saw chris here took. Its much calmer inside the eye typically. And with florence, the eye wall two or three days ago was quite nice. You had a night stadium effect but no ocean floor and as the storm got closer and closer to land that eye wall collapsed more and more until last night that wall pretty much has disintegrated to the south. From a training aspect, you cant really practice hurricanes. We run the patterns, we fly missions like we would. We practice the actual routeing. As to how the weather and storm is going to treat us each storm is different and has its own attitude. You hold on and keep the plane level. Ainsley sergeant, when you leave your house are you like see you honey, love you. Love you kids. Im going to fly my plane right into a hurricane. Steve and take pictures. Ainsley why . Do you have to do it because its your assignment or did you choose this . And if you did, why . I dont fly the plane, he does. Thank god. But, you know, its part of our air force reserve duty. We are all citizen airmen. My job is to document and take pictures of missions that go on. I know i talk to my mom, my girlfriend. My kid doesnt know. But both of them are a little bit worried about me but i told them, you know, im in good hands with the major. You know, do my mission. Steve surely. You are trained professionals and it is great what you do and thank you very much for serving in your nation to bring us the data so we can figure out where these storms are going. Pete save lives ultimately. Ainsley glad to see you safe on the ground. Thank you gentlemen for your service. Steve on the ground not so safe right now. Griff is in Morehead City, North Carolina. The eye wall is moving on shore. Griff . It is moving on shore, guys. But its certainly not here. Its anything but calm because we are getting northeastern quadrant the dirty side of florence hitting us right here. And the winds are just having us. Where we are for the viewers just picking up we are along the sea wall of Morehead City. Barrier island facing out where we were yesterday. These winds, high gusts upwards of 80, 90 Miles Per Hour. We wanted to look at the waves come in, the surge and the tide. High tide very worried about it when i talk to the officials. The fire chief, the police chief over in Atlantic Beach, they tell me they are getting pounded by the wind and the storm surge over there. The firehouse the bay windows of the firehouse have been smashed by the wind. The roof on the business next to them has been totally ripped off. They said they havent had the calls for rescues because most people listen to the evacuations over there. Here in Morehead City, officials tell me that they are not able to go out and assess any damage. That they havent gotten coastal rescues. Thats good. We are not yet to a point you begin to see in the next hour. Right now its pitch black. The only lights you can see anywhere are just those blinking emergency lights of inside businesses. If they have maybe emergency lights going on. It is that story, northwest of here at new bern with the 200 rescues already. 150 underway. People on their roof. Thats going to be the stuff that why sa we saw and i covered for you with harvey trying to get with people with houses under water. Noose river is one of four major rivers, five actually. Noose river, the newport. The peopl pemlico and tara. All feeding down to this area here in Morehead City. When this water comes, in and Atlantic Beach finally is able to have their surge go out, and thats 36 to 48 hours away, they are going to be inundated with the amount of water in those rivers because unlike the ocean where the tide can go back out, well, it cant go anywhere when it stresses those rivers. That noose river you will hear a lot about up in new bern area because back during irene, hurricane irene it crested at 8 feet. At its worse. Its already, as you heard janice earlier talking about already crested possibly 10 feet this early. And we are expecting 40 inches of rain fall. Have you four punches that are going to absolutely leave North Carolina with a painful history for many days that is the wind, the storm surge, and now the flooding and the excessive rain. As we sort of try and deal with the conditions here. Were hoping, steve, ainsley and pete, to get a little bit of light so we can go out and see some of what is going on in Morehead City. We tried to go around in the parking lot. Its just too dark and dark is really what is a condition we dont talk much about. Its why you cant get out and get to people. You cant drive around. We would love to get up to new bern to see whats going on there. Try and bring some help if we can to people. But there is no way you would take off in these sort of situations as we continue to monitor what is right now a very angry sea. Off the coast of North Carolina, guys. Ainsley griff, do you know what im wondering, if there is no electricity where you are and most of the coastal towns in North Carolina, all of them, in fact, dont have electricity, where do you how do you live in those conditions . Where do you get your gasoline . How do you eat if the restaurants are closed . What do you do as a reporter . Well, listen, as a reporter, you bring gas cans. You bring a generator. You hope you have a supply of batteries. But for residents, some tried to stay behind because of this dilemma. Where they saw it diminish from a cat 4 to a cat 2 to a cat 1 and they thought well, i will ride out the wind because i dont want to get trapped by the flooding inland because i cant get back to their area. Those folks may have been less prepared in the gas, a lot of people in these small communities people are leaving they were wearing out the gas stations. We had a hard time finding any gas station that was open on the early side of yesterday that run out of it. Getting the fuel trucks past flooded areas, there is one highway, highway 70 really that goes from raleigh all the way down to this part of North Carolina and its flooding in several places and going to continue to flood. So its hard to even get fuel. In thats a situation going to go on for days. Guys . Ainsley stay safe. Pete more coverage on the other side. Cigna. Together, all the way. Unmotivated . Feeling like you cant keep up . Maybe youre tired of the same old workout. Then you need aaptiv. Aaptiv offers incredibly motivating musicdriven workouts led by the worlds best trainers. Youll find classes for everything. From running, to strength training, to yoga. Aaptiv real trainers, real music, real workouts. Try aaptiv free for 30 days. Visit aaptiv. Com to start your free trial. And the wolf huffed and puffed. Like you do sometimes, grandpa . Well, when you have copd, it can be hard to breathe. So my doctor said. Symbicort can help you breathe better. Starting within 5 minutes. 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Being outdoors was good for them . vo check your rate at welcometotheclub. Com. Ainsley right now, Hurricane Florence is pummeling the east coast with winds up to 90 Miles Per Hour those powerful gusts blowing off the roof at this gas station at that one right there at Top Sail Beach, North Carolina. It starts going and then it is gone. Steve it does, indeed. It keeps blowing down the road in additional video. Something else that they are seeing a lot of. The blue flash at night, a transformer exploding, hundreds, perhaps thousands of them as their heavy winds and the rains pummel the coast. Right now nearly 300,000 customers in North Carolina have no electricity. Pete thats a big one. Ainsley look at this storm right here. Pete it has made landfall. It is on the coast line. Janice it has not. Ainsley making landfall. Janice its coming this hour. Steve very close and slowly move across the state. Jeff flock joins us from the Fox Business Network. Carolina beach where the storm is coming ashore eventually, jeff . Whoa, you just saw maybe that flash of another transformer going. I will tell you thats the scary part. You talk about the slow forward speed of this or i guess the backward speed almost going south sort of, south and west. We could have these conditions for a while. You know, they start in fits and starts. That was another one. That one was fairly close. You cant see it from here. I dont want to bring the camera out obviously into the wind, but that was another one right there. And i think we have now lost power in the building although i do see some streetlights still on. The scary part of this is that we get these conditions now and until this gets past us, and its moving so slowly as they say now about five Miles Per Hour, five knots, maybe. Until it gets past us we will be in these kind of conditions. This is why we are here. Because this is where we thought the center of circulation would be coming ashore. As you can see now. Repeat myself. We are looking at cat 1 storm here with the kind of conditions we are looking at. Can you only imagine if this was a much stronger storm. We certainly wouldnt be standing here right now. And i dont see huge debris, you know, you say well you are standing out there could you be hit by something. We have picked this spot where you would have a pretty good sense of any debris coming at us. At this point im not seeing any debris, which is a good sign in that that means in terms of damage, i mean we may get power lines down obviously because of the transformer flashes we have seen. But that means that we dont see buildings breaking up and destructing at this point. And we certainly hope that continues. And if the wind speeds stay the same but i dont know. I dont know exactly how much more punch this thing has got. A lot of it is still out over water, which is why we are still getting this kind of rain. We will continue to be here and see. We could be here for a while though. Hopefully not here tomorrow. Steve it sounds like, jeff, according to janice, the eye wall of the storm has started of to make landfall. The eye itself has not. Im looking South Carolina, electricity and gas says that some customers could face week long Power Outages because of the storm. What sort of electricity, as we watch the transformers blow in your area, what sort of electricity are they operating on with those lights . Is it battery . Is it generator . What is it . This building, one of the reasons we came to this building they had a backup generators put the lights on in the hallway and parking garage which is where we are underneath. So that was a positive. I still see streetlights on and i still see thats another one. Maybe can you see that. Steve we saw it. I dont want to bring the camera out in it. But i can just tell you also my walk over here will be a little less windy. Maybe you saw one flash over there i dont know if finn is able to fall me. This is the ocean out this way in the dark. Whoa. That was a big one. Did you hear that, ben . That was a big one over there. And now i have seen power go down to the whole northern side of Carolina Beach. I still see some power to the left here, which is south. They just flashed back on. You know, when one goes they go to another one and until, you know, they get to the point where they cut it all down. But we just lost power there and it came back on. Thats your warning shot across your bough though if you are somewhere here still and you have got power. You want to have everything ready i have a flashlight in my pocket and good idea. Because, when it goes away, it goes away and you are done. Steve jeff, you are in a perfect location for hurricane coverage, actually, because it looks like you are in a parking structure. If it gets really windy, you can go over by concrete wall. How close are you to the water and at what point do they suggest that the storm surge could be a problem there in Carolina Beach . Well, heres the positive on this. Is because we are still south of the center of circumstanccirculation see the r loops. Because we are south of it we are getting the circulation moving off the water. We are getting it from the west, as i said out this way is where the water is so if you could get out there to look and we had a report out there earlier, the waves action is being pushed back waves roll in the tops get chopped off because of the winds that are knocking them down. Thats keeping the surge at bay. Heres the problem. When they get past us, when the storm center of circulation gets past us, we then begin to get the headon. So we will get head on off the water at somurge issue im going to look over here again to see if i see anymore power issues. But thats when we would begin to get the surge potentially out here and have any problems. We have a big berm here. We think we are okay. I wish i could show you the set up we have here. The truck parked out of the wind. Ben is out of the wind. And we dont want to we can show it to you, hey, ben, thank you, man. Thats nice work. Have you really got to be careful in these things because is he looking through a view finder. There is the rest of the team there he is looking through a view finder and he cant see. There is debris coming or Something Like that he cant see. We want to keep him in a place. Im looking out here can i see something maybe coming at me. I think were in a pretty good position. Were not going to be harmed at all. But if we get that water in there, you lose vehicles and that sort of thing. We dont want to have that because unpleasant life just got a whole lot more unpleasant. Ainsley only one car there and its yours, jeff. It shows us everyone sells evacuated. Be safe. We will check back in with you. Steve so important that the crew keep an eye on whats happening. I remember we were doing this show probably 15, 16, 17 years ago during hurricane coverage and somebody was just in the shadow of the building, and they said i have got to move. And a great big hunk, i would say a 10foot piece. Ainsley metal . Steve metal roof went tumble weeding where the correspondent had been standing. They have to keep an eye out to make sure as the wind blows something doesnt blow in. Pete you draw on your own experience very similar to military service. In the middle you always have people watching outside of the objective because you cant be focused on that. Ainsley like football games. Lauren blanchard is in North Carolina, she is in wilmington and janice was just telling us 91 mileperhour winds and you said, janice, right . , that this is where you think it will make landfall soon, the worst of it okay, lauren, whats the latest there . Yeah, hey, guys. We have been watching these conditions just get worse and worse over the even last hour. We are really feeling those winds. Believe it or not, i am actually partially covered by a part of a building. If that gives you any idea how strong these winds are actually behind me. The rain is also just pouring down in sheets right now. We have also been watching a lot of this town lose power. Transformers have been blowing up all behind us. They have been lighting up the sky in turquoise, we have seen them do that all over the area in wilmington. People losing power very, very quickly over the last even just two hours that number has jumped from 200,000 over 300,000 people now without power and duke energy saying they expect that number to go up to the 1 or 3 million range. So this storm were still as janice im sure showing all of you guys we are starting to get the worst of it. It is not fun out hire. I would suggest that folks stay inside. Listen to those evacuation orders. This is why they are in place. Pete its a simple but important reminder these evacuation orders came out because they knew it was going to get bad like this. As jeff flock emphasized, the water could come later, not right now. Is that what they are saying there as well is water more water rising later on as the winds die down . Yeah. Especially, with the tide. Right now, just looking down here below me, we are actually quite a ways off the ground just for safety purposes. Down below me it is starting to pool, it is not flooding just yet. The water is coming so rapidly where we are kind of a parking structure area next to a oh, next to our hotel it is starting to pool water even up here. We are expecting to t. To get much, much worse. Winds obviously getting very intense. This is going to be a wild ride. Thats for sure. Steve and its just starting. Lauren blanchard we thank you very much. Pete thank you. Now we turn to our own todd piro live from myrtle beach, South Carolina where strong winds are also picking up. Todd . Hey, pete, yeah. Going on social media and readings comments people are saying. There seems to be a view amongst some people that oh, North Carolina is getting the hurricane. We are not going to get it here in South Carolina. That view is incorrect. We have been knocked over a few times just waiting for griff, jeff, and lauren to finish. Thats part a. Part b, you guys have been talking for the last, 10 feet minutes about pour outages. We saw Power Outages the moment we arrived here earlier today. Then we saw that big turquoise flash in the sky earlier. As you can see no lights are on here. The sun is coming up. But no lights are on here on north ocean boulevard. The main drag here in North Myrtle Beach. In addition, we havent really seen much significant rain yet and all projections are that we are going to get between 18 and 24 inches of rain by the time all this is done. Add to that the projected 4 to 6 feet of storm surge, and you have to worry about flooding. For those people who say South Carolina, you are good. We are not good. You do need to be weary of that flooding, because its not just the ocean. The ocean is going to meet those rivers, those tributaries and inland areas are going to have a concern in addition to to where we are on the coast. Back to you. Steve is he live in myrtle beach, thank you very much. Janice, its almost here. Janice landfall is coming. The eye of the storm is going to push over. Right now getting the worse of the eye wall in wilmington. Pete eye wall is the strongest wind right inside . Steve we will get out of your way. Janice thats happening right now. Wilmington 91 mileperhour gusts. Thats happening. The landfall and here is. So wind gust that we are seeing right now. There is wilmington moments ago. 91 Miles Per Hour. We have. So buoys out there 80 Miles Per Hour. Some of the winds have certainly topped category 3 strength in the last 12 to 24 hours. So here is florence making landfall. The core of the strongest winds coming on shore and the landfall, the eye making landfall is the calmest partly of the storm. The lowest Pressure Point and that will certainly happen probably within the next half hour. So there we are right now. You can see the worst of the winds west of Wrightsville Beach. And we think perhaps a landfall of the eye, the center of the storm anywhere between top sail and Wrightsville Beach. But that is just a point of history right there. The worst of the winds happening right now in North Carolina. Here are some of our peak winds gusts 106, cape lookout, fort macon and beaufort. Wind surge topping 10 feet. Right on top of the river there new bern where 200 people were rescued. 150 people still apparently on top of their homes waiting to be rescue you had. So First Responders are trying to get there but its too hard right now. So unfortunately thats going to be a difficult situation. This is not a wind event. I know we are focused on the category but it still has some of that energy from when it was a major hurricane. So thats why were seeing the extraordinary amounts of storm surge, the extraordinary amounts of rain is going to come because the storm is going to slow down. Already 5 Miles Per Hour. And we think its going to be with us for the next 24, 48 hours and can you believe were going to feel this storm effects in new york city on wednesday. You can see between now and saturday morning still, we think, a formidable category 1 hurricane, at least Tropical Storm force winds for parts of North Carolina in to South Carolina and then parts of the virginias and Tennessee River valley. So this is a long lasting prolonged event of the winds and the rain and the storm surge and you can see when we go further out in time we will get an area of low pressure from this system move to the northeast. The take away here is we are not going to seat damage until next week and because of the slow movement of the storm and the water, thats why we have got these high water rescues and these people steve sure. I heard 1. 7 Million People are in the area that were told to evacuate. I was listening to a guy, a college professor. They had done a study why dont people get out when they have the chance . Two things, one, most people think of hurricane as a wind event. And youve addressed that 75 of the people who die, die during storm surge or flooding. Janice the water. Steve the other thing its human nature. We all think its going to happen to somebody else. Couldnt possibly happen to me. Ainsley my South Carolina many didnt evacuate because they were waiting to see if it hit. When it looked like it was going to hit North Carolina. Many stayed in place. Then talking to them. My sister lives in charleston, she did evacuate. We talked to them on the phone yesterday we regret staying. We should have gotten out because of all the rain we are going to experience. Janice the National Hurricane center has done incredible job. We have known about this forecast for five days. People knew and all the governors in the state officials knew to get people out in time. So that part of it was welldone. Its really a personal issue. Are you going to take care of your family because the government cant do that for you. Ainsley all the schools closed. All the kids went to school on monday. Then they decided to close schools tuesday get out. That way the highways werent packed with people on one day. Tuesday, wednesday and thursday. Steve grate hidz up from thgreat heads up fromthe governs how bad the storm was go to Wrightsville Beach in North Carolina. Yeah. Good morning. Just an hour ago, we were experiencing some of the worst winds of this storm. Right now its relatively calm. Its sprinkling but we are not getting et heavy downpour that we did before. There are still some very thick clouds overhead so i dont know how long this is going to last. I know we are very close to the eye. I dont know that we are in the eye just yet. But it is a concern because wherever the eye ends up passing over land, officials are telling people resist the temptation to go outside. Things get calm in the eye. People want to explore. They want to check on their property. They want to look for damage. But there is the potential for debris, scattered on the ground. Perhaps downed power lines and also if you end up walking too far, you might get hit by the other side of the eye and then once again, Hurricane Force winds resume. Only in the opposite direction. During this brief lull we are sort of surveying the damage just near our live location, seeing some homes and buildings. We have not noticed any structural damage yet. These look like pretty Solid Structures that were shored up before the storm. Many of them have storm windows installed and those that do not have glass that is up to hurricane code. But this is just one small section of the island. Now th that day is breaking, once things calm down we might get a better picture of whats going on. Again, there is still second half of the storm. And we dont even know that were quite in the eye just yet. So were not going to venture too far from home just yet. Thats whats going on right now on Wrightsville Beach. Back to you. Steve it is headed your way, jonathan, thank you very much. Meanwhile yesterday you saw Griff Jenkins he was at Atlantic Beach in North Carolina. It is not safe there this morning. And so he has moved one mile across the bay to Morehead City, North Carolina. Griff, for people worried about your personal safety, you are on a sea wall, a concrete sea wall. But its the water thats coming up. Thats right, steve. Were finally getting a little bit of light here at morehead. Look how angry this sea is with these winds that continue to whip us. In the distance you may be able to see a little bit of a red light blinking. Thats the water tower of Atlantic Beach. But this is the storm surge coming in. Its only rising because high tide is at noon, around noon. And the island over there, Atlantic Beach, the chief of police and the fire chief tell me that they are just getting whipped with storm surge, getting whipped with wind. Thats going to be a very, very big problem. And thats why now that we finally get some light, the Law Enforcement and the emergency folks are going to have trouble even getting out of this wind. Because its just not safe yet to operate in. And because size of florence. Were not exactly sure how long its going to be before these First Responders can get eyes on and do that assessment damage to figure out what they have got. You can see some of the roots here in Morehead City being ripped off. We have been in contact with the city officials and surrounding town. Stories in new bern and flooding because of the noose river. Jacksonville with the Hotel Collapse unfortunately, 70 people rescued. None injured. But here, along the coast in Morehead City, Officials Say they havent gotten calls, thankfully, for the rescues but they have stayed in. They are still hunkered down because it is too difficult to get out in these conditions. Now, if you look, you can see two sailboats just listing. They seem to be they are rocking back and forth. The docks floating around here we have seen. We cant begin to tell you how familiar debris we have seen flooding in these waters. This is the capital of shrimp fishing pretty much for North Carolina. A lot of commercial boats taken out. But many werent. There is going to be assessment damage. We could be looking at a real Industry Impact certainly in the shortterm for the folks here. This story is just beginning as we are waking up simply because of the fact that the inland areas are just starting to have that flooding and i just cant stress enough that if you are in these situations and you are n new bern and have water and getting on the roof. I have been talking to authorities they are working heroically as fast and as hard as they can and in conjunction with fema teams. They will come get you. Stay patient, keep your calm. Do what you can. This is certainly in some areas going to be a lot of what we saw a year ago in harvey with the massive catastrophic water event when people had to be else are could youd and it will take possibly days. You talk about the complex situation of the coastal areas like, this there are certainly a few roads, highway 70 just a block from me we are going to go out and get a look at it pretty soon. Thats the main thoroughway, it also makes supplies, gas and First Responders makes it difficult for them to get in as well. Were going to stay . Contact with all these areas. What im really worried about now is the across the bay there. The authorities tell me that they believe most of the population on Atlantic Beach did heed the warning. And get off. Because they have gotten very few rescues. But even the firehouse over there, the fire chief Adam Schneider sent me pictures. His bay windows of his firehouse completely smashed. In the roof ripped off, so they are in a situation now that is going to last for several more hours. This wind has been whipping us now for a good solid five or six hours. Power has been out since early afternoon. Thes can where we are neighboring oslo they have been without power for a long time. Thats going to start to make things difficult when you add it all up with no power. Difficult conditions to get around. But, they are going to get out and do it were going to get a report here probably in the next hourly of Atlantic Beach of what the authorities can see over there whether or not that pier is still standing. Were just not sure what the surge has brought but Hurricane Florence certainly brought a bad situation for North Carolina, guys. Steve it has, indeed. Griff, we should point out for the folks who are watching, griff is along the coast. Up one of the big rivers is new bern, North Carolina. And because of the flooding, not because of the coastal surge, the water in some spots 10 feet deep. Thats why so many people, a couple hundred people have called for a rescue. Many of them on the roof. Weave had the mayor of the town with us in the first hour of this program who said that they are working to rescue a woman who they they had told her to go to the second floor. She did. The water is coming up. She is now in the attic. Im looking at the New Bern Police Department girt right tw. As of now please be advised the curfew in new bern starts at 7 00 a. M. , a minute and a half right now until tomorrow at 7 00 a. M. Always contact 911 for any sort of assistance. And that, griff, that is the miracle of cell phones because if your house is interested inned. And your phone is under water. If have you got a cell phone, rather than a land line, can you call the cops. You can call the cops. We saw in houston where people would text to someone to call for heir location, you know, you can tweet at us. Send us an email if only you can get us an email friends foxnews. Com. We will try to coordinate this because the new bern officials are saying that they know that ultimately they are going to need more resources rather than less and you know one of the challenges down in jacksonville where the wind collapsed the motor inn down there and and they removedrescued 70 people. They had a compounded problem because then they had trouble moving them to a shelter. Find ago shelter because of the treacherous movement. Now they are getting a little bit of light and hopefully the winds will start to die down a little bit. While we were getting the dirty side and really whipping wind have you seen in the last few hours, were going to get the back side of the eye wall moves in and moving slow with a lot of water. So, really, this story is going to continue to play out throughout the morning and its only going to become more difficult for the First Responders who finally can begin to move in this sort of light. You are right about one thing. That is thank goodness for communications and if you think you may possibly be on a situation where you could have increased water, increased flooding, you are hearing it rain harder. You are hearing the rain pick up because this is picking up. Save your cell phone battery and resources. This is not almost over because it was a long night. It is going to be a long, long day. Guys . Pete its 7 00 on the east coast. 7 00 there we are starting to get those images and get a better picture. It was dark behind you earlier in the morning when we were talking to you. Have you senile have you had a chance to check out anything inland . Can you see anything i know its a water damage situation. But anything from wind and how long dual this is a huge storm, how long have you been told that that area in Morehead City will be pummeled with this kind of weather . Well, we just dont know. Moving so slow, pete, and when i talked to the authorities in Atlantic Beach, they are really itching to get out to get eyes on the assessment of what they have over here. Here in morehead the officials hoping to get out. We dont know how long its going to last. When i walk out, can i see roofs with shingles missing, signs down. Typical wind damage. Get you a shot. Little more light i will get you another shot here coming up shortly from the street side of this just a block away where highway 70 meets and heads over to beaufort which is a really low area. I have a resident or two over there trying to find out and do welfare checks on them. We will get you some of those pictures coming up soon. Ainsley amazing how a storm can change all of our lives. Everything changed with the janice and the meteorologist started reporting the storm is coming that way. You know first hand. Peoples lives have changed. Think about women having babies they have to go to a hospital and then they doo they go to another hospital. Think about people hooked tomb life support in a hospital where do they go . The elderly i was reading an article in South Carolina where they were removing all the animals from the animal shelters there and transporting them. Zoo in South Carolina. Taking the flamingos and putting them under ground. Severing affected. Im getting snaps from janice. Whats going on . Janice update from the National Hurricane center the center is about to make landfall near Wrightsville Beach where we have on own jonathan seare. They will update us. The lowest point of pressure now making landfall near Wrightsville Beach. And thats where we very steve what does that mean . The eye is the calmest part of the storm. The eye wall surrounding that is where we have the core of the strongest winds. The eye is where we have little or no winds. It is the calmest part. It is 2 miles wide. The National Hurricane center are the ones that take the lowest Pressure Point in the center of the eye and that becomes an historical point of landfall. Steve gotcha. That is apparently near you were talking about Wrightsville Beach and you mentioned Jonathan Serrie. He is there live right now. Jonathan near where you are, 100 mileperhour wineldz. We know you are in the shadow of a great big building. You can feel coming ashore, cant you . Yeah. In fact, what janice was saying explains why we are experiencing this calm. I wasnt sure whether we were in the eye because the there are still plenty of clouds over here. But, the winds have died down. Things are very calm here and just for the past 15 minutes, 20 minutes, we have been experiencing virtually no rain right now. No rain at all. The winds incredibly still but in the last hour, we were getting these huge gusts. It was very hard to stand up. We were experiencing the very worst of the storm. You looked at the radar, and you could see that you were in what appeared to be the eye wall. But now we are in the calm of the storm. We were able to do a very brief survey just of this mead area only superficial damage. If you look um here on the side of this condominium building up near the roof, there is a tiny bit of what looks like sheet metal that is sort of dangling from the building. But, other than that, other than just minor things like that, this building held up extremely well. These buildings behind me houses, apartment buildings, consd minute yums, we have yet to see any shattered windows. Tiny bit of debris, some plants, some tree branches, very small branches down on the streets. Only superficial damage. This part of the island, at least, seems to have pulled through very well. Its not over yet. We are just in the center of the storm. Officials are telling people not to be lulled into complacency by when the eye passes over because the other side of the storm, the other side of the eye wall is likely to come over once again, Hurricane Force winds, this time in the opposite direction and you dont want to get caught out in that. Also possibility of dangerous debris, maybe downed power lines. Dont want people stepping on that. Best advice, stay indoors, stay in your shelter until the rest of the storm passes over. Back to you. Steve shelter in place. Pete calm anstorm and the calmd more storm. Janice people get fooled think its over and then the back side. Steve just a little while ago the rain was coming in sideways and now its calm. Janice pretty incredible. Obviously the massive amounts of destruction are one thing and we are going to be reporting on that for probably weeks, but, a hurricane i mean, a hurricane is an incredible form of nature. Steve we will get out of your way. Janice landfall, we think, we will get official document from the National Hurricane center. We do believe the lowest Pressure Point of this hurricane will be in Wrightsville Beach. Thats just historic point. Remember, the strongest core of winds are on the outside of the eye. So, right now, the calmest point is moving over Wrightsville Beach. We still have the threat for those very strong winds on the back side of this storm, so we still have that to go through. The fact that this storm is moving so slowly, again, thats the take away, the fact that we are going to have still ongoing storm surge, relentless winds and rain and thats going to be going on throughout the day today and in throughout much of the weekend. Its not going to move quickly. Only moving at 5 Miles Per Hour. There is the current radar. You can see Wrightsville Beach right there they will probably make that the official landfall point. Here are some of the wind gusts 105 Miles Per Hour. Cape lookout and the Barrier Islands there the storm surge, that will be the big creanissue heard all the reports of people rescued in new bern. People on top of their roofs right now waiting to be rescued with 50, 60 mileperhour winds still happening. So, First Responders are saying well try to get you when we can when things start to calm down. Thats why we had all of those evacuations. The storm surge and the rainfall concerns. That is the take away. This is going to be very similar to what we had with Hurricane Harvey in Southeast Texas. And at that time it wasnt even a hurricane. A lot of these tropical systems dont have to have a status to do incredible amounts of damage including epic amounts of rain. We could see 20 to 40 inches depending on where you live and the storm surge, of course, we have seen reports of 10 feet of storm surge. And then we are going to watch this track. Even tomorrow, talking about this storm perhaps as a hurricane becoming a tropical system. But the slow movement of the storm will continue to dump so much water and that, again, is going to be a concern well inlanelsd. So, inland flooding is also going to be a big throat. Listen to your local officials and local forecasters. And then we are also going to feel the remnants of this storm here in the northeast. There are some of the wind gusts that are still happening. We received an official wind gust of 91 Miles Per Hour in wilmington. And thats going to be ongoing. The relentless push of water will continue along the coast. Steve we are looking at the map behind you and you can see new bern up the river there and to the south up the coast a bit is jacksonville in North Carolina. There is news this morning apparently about midnight last night a call came in to 911 there about damage to the triangle motor inn out on wilmington highway. And apparently they had to rest rescue 62 people includinincluding pets. Basketball size found in one of the rooms and cinder blocks threatening damage to the structure. The problem was at that point there were Hurricane Force winds and apparently some of the First Responders had to force themselves into the room to try to get people out. Janice good lesson from this is we do concentrate on the category a lot. Im guilty of that as well. You know, we had a major category 4 in the atlantic. Its a 1 now and because we dont see those 3, 4s and 5s, we get complacent. But this will cause catastrophic damage regardless. Pete what im also struck by is the slowness and size. As a result when you are showing graphic of trajectory still in the middle of the state sunday at 2 00 a. M. In the middle of the state. Because its so large we may face those rains middle of sunday 48 hours from now. Janice thats the dangers of slow movement. Steve there we are right there the one and then moves slowly across and eventually becomes a Tropical Storm and big rain mess. Janice for 24 to 48 hours still dealing with a storm impact with tons of rainfall. Ainsley jiff greenins is out there in the middle of it. The big 1 in the middle of it griff, we can see behind you. Are you in an arena. Im along a sea wall in Morehead City. We are parallel to Atlantic Beach. Look out there at that water. Look at the sea. It is stipulating whipping. Its still angry. Thats the storm surge thats hitting Atlantic Beach. And that is the Barrier Island out there that is being pounded still by wind and storm surge. The chief of police there and the firemen tell me that theyre just getting even the firehouse taking significant damage. And you can barely begin to see the island over there. But if you remember, one of those live shots we did yesterday we were on the side of the beach over there. Even before the storm was hours away they were beginning to get flooding in low lying yards, those houses undoubtedly under water. Now, if you kind of look around here, along this sea wall in Morehead City. This is where all the fishing boats are this is a big big boating community. Home of the capital of the shrimp fishing industry in North Carolina. You can see that there is somtiles missing on a boat house down there and much of the structures that secure boats here has been knocked down. Most of the boats moved and we see amazingly sailboat there just listing. It seems to be more we have been watching it to see if the wind was going to take it down. Fortunately it has not. Our winds died down just a little bit. We are back down to where we were around midnight last night where it was picking up with sort of a gale force wind. Thats of course at about 39 Miles Per Hour. But, boy, were we getting whipped earlier. And, you know, it is fortunate that much, as you look at dan is panning over there, some of the infrastructure. You can see the shrimp boats were elevated. Fortunately none of that infrastructure broke loose in the surge of wind that we had last night. For that to come on here would have been very damaging but pretty soon we will get you around the corner and take a look here at the buildings that have been damaged pretty significantly by the wind here. It is just two parts of that unbelievable four part catastrophic punch, can a charlie is just taking between the flooding just 40 miles northwest of here in new bern with a noose river is crested at 10 feet. Which is really historical in 1999 irene hit much higher already. We are on the front end of that storm. Those rivers all come down into these waterways. Into these bays, creating a very difficult situation, guys. Pete griff, have you talked about Emergency Services and rescue. For a while you ride it out. As the daylight comes, how soon before police and fire and e. M. S. And others can address ongoing issues . Well, they are going to try to get out very soon. In fact, the chief of Police Jeff Harvey over Atlantic Beach says he is inching to get out to get eyes on it. He doesnt want to put himself or his officers in harms way. But one thing is for sure. Just because the light is coming up, in any of these communities, you should not, by any means, get out in this just because you have a little light, because the wind, the surge, the flooding is significant. This is the part where the media and everyone on the airwaves need to remind if you see standing water turn around, dont drownel. The flooding is going to be very, very significant. I can tell you one thing for sure where we are in Morehead City and Atlantic Beach behind me authorities are very determined to get out and get an early assessment of the problems theyve got. They have got to start positioning Law Enforcement on downed power lines and other hazards. Pete message to folks dont do this at home. Steve griff, i know some of the hurricanes last year that impacted portions of florida and the gulf coast, the Police Department said, look, we will come out as soon as the winds are below and i remember one town in florida below 40 Miles Per Hour. Right now you are above that so they are not going to go until the winds go down to make sure nobody gets blown off the road. Exactly right. Yes. We are not there by any means and that gale force determination right about 39, 40 Miles Per Hour is what we need to get under. Its the same determination that closes the port. Should the coast guard and some of the water assets that need to come in to coastal areas, they will not begin to move until we get rid of wind. From the size of this and janice is reporting all night about how much water and surge that this storm kept, despite the decreased wind impact, its going to be a long time before that happens. But, right now, this wind is not dying down anywhere near to the level that Law Enforcement needs to try and get out and really survey, lest it should be just a critical emergency. Ainsley griff, do you feel like the wind has died down a little bit. Halls it gotten better or worse since you have been on air this morning . Its definitely died down a bit. When we were in early hours here, a couple of hours ago i was talking to you guys, i was really clinging to sea wall chain. You know, we took care because its a very strong structure and i felt secure and safe. We wanted to show you the surge coming. In there were times when it was really lifting me off my feet. Those are probably the gusts upwards 80, 90, maybe upwards of 100 Miles Per Hour. We know on fort macon on Atlantic Beach reported at 92 Miles Per Hour. They have died down. However, im also not sure whether or not this is a little bit of a being parallel with the eye coming on shore and whether or not i will get stronger winds that could possibly cause a wind change direction. The winds you were watching me get pounded on early were from the northeast quadrant. As the wall comes on, probably get another set of winds that is the back side of these winds. And so we are far from over with the wind event here. And actually, as you mentioned, its starting to pick up as well. I want to add one thing, ainsley, you were talking earlier about, you know, people dealing with the situation with babies and whatnot. There is a gentleman with a wife that is due september 19th in the complex we are staying at. I talked to him before. I said are you worried he . Said no im not worried. Yes, im worried. He didnt want to seem like it because storms cause babies to come a little bit early sometimes. Steve yep. Griff we are trying to reach out to him to find out whats going on. His situation was complex he knew if he stayed here he would be subject to the conditions and it would be a threat. He was worried if he went inland and wasnt close enough to the hospital where he wants his son to be born that he wouldnt be able to get there we are trying to find out whats going on with that story. Steve there is some suggestion it could be related to the low pressure. Now, griff, you are staying in a condo in that area. Thats where your base of operation is where have you got all your supplies and things like that. But about a mile away over in Atlantic Beach where you were yesterday. Griff sorry, i lost if feed there we will get that coms back there i lost feed and we will get back to you. Steve thank you very much. What that means is he cant hear us so i will go ahead and stop talking. [laughter] im interesting to know what about the people because you know, ainsley, there are so many hotels down there. Did they close the hotels hunker down couldnt guarantee they would have electricity or water or services. Pete ainsley you raised that question earlier about what about the special circumstances, he will derlly, special needs, somebody about to give birth. Hospital where you dont know the doctor, stay and wait it out . At what point do you start watching youtube videos of home birth, it becomes very human and very real. Amongst the chaos life gets very simple as well. Where do i get my food . Where do i get my power, where do i get my water . Ainsley for me i would want an epidural. I would get the heck out of dodge. The good thing about this storm is we knew about it days in advance. If you did have a situation like that, there was enough time to get the animals out of the shelters along the coast, to get the people, the elderly out. So we did have a little bit of time. Pete these images of transformers exploding a reminder that power has gone down. Steve, i believe 400,000 folks in the carolinas are now without power. Steve those are images from wilmington, North Carolina. I understand that apparently according to wral, down in that region, the raleigh television station the president of the United States called the mayor of wilmington last night. The mayor was surprised to get the call but very thankful. The president wanted to make sure that he understood that the federal government was standing ready, thinking they needed. Ready, anything they needed. The federal government would get to the impacted area as quickly as possible. Speaking of wilmington. Thats where bill hemmer is doing his program from today. Bill hemmer is joining us right now at 7 20 in the morning. Bill, whats it like down there . Hey, guys. We are on the leading edge of the storm, as you can clearly see on that radar. This is the fiercest part of florence now hitting this part of wilmington, North Carolina. Perhaps in an hour, steve, maybe two hours from now were going to be over the eye and things are going to calm down a little bit. We lost power about 6 00 this morning. That was about one hour and 20 minutes ago. Prior to that consistent winds from the north blowing and blowing all night long. Shifting a little bit to the northeast as we expect as this storm comes on land here. We have been staying in a hotel here. Its about nine stories tall. Its made of concrete. Its been enormous bunker with us literally speaking with low ceilings and good protection. We felt pretty good throughout the day. A lot of International Media out here. Steve, try to step out here and give a sense for what were feeling and we are getting here in wilmington. The crazy thing about this storm is that for a week now we have been watching wilmington be in the crosshairs is, that as far as it goes, guys . Yes. Bill we have watched wilmington be in the crosshairs of the storm you dont know what a storm does when it starts irnghts acting with land. We are starting to seat reality of that now. A lot of rain is expected. But, three days ago, this storm was cranking at 140 Miles Per Hour out there in the ocean. When it dropped to about 100 Miles Per Hour last night, and ticked a little lower today at about 90, that was a shade of good news for the people here in North Carolina. But, they are not out of the woods for a while here. This thing is going to blow. The eye is going to come on shore. We are going to get quiet for a little bit here in wilmington. And about two hours after that we are going to see the back side of the storm. If there is one note of optimism in all of this, i think the winds dropping low over the last 40 hours good news. Rainfall and wind bad. Flooding rivers in North Carolina and South Carolina is not good at all. No bueno here for the carolinas. However, the back side of the storm as you talk to the Hurricane Hunters of the past 24 hours or so, they saw a weakening on that wall. So, maybe this is the worst of it. We will sees a we go throughout the day here. Its early in wilmington, steve, ainsley, pete. Steve it is. As you were arriving to that location, a couple of days ago, as compared to now, you started to see people evacuate. How many people would you say are still around there as opposed to, you know, somebody listen a lot. Steve okay, good. I think two things the way to answer that steve. They told us that more people than ever heeded the warnings and left town over the past three days. However, we are on the boardwalk yesterday for about 12 hours, we saw dozens and dozens of people walking their dog and riding their bikes and going for a morning run. People will tell you we have heard the storm warnings forever and its not add bad as we think. Other people say if you leave have you no idea when you can come back. Guarding personal possessions something very personal to so many people as we know we have seen throughout these storms. A lot of people stayed behind. I dont have a good firm number on that, steve. Perhaps more than the local officials would like. Pete bill, basic safety, what are you hearing from officials about sometimes these situations can bring out the best in people. Also bring out the worst. Do local officials feel like the situation sunday control and they are able to react in any way to contingencies, accidents, things that happen to people that did stay . I have been very impressed by the direction we have been given by the mayor, by the police chief, by the fire chief. I have been very imprelszed by the officials here in wilmington. By the people who manage and run this hotel there have been a lot of close calls over the past 20 years and a lot of storms that came and dodged and missed and went on. Some were very concerned about a sense of complacency. I do not get that sense at all from speaking to the people who live and work here. However, pete, i really want to caution our viewers here. We are in the early stages of what could be a several day event. Especially to the north and northwest of our location in wilmington as that water goes up the river and we approach high tide and the storm continues to swirl. We saw a high tide last night around 11 00. You get another high tide this morning. We could be in several cycles, maybe four, possibly five high tides. That storm surge is going to push that water north and youre going to see towns that are inundated with flooding for several days to come. Pete bill, what you would it family size the flooding in multiple cycles is probably whats concerning people more than the wind gusts that are going to come and go . Bill no question. I think about that. 90 Miles Per Hour is nothing to shake a stick at. Thats powerful storm. I dont know if you get the sense of it here because we are back behind a concrete area. But as rob shows you the trees blowing in the background there, pete, on the other side of that that i know you cant make out because there is no visibility. The thats the cape fear river. It has been going in and out for the past day and a half that we have been here. And they were concerned about the water coming up, maybe 4, 5, 6 feet or higher. We havent seen that just yet. Again as the high tide comes in and reseeds yet again we will see whether or not thats the reality. From the north again 12, 14, 16 hours should see a shift to the northeast. Thats to be expected in these hurricanes they swirl and work their way on shore. But have you got more than 100 Evacuation Centers up here in North Carolina. We know thousands of people have taken advantage of that and i think city officials did their best and state officials did their very best especially the governor who has been on tv every three hours for days now dont mess with this one because florence is for real. We will see how real the next 24 to 48 hours. Ainsley thank you so much. A lot of people without power. You bet. That you can to you soon. Ainsley that could go on for several weeks before they can restore the power. Pete you never know. Steve step aside more from the zone down in the carolinas regarding Hurricane Florence. Its coming ashore. You will see the best coverage in america right here on fox news channel. burke fenderbiter. Seen it, covered it. We know a thing or two because weve seen a thing or two. We are farmers. Bumpadum, bumbumbumbum ainsley right now we will go to our fox affiliate. He joins us from jacksonville, North Carolina where an entire hotel was forced to evacuate. Gary . Thats right. The hotel is a half mile to e. East of us. Jacksonville, North Carolina. A mile away from the new river here. We are protected by our hotel. The hotel down there triangle motor inn they had breach to the roof maybe about the size of basketball. Authorities came, in they said nobody can stay here. Its uninhabitable. They moved them out. About 70 women and children. Once a roof gets compromised even if its the hole the size of a basketball it doesnt take longer before the hole is bigger and bigger and then the whole structure is compromised. Im protected. The hotel is off to the east of me. The winds have switched to the east. So they are right down this road ahead of us. If i just step out here, its almost like going into out into the gauntlet. Im not going to do that because i have seen debris flashing by the last several manipulates. Right when i came in the hotel sign best west inn exploded. Dave, my camera guy if you with zoom in. We are beginning to see the roof top past my shoulder there beginning to be pealed away. There is also a gas station right there, too. You can see the tops that protect the pumps. They have been getting shakier and shakier as these winds continue. Just so you know, these are sustained winds 40 to 50 Miles Per Hour for the last several hours. Believe it or not, we still have power here at the hotel and surrounding areas in jacksonville. Not the case for a lot of folks in southern North Carolina. But, listen, as this hurricane continues to pound, its a wind issue today. The story becomes flood issue tomorrow and for the next several days as this slow moving Hurricane Florence continues to work down the carolina coast line. Im from jacksonville, North Carolina gary mcgrady, i will send it back in. Pete a lot of things happening in live shot. Sheet metal. Saw white sedan didnt look like emergency vehicle. Are cars still driving around. People out . Thats a great question, pete. Occasionally you see what is probably just a public personal vehicle coming down. But most of what we have seen have been the First Responders and the police going back and forth. Most of this place has been moved inland and those that could get a hotel room because a lot of hotels just closed and a lot of the hotels actually closed and sent their people away. Everybody in North Carolina, they respect these hurricanes. They have had several big ones. They move inland. Those that cant move inland find places here. Mr. Patel has been great for everybody. He is treating us all like family. When you put yourself in this kind of situation. Its important for Business Owners to help us out as much as they can just to get a hot cup of coffee in a situation like this means all of the difference. Back to you guys in new york. Ainsley gary, stay on this side of the hotel when did you go around the edge you could be hit by that debris coming off the roof. While you were doing your live shot, i dont know if you saw it your photographer zoomed in there was a piece of the roof that flew right behind you during your live shot. Thats exactly why im not going over there. I told my wife and my family no matter what, im coming home safely. Pete good man. Georgia mcgrady wttg thank you for your reporting this morning in jacksonville. Steve just down the coast a bit is griff. He is live in Morehead City, North Carolina. Griff, okay, we are looking at your hair. It looks like things are calming down a little bit. Well, not necessarily, steve, its still gusting. Im being protected at the moment from the building. Im taking you to the parking lot. I want you to see some of the damage. Just less than a block from that sea wall of where we were. But, look at the wind whipping here. We are getting an early look at some of the damage that we are seeing over here. If you look at this building over here, that roof absolutely just getting pummeled still by these conditions. Be real careful here. These are the hazards that we wanted to show you. This is a power line. This is a live by all accounts we should consider this a live power line thats very dangerous. Can you see its connected up top to the transformer. That is a sort of thing in a road. This is why you dont drive at night. This is why the police need to get out before anybody gets an eye on it we are going to swing wide of that you can see the debereavement it looks like a couch has ended up in that parking lot over there. You can see some sort of a lamp post also down over there guys, dont get too close to that wire, come this way a little bit. Come this way, daniel, can you see a little look at the gas station over there, you know, you were asking me about fuel. This gas station isnt going to be servicing any time soon at all. You can see the roof has taken unbelievable damage up to the top there. And really its as, you know, the wind is still whipping. Look at the water. If you look at our parking lot, you can see just the waves of it. I dont want to turn my cameraman too much into that all you will see then is water. But the surge of winds and the water is still very great. As we take our first look, we are taking you up here. This is highway 70. Thithis is the main highway from raleigh how we got down here goes by new bern and the rivers that we talked about all morning, many of them getting close to nearby 70. You can see now as you look up the road a few cars coming. We will wait to see who comes by. Im not sure whether theyre Emergency Personnel or not. One thing is for sure, you certainly dont want to be out in these conditions right now unless you absolutely have to be, guys. Steve we can see in the distance a couple of cars are out and about. Lets drive down the carolina coast. Jeff flock is live right there right now. Jeff, its getting bad again. Yeah. We are in now steve, we are in the eye wall. I just looked at the radar. Wrightsville beach got the eye. We are now in the eye wall and, of course, thats the worst conditions, we are starting to get debris here which is why im hanging back behind the thing. Thats a piece of roof there came off the building where we are staying here as you see and hear. Thats a chunk of stuff. It looks like we may get the we may get the eye here which i havent been in the eye in several years in a hurricane. And, you know, that would be a real interesting to see it because you might even see blue sky. Its a ragged eye at the moment. So, you know, its not as clear as you might see in a storm thats totally wellformed. We still might get it its been bumping down the coast. We are next in line for it. And as you know, the closer you get to that eye, you are in that eye wall and thats where the conditions are tough and boy, we have been hit with unrelenting rain and you can see the wind as well. So, and the gusts, the gusts when they come are pretty solid. So, well let you know if we get that eye, i will let you know and, you know, we might be able to come out because the rain will stop. And we might be able to see the sky. That would be a treat. The only treat in a hurricane like this. Steve jeff, youre there in Carolina Beach, i know we have been talking about how many hundreds of people have called First Responders to rescue them in new bern, North Carolina because the innun accommodation, 10 feet une accommodation. 10 feet of water in some spots. Carolina beach, how many people were told to evacuate when push came to shove they wound up calling the police saying hey, i need help . I dont have any idea how many people changed their mind. The people we talked to they have been through a lot of hurricanes they are prepared. The thing is we dont have that same issue here with that inland flooding issue because, as i said, that counter flow has kept the water off in terms of the surge, that would have been the real thing that would have killed us would be the surge. And the storm has not gone past us yet. Until it goes past us, we will not get that on shore flow and so you will not get storm surge. I cant bring this camera in this weather over to the surf side. Ben is pointing in that direction. On the other side of that berm and boardwalk that you see up there, that is where the ocean is. And right now that wind as you see is pushing those waves back, knocking the waves down, keeping the surge at bay. When it comes past and we get the other flow, thats when we may get some surge. I dont think the storm will be powerful enough to really inundate us here. So that is one of the positives. Going out there to try to see what the wind speed is there he is. Let me see if i can get a wind speed here. What is it . Can you see . I cant see, im old. Whats it say. Gone down, 40 some. I pulled it away. 40 sustained there. I suspect we are maybe in 70, 08 mileperhour winds. But, you know, you think oh, jeesh, is it 100 miles or whatever . No, these winds are not that strong comparatively to what this could have been. Still a good blow though. Ainsley did you talk to people who decided to stay and if so what was their reason for staying . Ainsley peoples lives are complicated. One person i talked to said my mother will not go anywhere. She is 80some years old. She will not leave. She has lived here her whole life. Somebody else said i have four dogs, two cats. There is no place i can go that will take them. Other people have said listen, i have a solid house. I talked to a guy he said i have a steel concrete built house. I have a second floor. Im not going anywhere. There are multiplicity of reasons why People Choose choose not to go. A lot of these homes are vacation homes. Not a problem those people a see you. If you have lived here and particularly if you have lived here a long time, there is some ben, can you see that hughe house across the street . Thanks for moving. I dont want to put him in jeopardy. That house right there, there are people in that house, we thought we would talk to them but not a good idea they moment. You can go back. Go ahead and back, ben. You know dont get crazy. But, yeah, there is a multiplicity of reasons why People Choose to stay. There are a lot of people. And i think, i hate to say this, i think some people will be happy they did if this doesnt get any worse because, you know, when you leave, its a while to get back. Its disruptive if you can stay, i dont want to say that almost, i dont want to say that. Ainsley jeff flock live for us in North Carolina. We have a fox news alert. We are just being told that florence has officially made landfall. Lets bring in the North Carolina governor roy cooper to talk to about the situation. Thank you so much, governor, for being with us. Hi, guys, make sure your reporters are safe out there. A lot of wind blowing and a lot of rain and floodwaters. Steve they are safe places up in the shadow of big strong buildings. Governor, can you tell us the very latest on it seems as if the most dire situation has been in new bern in North Carolina where the water came up 10 feet in some spots. We had the mayor on a couple of hours ago. And he said that they have been telling people to move up to the second floor and for the most part that was successful before people were being rescue i had. But they were still waiting. One woman, they werent able to get to at that point, she was in the attic and she was waiting for First Responders. How are the rescues going in new bern, North Carolina . We want to thank our brave First Responders who are out there working now in terrible conditions. Over 100 people in new bern have been rescued. But there are still more to go. We are glad to see the sunlight here. You know, we are executing our plan but now its time to move from preparation to determination. A lot of people did evacuate. And we are grateful for that we got almost 20,000 people in 157 shelters. We have a lot of medical shelters that are set up. But this is going to be a long slog for North Carolina. Florence is uninvited guest who does not want to leave we really know with the rain thats coming, historic, sometimes measured in feet instead of inches, even when the sun comes out, these rivers are going to continue to rise and were going to have significant flooding. So we have to be ready for that. Pete governor, when it comes to rescue efforts which is another part of this phase still hunkering down. Who is taking the lead . Is that local officials . Police departments . Fire departments . We heard the cajun navy is there . We have the National Guard and military. How are you coordinating that and whats the status . Our state Emergency Response center is coordinating it. We have search and rescue teams from 19 different states who have come to North Carolina and are on the ready and, of course, we have our local teams that are out there along with state teams. And, yes, we have volunteers who come in with boats like the cajun navy. They are here. We know that we are going to be needing them in the coming days because this water is going to continue to rise. Massive storm surge coming in at high tide with more rain falling into the rivers. There is nowhere else for that water to go. So we have done, i think, a good job of pushing the evacuation message for the last week. And i will tell you last night i was thinking about all of the people who are staying with friends and families or in hotels or in one of our evacuation shelters, wondering whether they are even going to have a home to go back to. So, after this initial storm is over, were going to have a long process of recovery and rebuilding. And were all going to have to Work Together to make sure we get that done. Steve you have a busy day. Governor cooper, thank you very much for joining us live from down there in raleigh. Thanks. Steve janice is going to give us the latest on the location. One other thing to add to it. I was reading in some of the papers down there that apparently one of the worries is once the sun comes out. Snakes. Apparently the worry is that this great big wash of water is going to take some snakes that had been in the low country and in the grass lands and put it in peoples neighborhoods. Pete they have to go somewhere. Main worry is cotton mouths. A lot of cotton mouths out there. Pete i didnt know about the cotton mouths until i went to infantry training in georgia. Ainsley thats a type of snake cotton mouth . Pete cotton mouth. Steve janice, finally florence has made landfall. Janice 7 50 a. M. Wrightsville beach is the official landfall. Remember that is the quitest part of the storm. Its the lowest pressure according to the National Hurricane center. So its just a historic point. Now we have it making landfall. North carolina, Wrightsville Beach as of 7 15 eastern time. And there it is on the radar. Official landing fall at 90 Miles Per Hour sustained winds. The core of the strongest winds. And we have gotten reports of over 100 mileperhour winds overnight last night. And, again, the legacy of this storm is not going to be the winds. Its going to be the rain. So there is florence making landfall. Officially now as of the National Hurricane Center Bulletin that we have just issued just moments ago. All right. Lets take a look at it there is the current radar. The core of the strongest storms, of course, in just west of that and then the back side of the storm is going to come on shore. So i know we have bill hemmer in wilmington, he is feeling the worst of the rain and the winds. And the storm surge is going to be continuing ongoing because the storm is slowing down. So there is some of the wind gusts certainly over 100 Miles Per Hour. And then, of course, we have gotten reports of over 10foot storm surge in and around the new bern area. We are going to continue to feel the effects ongoing effects from this system, not only today but tomorrow and into the weekend. And thats why this is going to be a very memorable storm system because of the water. Steve were in phase 2 now of the storm. Yes. We heard her say bill hemmer is live in wilmington, North Carolina, thats where he has chosen to ride the storm out. And, bill, give us an update. Bill hey, guys, we just moved a couple feet here. We are using this bring wall to my left. Rob is showing that to give a little bit of protection. If you were looking at us on a compass due north is that way. What janice is describing is 8 miles due east. But just past her you see these trees. This has been the image we have now for the better part of four hours. My guess is based on what janice is describing we will have this for another hour. See the parking lot. Another reporter out here in the middle. This parking lot you can walk there maybe an hour ago. Now it has 12 inches of water and climbing. Behind me is the cape fear river. 3450eu9 remember the movie from 1991, shades of that movie today, a movie about revenge in florence right now is taking a little bit of revenge out on this part of the carolinas. 90 mileperhour sustained winds from the north. We expect that to move to the northeast, and watch that storm swirl around. I tell you, steve, i thought the worst bit of news for this forecast came last night when it went from 12 Miles Per Hour forward speed to about 10 Miles Per Hour. And then it dropped to 5 Miles Per Hour. And that was really pretty much in the forecast. A lot of folks thought it was going to take a jog to the southwest it still may do that but when you have a storm of this size moving only 5 Miles Per Hour. It gives you an idea how much rain is going to come here. Rob, you can show them this, too. This is coming off the second floor of the hotel where we are standing. You see that Drainage Pipe . Thats popping down in the parkinparking lot. You think about image like that that stretches over a period of 200 miles on the coast. And then inland. So, you know, water finds a way to go, eventually. And thats what a lot of people are going to be feeling very soon. Ainsley you mentioned how slow the storm is traveling. Five Miles Per Hour. Its going to go through the center of South Carolina and hit that on sunday morning at 2 00 a. M. Janice said its going to whip up to new york actually but wont hit our area up here until next wednesday. We all got together and we are thinking this is something thats going to be with us for a number of days. I think for our viewers perspective, what you cannot see or understand right now is the inland flooding from these storms. The reason for that is hard to access. You cant move around when conditions are like this. We are in touch with the mayors office. We hope to speak with him at 9 00 in americas newsroom. We still hope that happens. But, there is nobody moving across the streets of wilmington town here in the historic district. Town of 105,000 people. Well boarded up. Not to suggest everybody has left. They have not. Many people have stayed behind. Ainsley there are few behind you, bill. Pete even over your shoulder on that bridge right over your shoulder is a couple folks walking around. Are they other reporters . You know, it could be media. I will tell you what, there is a lot of folks staying here. How far can i go, rob . Okay. Let me just take a glance at at that guys. So as soon as you step out in front of that bring wall, do you see quhaps there . Then you start to feel the force of these winds and the palm trees that flow. And the rain that just smacks you in the face so hard. Ainsley janice is just telling us 105 mileperhour winds where you are. Bill i will tell you, this guys, a lot of people in this hotel from all over the world, the International Media has asensded on wilmington, i think those folks too are from a Spanish Network they were talking to last night. My point earlier we all got together last night among our team and just preparing for 12hour shifts on and off, on and off until she blows through. We await here now in wilmington with the eye soon upon us. Steve thats right. The winds are upon you as ainsley just said, 105 according to janice. Right there out at the airport in wilmington. Youre going to hunker down in that location throughout the day, right . Yeah, there is no reason to leave, steve. You cant drive across these streets in these conditions. We will see what we get. I expect the eye wall to be here. And calm down as i mentioned a short time ago. Then we will feel the back side of the storm. How is it going out there . Good . So far. We will see the back side of this storm, perhaps its not as intense as we are getting it right now. Thats pretty much what we expect through the next. Ainsley the people behind you are they walking in water . It looks like a past their calf. Bill all reporters. All media. Pete dont need to interview the interviewers. Steve mark, the director, can you take weather 8 . I think weather 8 shows exactly what is going on there. Look at that 105 Miles Per Hour winds in wilmington. Bill hemmer is right there in the bulls eye with this particular storm right now. Bill, you are in the middle of it. Bill that was an amazing thing. Im going to move up here a little bit so we can try to catch these the wind right here. You are a weather man, do you this janice dean is watching this as well. When you think about a storm, even five days in advance, when you look at that track and wilmington was always on the map, always, it was always there. And you think about erma from a year ago, we have sent so many team down to florida trying to figure out that storm. What erma did was move to the south. Right after she got to she took smacked the keys and you saw the devastation there and went up north into naples and then the storm scattered. Again, thats the lesson about these hurricanes. You dont know whether a they do once they interact with land. Starting to get an idea whether a sort of shape florence is taking here. 90 Miles Per Hour. Its listed as a lot better than 140 from three days ago. Still a very strong storm from many. Right now taking on the eye wall. May be in the eye of the storm where it calms down in a matter hours. Then take the other side of the eye wall. As we show the graphics and janice has been showing it all morning. As it moves through the state slowly because of the size of this hurricane comes saturday and sunday on this morning show on your show and others. We are still going to be talking about rains and intense winds because this thing scopes a couple of states. You are doing fridays show today. Could it be the type of scenario by monday the coverage is focused on this because of the slow speed and because of the shear size of it . No doubt. You nailed it, pete. Thats exactly whether a you can expect over the coming days. Rivers will be inundated. The high tide, river eventually come back out. Rick reichmuth will tell you thats all based on gravity time and time again. Thats a party of the story we cannot show just yet. Cant get people there just yet. Once that develops we will be there. You have been talking to Griff Jenkins out on Atlantic Beach, which is a little maybe about 50 miles from our location here. The surge on the shore smacking against piers is impressive site. A lot of these piers are made of made of wood get tore down. Built back up again. Its part of the lively hood up and down the shore. This is the reality of people who choose to live here, who choose to make their livelihood here. 10 of the entire state of North Carolina gets its money, its income from tourism. And you think about erma and what that did to areas of the keys where people didnt come back for a very long time. There will be a significant Financial Impact here in north and in South Carolina. Ainsley bill, what surprises you the most this morning now that the sun is up. You were there yesterday i watched your coverage. Good job. Today whats your feeling not as bad as you thought or more flooding than anticipated . What are you thinking today . When it got dark last night and looking out the windows and taking a look around we thought wow, did we dodge it or are we still waiting for it . And in the middle of the night, that the storm revealed itself. The lights went out at 4 00 a. M. All the power is out now. As of 6 00 a. M. The intensity of this storm. The way it has tracked and what we are getting right now. Steve bill, ive got a question for you. We understanding that food banks are and we heard from the governor a little while ago a nudge of the people are in shelter. Food shelters are looking for donations. You guys good . Steve were good. They are just walking through. Steve more than 1300 flights are cancelled throughout the country because flights to your region and out and across, and more than 22,000 patients have been evacuated from hospitals in South Carolina do you know where any of the people who are in hospitals in your area in wilmington, North Carolina, were they evacuated out . Are they inland . Yeah, i can tell you, this steve, i mentioned earlier, more than 100 shelters have been set up and a lot of these shelters had a plan in place. If they lost power. If they did not have generator power to be prepared to evacuate from the shelters themselves, i cant say for a fact that that has happened. There was a plan in place for that about a half an hour ago when we were speaking about the preparations down here, again, i mention, im well impressed. I would walk through here but there is about 18 inches of water and wouldnt want to take the risk of losing technical communications. The airport closed on tuesday afternoon in wilmington. Flights were still coming in to raleigh. I dont know how they will get the air traffic working yet again. Maybe they come behind the storm once it passes on saturday afternoon into sunday. Everyone was given a sheet of paper. I have covered a lot of storms. 15, maybe 20 over the past 20 years or. So everyone was given a sheet of paper and i was wellimpressed with the plans they had laid out. A safe room in the middle of the hotel. Again, i mention its a nine story concrete structure with very low ceilings. We feel very safe here. They had a plan for everything. When they would turn the generator on, how long it would last. What you should do when you lose power. What you do when you lose water. What their plan is for food. I was impressed with the Hotel Ballast here in wilmington, North Carolina. Thats just and indicator how they were ready for florence building up to it. Pete the outside earn environmenoutside environment i. How is it going to shift and change. Within your moments your life simplifies a great deal where am i going to get food and water whats my Evacuation Route and how do i get power . Your sense the authorities who are there are very focused on the basics at this point . Yeah. No doubt about it, pete. What happens when these storms passes and its the same story time and time again. There is no power. The sun comes out. It gets hot. It gets humid. And you have no ice. And that last component to our daily lives is so significant. When you dont have ice, you are so helpless in so many ways. But, listen, airconditioning is in our lives for a reason. Airconditioning 40 years ago enabled so many people to live on these Barrier Islands and look at google maps and see the homes that have been built over the past 20, 30 years. Its a vacation paradise for so many millions of people. Right now there is high anxiety for so many as to what happens with their property and their homes. And right now we do not have a clear answer on that. Ainsley thanks the good lord we have the technology where we can predict these storms coming days in advance now. I cant imagine what it was like before we had these satellite images and we knew for our five days in advance that this was coming. You mentioned the shelters. 126 shelters in North Carolina. 12,000 people took advantage of it. And then i read that 750,000 to a Million People heeded the evacuation orders. You talked about the you talked about the airports, raleighdurham International Airport canceled 400 flights today because of the weather and that could go up. Charlotte airport remains open. 200 flights today. Reporter i was just saying that is what the airlines do. It is Smart Business for them. They dont want to get stuck. It is the way they manage these storms. Peter it is 8 00 in wilmington, North Carolina. This is one of those days people live along the coast with this storm surge, talking to wives and husbands going we have insurance for the house but do we have insurance for flooding. A lot of people think it is all included but that is one of those separate things you have to buy from fema and if you didnt do it a month ago you dont have it this morning. Reporter it can be a struggle when they fight that fight, that is not something to solve in a week. That goes on for months thomas him for a year or longer. The first hurricane i ever covered was in 1999, hurricane floyd and it was a storm that was barreling into Daytona Beach wealth out of here, several hundred miles, it was a category 5 and right before it came on short took the northern turn, dropped in intensity down to a 4 and eventually 3 before slamming into the carolinas and what did you do after that . Installed over North Carolina. You can google the images, look for the story, you might tell people who lived here they remember it all too well, hurricane floyd stalled over North Carolina and the rivers rose by the hour, hour after hour, i am not suggesting we will see a similar image but we hope that it does not happen the same way. The we saw 19 years ago. A woman here yesterday, 35 years, i have seen a lot of storms come through and not willing to give it up. She was talking about her house. Peter as we make technological advances in how we build things and the technology we have, our capabilities we build in place that didnt have a geographic advantage or seemed vulnerable. As you cover the storms over years, is the impact greater because we are living in places that are more precarious because of this technological advances so you have the upside . I can see the argument for that. People who love the ocean, it is a hard sell to get them to leave. You understand why. Dont know if you had a chance, you are from South Carolina. The carolina sure is one of the most beautiful places in america. Hardpacked sand run 300 yards to the beach and becomes an instance playground every day. Ainsley people in the carolinas are so nice, and you get a little bit of peace in our crazy lives when you go there. People flock there especially in retirement because it is easier and a fun life, wonderful. I have one friend who said he worked his whole life for his house, to build a wonderful home for his family. He wasnt going to leave his house and was planning if they lose electricity, to sleep with his gun next to him. He got his family out but he wanted to stay and make sure his house was safe. Reporter one thing that you do is try to build the strongest house possible, fortify the windows with impact glass which is good to 150 mph, you have a good roof so you try to build the houses safely as you can. You will try to talk to the mayor of wilmington and i was reading on foxnews. Com the president of the United States called last night, anything you need we are standing by to help you. Heard about that. Talked to senator richard burr from North Carolina, he said in all his years, he knows a lot about these, never saw fema more prepared. We will see whether that statement is true once the storm passes. You mentioned the carolina sure. The hammer family has been coming here since the 1970s. My parents have a house, 45 miles to the south, on sunset beach, and our annual pilgrimage at the beach, going there they know it and enjoy it but i have seen what happens with these storms when shingles get ripped off. When you lose shingles and get 20 inches, 30 inches of rain you are helpless and the water gets everywhere and it takes a long time to rebuild and get it back to a level that is satisfactory. You can run up the shoreline and you come to rice bill beach eight miles east of here and wilmington and holden beach and open aisle, sunset beach and little river, South Carolina, myrtle, georgetown, South Carolina, that is a stretch of 200 miles as the bird flies and everyone is feeling the impact of that but in wilmington and parts north if you look at the radar, the upper righthand corner, fema talked about that the other day, the right hand, the righthanded shot that comes in when the storm makes impact with land and the storm surge comes with it if it is four feet, six feet, god for but it is any higher than ten feet, use the homes get wiped out because the surf just pounds it and does not let go and the pierced starts to give way and they dont have the strength to hold a be there. Some of those images may come clear throughout the day today. The most vivid image is due in wilmington, North Carolina as the center of the storm with 105 mileperhour winds would break over you, right in the bullseye. Stay safe and we will hear from you shortly. In half an hour a 3hour show coming up at 9 am. We will see if we are in the eye wall and we will talk to people to figure out how they come through. What did your parents do about their beach house . They said some prayers, no one to board it, my parents are 79 and it has become their refuge, their happy place. There is some concern but two nights ago they had a really good attitude. Theres only so much you can do when Mother Nature is in charge and she is running the show. Peter as we move on a fox news alert, Hurricane Florence officially making landfall. The powerful storm pounding the carolinas. Wind gusts completely demolishing the hotel sign in jacksonville, North Carolina, transformers are exploding, one of them bursting into flames, there it goes. Peter jonathan is standing by embrace bill beach, North Carolina and im sure you saw the transformers popping last night and the sun is up and it is a hurricane. Reporter we are experiencing all the streams of the storm, overnight at 1 30 the power went out. We came outside and saw boom, boom, boom, green flashes as lights went out across this ill and in prejohn and don hours we were experiencing the ion, the most extreme windss of this storm and in the last hour the winds quickly died down, the rain stopped. I looked up at the sky, there were still clouds so i wasnt sure i was in the eye. I wanted to wait for janice dean to confirm where the i was and it was passing directly over us explaining the calm. We used the time to briefly survey whatever damage we could find. Only superficial damage. Them middle siding on some of the buildings ripped off, small tree branches, some garbage cans blowing in the streets. But nothing major to speak of. But remember this is just a snapshot of one block of an island that is four miles long. It is too dangerous to go out and export the entire island because in the eye, eventually the center of calm will pass over you and you will be hit by the eye wall on the other side of the storm and experience Hurricane Force winds all over again which as you can see behind me is going on right now. We went from extreme winds, extreme rain to sudden calm and once again we are back to extreme wind once again but we hope this section of the island pools through on the back half of the storm as well as it did on the front half. Back to you. Geraldo joined us shortly after 9 11, you have been covering hurricanes as well. I famously remember one fox and friends that you were in galveston and you were alive soundbiteing and something the wind is dramatic but it is the water that does the damage. That is the fear on the carolina coast. One year i covered four hurricanes hitting wilmington. It is under Cape Hatteras which sticks into the gulfstream. The storm get sucked in under Cape Hatteras and they go in land from there and makes life miserable. People will be hunkered down, the place is relatively easy to get help to even julie unlike puerto rico, 1500 miles off the coast but this is going to be a mess. Peter we covered transformers exploding, recorders clinging to the chain but fast forward 24, 48 hours. Once everything calls that is when the water keeps going up. Is that the type of thing you would anticipate here . My inlaws live in greensboro, North Carolina. They have a place on the outer banks. This will be the third time they rebuilt that house. The ocean on the one side, Cape Hatteras, the graveyard of the atlantic, big magnet sucking these storms in. The Intracoastal Waterway just inland, a very broad river for nautical traffic that runs to avoid the ocean, they do the inland waterway and the North Carolina, famous for all the rivers, cape fear and so forth. A very spongy place in the best of times. Now when you have this soaking rain. Peoples lives will be a wild before they can get dry and get the power restored, a big mess for millions of people. The nations capital, you have some impact, the storm going two weeks in. Ainsley did your inlaws board of the house . They boarded up but like bill hammer was suggesting, the island where your parents holiday, you do the best you can and then throw up your hands, you cant get flood insurance, it is so prohibitively expensive. They give you insurance for the wind, you lose a couple shingles, no biggie. All the houses are elevated 12 or 14 feet but when you have a storm surge that big, it wrecks all the infrastructure and your machinery tends to be on the ground, you wreck your infrastructure. Peter one of the worries is downed power lines. Behind the wheel in Morehead City, North Carolina, Griff Jenkins is joining us. Where are you going . You are on the passenger side. Where are you heading and what have you seen so far . Reporter we are seeing a lot of damage. We jumped into the truck and spinning out of the back of my truck, you will get a first look at what the wind damage has done. It is substantial to say the least. A little look outside our place, look at this street. The street is smashed next to us, brought down wires, thankfully missed the house but that is one of many as we see people starting to come out of their homes trying to assess the damage, the street just littered and worth pointing out the wind and rain has not stopped. We are going to take a turn around, this is highway 70, this is the main highway that goes from raleigh all the way down to Morehead City where we are over 2 Atlantic Beach. Seeing pictures from Atlantic Beach, these are really devastating but let me show you this building, the roof of this building has been absolutely ripped off to say the least. It is one of many we are seeing, we start heading up highway 70. If we can get across the sound where we were seeing such aggressive storm surge and water, see if we can get 2 Atlantic Beach to assess the damage. One thing is for sure, Morehead City has taken significant wind damage. It did not get much of the surge, the ocean seawall where i was much earlier but a lot of trees down here. Look at these images, it will take a long time. Peter you can see the signs, blown out. Youre going to try to go across the bridge back to the actual beach you were broadcasting from yesterday. What is your sense . Are people outside their houses right now . It looks as if the winds of died down. You might be in the eye of the storm or something. Reporter theres a good chance we could be because the wind has died down considerably. There are a handful of people that once it stayed behind on this street on 70, looking out their windows, some coming out to figure out what the damage is to their surrounding property but theres always a chance that we get another burst of the backside of the wind and storm. Because of the size we have been talking about of the storm we can expect constant rainfall coming in these tropical areas, even a Tropical Storm can be very difficult and damaging on top of jeopardized conditions such as this. We have a little bit of flooding coming up. We are going to take you through and this is a time you see standing water, turn around, dont drown. Looks to be fairly shallow. We are going to go through now that you see the flooding, one of the intersections on highway 70 as we take a first look, that is a foot or so deep and you see the combination of flooding in that intersection along with the smashed tree, the tree bringing down the power lines that line this. One of the challenges to these communities is all the power lines are above ground and that creates a problem when you get a weather event like this and it is tree after 3. Just a few blocks away from the turn to Atlantic Beach and we will get there, then undoubtedly even more devastating impacts as far as wind goes. Of my communications are to be believed with the chief of police and fire chief and i have no reason not to believe it, they have sent pictures of the wind damage and water surge damage over there, certainly going to be more flooding as well, some very lowlying on that Barrier Island over there. Jillian looks like most of the damage is trees falling down. I know you are farther north than where it is sitting in wilmington, your closer to hatteras than where the storm is hitting but remarkably not a lot of flooding where you are. Reporter that is a good point. Remarkably not a lot of flooding but you can say we are running on highway 7. There is a Railroad Track in the middle of this. It is the high part. If we venture off of the main road and look at the water damage we are going to see worst flooding but as we talked all morning, remember when you are on the coastal area the tide comes in and goes out, so does the storm. The storm water comes in and theres someone for to go, back out to see but those in land communities like newburgh and surrounding areas, you have these bursting, overflowing, cresting rivers causing all sorts of flooding. As we drive by and look at a little bit now peter you know what . Griffs signal depends on broadband and there are some issues with the electronic utilities. As soon as he is stationary in another location, we will check back in. Right now jeff flock joins us from Carolina Beach in North Carolina. Kirstin the situation changed a bit. Reporter this happens in the eye of the storm. This is something i havent seen her years. It is rare to get into the eye. Remember what it looked like earlier. We are now dead calm. Almost seeing sky up here as compared to what happened half an hour ago, 45 minutes ago, birds flying around out here. It is an interesting piece of nature to have the eye of the storm be right in the midst of the chaos that we saw and now we have this break. The fact is this thing is moving so slowly, 5 miles an hour, we are going to be in the art for a while. You can see the damage to the buildings, not catastrophic damage by any means but we saw piece of the roof up there that came off, all sorts of minor pieces of damage, there may be worse. We will look around. Right in the midst of this, here we are in almost sunshine. You can almost see through the clouds. In a welldefined are you could see blue sky. In hugo, saw stars. Pretty amazing. Peter you are right. The eye is large and moving slowly so you could be in that for a while. You anticipate indeed the calm before the storm. We were showing images of you barely able to stand as a generator exploded. Will you be back in that situation shortly . Reporter i dont think it will be that bad on the other end. I was trying to get my radar up and look at the back end of the storm. Doesnt look as strong. This is where we are standing. That piece of debris, i dont think the back end will be as strong. The difference will be once it gets past us, dont know if we have time to go out to the beach . Are you okay to take a run to the beach . Peter take us out to the beach. Reporter when we get past, the eye is past us, we will see the rotation the other way. Instead of this rotation from the west to east it will come around the other way. This rotation the way it is now got us a real break on the surge because it was knocking the wave down and keeping the surge at bay. Now, havent really seen, we are starting to see the waves coming back in again and we may see surge again on the side of the storm. I dont think will be as strong. We may not have a surge problem but we will see some of that i think. Ainsley you will be in the front of a hurricane and then not as strong in the back. I noticed, is that where you are keeping your phones and appliances . Reporter it came undone. No offense to the ziploc folks but you have to be careful to keep that trait. Peter Peanut Butter and jelly sandwich for mom. Reporter there is the phone and the thing that amplifies it. You could hear, pretty loud. You found out totally. The problem is in the storm it goes right down so pretty much at least peter great reporting from Carolina Beach. He is soaking wet but his iphone is nice and dry. Janice, it was an hour ago you told us we had made landfall with florence so how do you explain that it appears socalled . The eye is 29 miles wide so it is coming ashore. We had an official landfall at 7 15 a. M. On brightfield beach accorded to the National Hurricane center, 90 mileperhour sustained winds. The eye comes ashore, that is where we are feeling Hurricane Force windss and the storm is going to slow down by the way so we have a flash flood threat for the next several days. A lot of these areas not only North Carolina but South Carolina towards virginia. That will be a concern and wilmington wind gusts in excess of 105 mph. Just an hour ago we have bill hammer reporting. We are not getting reports of winds in jacksonville, our reporting stations are down. Wilmington 87 mileperhour sustained winds and the core of the strongest windss pretty much intact but we had landfall, the lowest Pressure Point as the eye came ashore, center of the eye came ashore and that is what we call landfall. We have pretty impressive wind gusts at cape lookout and new bird and got a report Atlantic Beach, this is unofficial, 30 inches of rainfall. 30 inches of rainfall in Atlantic Beach. That is going to be a record. That is historic for the area. That is unofficial but we will check with the National Hurricane center. Storm surge will be an issue, this is a prolonged event, not only the rainfall but the storm surge with windss pushing that wall of water on shore. We had a report of a cent 10 foot storm surge in new berg with people needing to be rescued. That is is a developing story. Additional rainfall totals 10 to 20 inches in some of these areas. Them will get an additional 30, maybe 40 inches of rain when all is said and done and the storm surge so the fact this storm is moving slowly will add to the potential disaster in this area of a major water event. Dont Pay Attention to the category. Now that the storm made landfall it is going to start to we can but it will dump a tremendous amount of rainfall and rivers and streams and tributaries cant take any more rain. That will cause flash flooding, a catastrophe in the making unfortunately and the slow movement, saturday still a cat one but Tropical Storm force winds being felt in North Carolina without carolina through the Tennessee River valley. It will come up to the northeast wednesday, still tracking the storm but the devastating impacts are yet to be determined. Bill hammer told us he would gather more information and rejoin us and he will do that on the other side of a quicktime out. You are watching the fox news channel, live from Carolina Beach where they are in the eye of the hurricane. It rocked our world. We called usaa. And they greeted me as they always do. Sergeant baker, how are you . They took care of everything a to z. Having insurance is something everyone needs, but having usaa now thats a privilege. As moms, we send our kids out into the world, full of hope. And we dont want Something Like meningitis b getting in their way. Meningococcal group b disease, or meningitis b, is real. Bexsero is a vaccine to help prevent meningitis b in 1025 year olds. Even if meningitis b is uncommon, thats not a chance were willing to take. Meningitis b is different from the meningitis most teens were probably vaccinated against when younger. Were getting the word out against meningitis b. Our teens are getting bexsero. Bexsero should not be given if you had a severe allergic reaction after a previous dose. Most common side effects are pain, redness or hardness at the injection site; muscle pain; fatigue; headache; nausea; and joint pain. Bexsero may not protect all individuals. Tell your healthcare professional if youre pregnant or if you have received any other meningitis b vaccines. Ask your healthcare professional about the risks and benefits of bexsero and if vaccination with bexsero is right for your teen. Moms, we cant wait. Peter hurricane for is making landfall, hammering the carolinas, completely demolishing among other things that hotel sign, blown out, the camera man took a picture of it in jacksonville, North Carolina. Some people trapped in their homes trapped by water, they have called First Responders and in new bern, North Carolina they are trying to respond. Mike and there are 400,000 customers without power. We saw that number grow to 280, now topping 400,000. It is a big deal, our lives run on that electric grid. Ainsley you were on the coast and we saw you in the car. Is it highway 70 . Reporter it is. No point showing me because we are getting these images to you and your viewers. Havent seen a house with a single light on but a lot of rooms with shingles ripped off, highway 70 is the main thoroughfare in this area from raleigh down to Morehead City where we are and we are just getting the scene of devastation when it comes to trees, downed power lines and some flooding, but not quite storm surge devastation, they were spared a little bit. We are driving on 70, the sound side running parallel to Atlantic Beach where we were yesterday. Remember that your . Part of that. Was damaged and we are going to get an image of that for you where we are driving down and you see some people out driving, turning to go to Atlantic Beach and take you over there because the chief of police over there, jeff harvey and the fire chief adam snyder are telling me they were hit hard and has i take this turn to go towards the bridge you are going to see an exxon gas station that was leveled by the winds on those seawall, trying to hold on to that chain. Peter broadband issues right out there in morgan city. The image as we look you can see the center of the storm is near where he is. They would have to bring me in a wheelbarrow but the funny thing about the eye. In galveston, the st. Louis resort, it was margaritaville, they came out, literally margaritas and then went to sleep, doing was somewhere in the 15 or 20, no two are the same. I was glancing over here at the eye wall. Go ahead and show the palm trees that bend, north and south wind from the right to the left from the north to the south and if you pan to the left i want to show you this. Our visibility was 0 about ten minutes ago and seems to break up a little but as the bands come through. That gray hulking ship is the uss North Carolina commission for battle pacific theater, the second world war. It has been a tour spot here going back to the 1960s. That was beyond our ability to see a short time ago. As you see the bands come through you will see conditions change throughout the morning. We have landfill eight miles due east of here, hot winds, 90 miles an hour on the border to a category one into category 2 hurricane so now we will feel the eye wall in the coming hour and. The drop off and go a little calm. The city put out a warning to folks in wilmington, do not go outdoors during the eye of the storm. It appears to be safe but there is a back end of the storm still to come through, downed power lines are to be expected, some trees down already but that is minor stuff when you think of the overall potential for a storm this big and strong onshore. What we have been hearing is up the coastal counties for North Carolina and portions of South Carolina a lot dont have electricity at this hour. Now we are getting away from the high wind situation and it is phase 2, any officials anticipating when people will return to their homes if they did evacuate . Reporter we dont know yet. Depends what the conditions are. You are in wilmington, lets see what happens on the other side, north northwest of here is anybodys guess, talk about power and electricity, we dont have power here running on generator batteries, the Media Outlets have come to a hotel, theres a reason we chose this place, it has given us good protection. As for the electricity a lot of these Barrier Islands have telephone poles, they have not buried them underneath. Passing storm you make different decisions about the infrastructure for your town or city or county for the days and years and decades to come and this has a way of changing life and we will see how it changes here but power down is to be expected. We will see how people get through that. We will talk to the mayor of wilmington North Carolina he will be onsite in 20 minutes. We will talk to him, the National Hurricane center live in a moment as well. And talk to the governor who is out there every three hours, he will be on the air and we will get a sense up and down the shore how people are faring and trying to give viewers an idea how big florence has been. Ainsley we are curious to see what the streets will look like. Griff has been up along i 70 and you can see trees down but no flooding in that area where he is. Im curious to find out what it will look like in wilmington because that is where the brunt of the storm is heading. Reporter keep focused on it. Watch these rivers as the water gets thrown up into these estuaries and rivers and has to come out again. It could be thrown back up again as you reach another high tide and come out again. That could be what emerges over the next 48 hours. We will watch that at 9 00 eastern time. Peter we will have the mayor of wilmington in 30 minutes. As bill talks about how there is no electricity on the coast i remember one of the problems when people come back, there is no electricity. We saw this during super storm or hurricane sandy, when there is no electricity, there is no electricity to pump the gas out of the ground into your car and if you dont have gas you dont have gas for your generator and it is a vicious cycle. Look what happened important point with Hurricane Maria which came a month after hurricane irma. Or matt already knocked out 70 of the power grid in puerto rico. Maria wiped out all the rest and now we have this current controversy over how many people storms were responsible for killing, whether it was not just people who roof fell on them or people on dialysis because there was no power over time, couldnt get the medication they needed, people in puerto rico power out for months and months, you forget how much you count on electricity for modern life. It sustains civilization. Puerto rico people dont realize outside the tourist areas where the selective suburbs, it is a third world country, colony of the United States, should be a state. Reporter you live in new jersey, we didnt have electricity for two weeks and there was no gas for over a week, nobody could run their generators so we wound up having to live in a hotel in new york. Look at the people of puerto rico six months, eight months it becomes a third world country, that is what happened. One of the biggest differences in my long time in public life in terms of the any qualityoflife or poverty and the rest of it is poor people got cars and airconditioners in the areas that used to be considered ghettos or slums and it elevated people. Take that away from folks and it doesnt take long before folks are in danger, they are sweating, sitting, no services, no ice to keep your medicines sustained, no way to run from the humidity. Ainsley you have utility folks from all over the country who will get power back online very quickly. Another thing puerto rico did not have because it is an island 1500 miles away, there was never the kind of association with Utility Companies to come in, North Carolina, like texas and florida will be flooded with assistance from people eager to help. Im sure convoys are already light up with telephone poles and wires and they will get it back online in days or a week or so. And in many cases lets pitch in and help the neighbor. We miss all the time. We are as vulnerable as our grid and electrical system is vulnerable doing that goes dark everything goes dark. They still have power lines above ground as we have seen along the coast. We will take a quick timeout, more live from the hurricane zone in two minutes. Hurricane florence made landfall an hour ago, 3 inches of rain have been falling in North Carolina, much the same in South Carolina where todd biro is at beach. Before it is right on the border. You are getting a lot of rain down there. Reporter we set a couple hours ago people were saying South Carolina is good. Now we are getting hit. The last couple minutes rain coming down in South Carolina. The rain kept up the last 20 minutes, the wind increasing as well. We are in North Myrtle Beach and we were hanging out with the guys we interviewed yesterday and they said we know we are not out of the woods. There big concern wasnt this low tire the next high tide but the high tide after that. That is what they are concerned about with regard to storm surge. On n. Ocean blvd. Where we are right now we drove up and down three times and havent seen the flooding we feared, just some ponding. But keep in mind, like those individuals said, it is still very very early on. It is that next high tide after the one we are about to hit in three hours that we are worried about. Earlier when we were hanging out with those guys they explained the direction of the wind was blowing the sea away from the homes, away from the beach but when we were hanging out with him did you see that . Wind direction just changed, now we are worried. Obviously North Carolina has their issues, South Carolina so far not too bad. Expect that to change from this point forward. Peter you were referring to people you interviewed yesterday, squirrel said he was going to ride the storm out and go someplace at noon yesterday. Reporter i think i heard your question. Talking about squirrel, these guys lived here for a while, squirrel and his buddies and they said we are not out of the woods, we are barely in the woods at this point. The next 24 or 36 hours is the key for the palmetto state. Peter you have to focus on the second iteration, not the current storm surge. It goes out, called down in the water comes in the river systems, reporters have done a great job emphasizing that inland with the rivers word cant flow back out is so much of what we are covering. Ainsley when janice told us the storm was about to hit that area we were all watching and everyone was watching and then she said it looks like it will go towards North Carolina. People in South Carolina were able to breathe a little bit, used to these things in the carolinas. Being faced with hurricanes constantly. But we are not used to what we were told originally, category 4. That was going to be extremely powerful. When it was downgraded to a one people even in North Carolina were breathing a sigh of relief but janice was telling us dont focus on the category because this surge is what you have to worry about. Dont focus on the wind because when you look at hurricanes generally, 75 of the People Killed in a wreck a are killed by water, the storm surge which is not been a problem so far or the flooding. The flooding was a problem in new bern where they have been rescuing people off of roofs all night. This particular hurricane is the iteration of a lot of learning. Taking the threat seriously, many days out we learned the trajectory to be accurate and even the National Guard more troops have been mobilized and prepared for what will certainly unfold for the next couple days. We have ten more minutes, we will hit every angle with the time we have left, dont leave us as Hurricane Florence makes landfall in North Carolina. Take us downtown, waze. Waze integration seamlessly connecting the world inside. With the world outside. Making life a little. Easier. Introducing the wellconnected lincoln mkc. phone ringing es offers big button,lized phones. And volumeenhanced phones. Get details on this state program. Visit right now or call during business hours. And accessoriesphones for your mobile phone. Like this device to increase volume on your cell phone. phone ringing get details on this state Program Visit right now or call during business hours. Peter Griff Jenkins has been in Morehead City because it is too dangerous for her to return to Atlantic Beach until now and that is where he is. What are you seeing . Reporter the wind is whipping in the parking lot up here. You can see the mobile homes behind me. As you can see, power lines, the p a has been destroyed. The end of that. Gone. Around the corner of the building, we were not able to get a live shot of that. We will try to give you a little look at it. The danger with these power lines, free flowing, as we came here we didnt get a strong signal because every power line, flooding on this side as well as structures and homes destroyed. What i showed you yesterday, but the water all the way up. The image and that. Being taken down is amazing, it was built in 1959 but mayor trace coopers grandfather, it was damaged in previous hurricanes and they thought they had the most secure end of that here. And it was not there, quite a harrowing site and as you can see, the fact these trailer homes survived is amazing because we saw secondstory homes, stores, gas stations, all sorts of debris, structures, at the risk of losing the signal we will take one effort to spin you around with the signal and i am going to grab there you go, we are not going to get a shot of that. You see the angry ocean, still quite a mess. Before we lose the signal, away from the power line, look down there. A shot of the period, gone, gone. We could not find it. It is quite a sight. As we look out for the power lines in his treacherous situation, this storm is far from over for the folks on Atlantic Beach. Peter it is amazing those mobile homes are intact but on the coast, dont know if we still have the shot of it, is there more flooding or are you in the middle of the worst . Reporter there is plenty more flooding that will come. I told you earlier we are still not at high tide. This storm is going to continue to deliver all of its moisture. Even if the winds died down it will deliver all this moisture to flooding and the storm surge is far from over. Live in myrtle beach, he showed us appear. You dont know where it is, where it landed. Todd said yesterday when the are broke off it landed on a guys house next door to when he was doing his live shot. Curious to find out what happened to the end of that. Are, hopefully just broke up and in the ocean and not on someones house. Reporter we dont know. From these power lines, this is such a hazard and part of the problem but if you point towards the end of the p a ier, the wav in the surge of the high tide smashing in and dont know if you can get a clearer shot. Nobody knows where that is and im not going to venture onto the beach to see where it is because the beach doesnt even exist. There is a very good likelihood that surge will come into the parking lot. It is not far at all right now. Most is not even there. It is not deep, it is shallow but the third is push 20, 40, 50 feet. By the time we had high tide, we could see that. And more portions of that. Are being destroyed as conditions continue to deteriorate on the backside of the storm which is hitting us. Peter it is great that you are able to go out to the beach to show us what happened and we remember seeing the end of the p pier. But be careful. We can see on television there is a power line every direction your cameraman is shooting just dangling and blowing around. Are those lines dead or are they hot . Reporter in any situation like that, you should assume these are hot wires. If you can a little bit you can see the nest. This is the problem with coastal communities. Everything is above ground. Once any wire goes down you should assume it is hot. In irma i showed you in naples we had wires come down, there is electric use in worries, fire worries and any vehicles going through you have a major power line and they cant get through and the emergency vehicles, interesting note, i talked to the mayor, the mayor lives next door to the appear, one last shot as we leave here. Peter fantastic job this morning. You have been in and out of it, you remain in it, thanks for the great coverage. Mike stay safe. The damage, we dont know what it will be like this sunday coming up but so many First Responders have been unable to go out because the wind has to be below 40 miles an hour and that is not the case down there right now. Ainsley this is the top story today