coast of florida right now that are under hurricane warnings and at least 22 florida counties that have issued some level of evacuation orders ahead of hurricane idalia. joining us live to discuss is the public information officer with dixie county emergency services. so dixie county is located in the northwest part of the state in the big bend region and has issued a a mandatory evacuation. mandy, we appreciate the time. good morning. we heard from governor desantis about 30 minutes ago and he talked about big bend specifically, he said that that area hasn t really had a hurricane strike in this area in a long time. these coastal areas are not been through this before. what are you most concerned about? yeah, absolutely. our last incident was back in 2016 with hermine where we had seen some storm surge but nothing of this magnitude. and back then, we had some major destruction to not only homes but, you know, commercial
coordinating, he have resource request we ve received has either been filled or will be filled by the end of this morning. we do have 420,000 gallons of fuel staged and ready to deploy and additional assets are expected over the next few days. and the gas stations that will be prioritized will be the ones along the heavy evacuation routes. we have 8 urban search and rescue teams activated and over 580 rescue personnel ready right now. we have delivered 431 pallets of water, 303 pallets of mre and over 1200 tarps to communities that may be impacted. we have more water and mres ready to be deployed as needed. there are over 20 shelters open and additional 20 special needs shelters are mobilizing or on standby throughout the state of florida. we have 5500 national guardsmen that have been activated. we have deployed 247 starlinks
the weeks and months ahead. yes, thank you, melanie zanona. and now, boris, we will go back to florida for the special coverage of hurricane idalia. we handcraft every stearns & foster® using the finest materials, like indulgent memory foam, and ultra-conforming intellicoils®, for a beautiful mattress, and indescribable comfort. every single night. stearns & foster® . what comfort should be during our labor day sale, bring home incredible comfort with savings up to $800 on select adjustable mattress sets. learn more at stearnsandfoster.com
points north. so florida s atlantic coastline there could be a period of time as we move into the overnight hours tomorrow where you have hurricane conditions occurring on florida s gulf coast and tropical storm conditions over on the atlantic side. so that s where the impact come in here when we re talking about hundreds of thousands maybe millions of power outages as this storm picks up is forward pace and charges right across the state of florida and eventually into places like southern georgia and coastal parts of the carolinas. an eastern track here, the right side of that forecast cone, would bring this back over water. there s the potential we get a hurricane off the coast of carolina. so a lot of people need to be watching this very closely. storm surge is always the greatest killer in tropical events. this area is geographically favored to produce an awful surge. trace, you can see the big ben down across the nature coast. this is a reasonable worst case
running as soon as possible when the storm passes. as wind becomes stronger later today and into the night, fdot will coordinate with local law enforcement to close bridges once speeds reach in excess of 40 miles per hour. road rangers will be concentrated along evacuation routes to help motorists. we have also called up 33 ambulance strike teams, so over 200 ambulances ready to surge into any impacted area. we ve also requested an additional six strike teams through our emergency management assistance compact with other states. and so this storm is going to hit tomorrow morning. you will start certainly seeing effects of this in different parts of the state later on today. you still have time this morning to be able to make your final preparations. if you are in one of those areas that is in line for some of the major storm surge and you are told to evacuate, you have time