water just crashing into the area. and apalachicola which is near here had a reported storm surge of eight feet and flooded part of the historic downtown. and again, the authorities are here are assessing the damages this morning and people are just getting to the area, and the bridge to st. george island had been closed off. we were trying to head west as well to mexico beach, because that area, the main road in and out of the apalachicola is shut down there. is debris all throughout the roadway and may take the quite a while to clear all of that out o, but u.s. 98 heading east out of apalachicola, that has been at least part of it has been opened, and that is how some of the residents are being able to come back to this area, st. george island. back to you, andrea. thank you, gabe guterres, and to your team as well. a white house journalist shares her surprise interview with president trump and a lot of other top officials as well.
yes, ma am. thank you and god bless. best to you. and gabe guterres is in st. georges island in florida after a tough 48 hours. what is the situation there? well, hi, andrea, and good afternoon. we have just made it to st. george island and this is the area that had been cut off when the storm hit, and the mayor has just let some of to residents back here, and cell phone transmissions are difficult, and we are only able to speak to you with the transmission lines that we have. we are told that 50 residents on the island have decided to ride it out, and the first responders could not get to them. so there is concern about how much damage was here, and we have literally within the last few minutes, and we have seen the siding blown off of the roofs, and the water is receding. and it is clear that the storm surge here was significant. there was video going around on social media showing a wall of
mariana atensio is in st. joe, and what about the flooding there? andrea, the flooding is picking up here. we had to the leave the area where we were last, and move over here, because the roads were impassable. i m about 30 minutes northwest of where gabe is, and you can see the wind gusts picking up here, and 50 miles per hour or so from where gabe was, because this storm is moving this way, and headed to panama city where it is likely to make landfall in the next couple of hours. i want you to check out the marina behind me. you can already start to see many of the boats there, 35 degrees, and you can start to see many of the boat covers, and then you the roofs starting to peel off, because, again, the wind gusts are really starting to come in in this city, and the m mayor is saying to everybody, it is now time to hunk r down, and the next couple of hours will be critical in this area, and as we have been discussing, unprecedented storm for the
rising by the minute. the authorities here expect 9 to 13 feet of storm surge and the downtown areas and parts of it are flood and many of the businesses here will be destroyed, andrea. as you can just get another gust right now. there are many businesses that have been sandbagged, and this entire town is basically clear ed out. earlier we were forced to evacuate from our hotel, because we were, we were going to be trapped, and so we moved further down the block, and we are okay for several hour, and now we are having to move further inland and this is within the last hour and a half or so, this road has gotten completely flooded. it is a devastating storm, andrea, and intensified so quickly overnight. and this is now a category 4, and the most intense storm that the florida panhandle has seen on record, and again, the authorities expect it to get worse over the next three hours. andrea, back to you. gabe, thank you. and please, move as quickly as you can obviously.
joining me now is nbc meet yourologist bill karins, and gabe guterres in ap lach kalach and bill bradley in tallahassee, and i was in a hurry to reach tout you, and while gabe, i think that he is coming to us first. gabe, what is the latest? hi, there. andrea, i can barely hear right no now. we are here and feeling the wind pick up over the last hour or so, and as you can see, the rain is really pelting me, and it has been for the last several hours now. and right behind me is the most dramatic images that we have seen. this road is flooded, andrea, and earlier on water street which is right by the apalachicola river, and we have moved inland a block or so, and this is not a river or any sort of roadway, but it is a road completely flooded and the storm surge here in apalachicola is