are more catastrophic. first responders say in this weather as we are hunkering down next to them, they will not venture out onto the streets behind me because they can become a wind tunnel. we have seen debris fly down the street, parts of trees, fronds from palm trees, garbage cans and other typical debris that you find on city streets, literally flying down the street here. they won t go out on streets in vehicles because they re concerned lives would be at risk. we don t know people can call for help, most phone lines are down. we are using live view system, using cell phone towers to transmit our signal. we are surprised we have been able to stay on the air this long. those winds that powerful and ferocious. it will be this way for some time, brian. migel almaguer in florida city. for those just joining us, the
so we have seen what is happening already. we have seen some of the rain, some of the wind, we know that the northern eyewall has already made way to the florida keys. we are expecting that landfall to happen anytime now. but north of that i want to go to nbc s jo ling kent, she s been in ft. lauderdale. i understand we re seeing some debris, seeing some things being whipped around by the winds. what you see in front of me are palm tree fronds and these are come off here in broad county. what we see are increasing winds. as you know, we are not in the path of the eye of the storm any longer, but this area really prepared for this and hunkered down. there s still 100,000 people out of power. these fronds that you see here are supposed to sustain a pretty high level of wind and we aren t
mattresses and pillows to cover your head and your family s bodies. remain in place through the passage of these life threatening conditions. that s pretty much it. naples. marco island. golden gate estates. everglade city. that message will be extended northward as we track the eye right up the coast. our friends at the weather channel are talking about naple, florida, one of their meteorologists is outside. we re talking about these palm trees. palm trees bill, have a kind of famously and bad for their structure compact root ball on them. you could see that when we had the live shot from miami beach. and they often go right over. but these fronds will take you out if you re hit by one of them, rain soaked, say nothing of the coconuts. this is the hotel in naples where a number of our different reporters and meteorologists are stationed because of its construction and its location.
stuff. we tied it around this to be able to come out into the elements a bit so we can show you just how dangerous these winds are while i m safely secured attached to the pillar here. i don t know if your photographer can hear me but he showed us a light post a moment ago. it was shaking. the and the interesting thing is that little thing on top of it is a sharp disk and that s what people have to remember. that a thing like that comes off. it probably doesn t weigh a pound. but if that comes ought you at 75 miles an hour, that s what the problem is. absolutely. it s why we re trying to use this building for add the protection. i got to tell you, we re quite amazed that we haven t seen more light posts, more news stands fly down this street. we have seen some trees, we have definitely seen plenty palms and fronds from the trees. this wind is incredibly
i know you said you re getting all the trash and debris out of the streets now. what are you telling people in preparing for the wind? we ve been actually in the prior days and today as well, don t put anything else out. we ve actually brought in extra crews to try and get any of that debris out of the way, pick up the bulk trash, the palm fronds and all that stuff that can be projectiles. i lived through andrew here back in the 90s and lost my home. so i m very clear what can happen in one of these wind events. we re just beating it into the the heads of our citizens. you guys need to keep the streets clear, hunker down and be ready to ride out the storm. one of the most difficult parts of the evacuation is what we re seeing there. not just traffic but gas stations are running out of gas, reporting that a third of gas