patrick, great reporting. stay safe, my friend. let s go to our meteorologist. tom, florida is just now starting to feel more of this storm. exactly how far do these hurricane-force winds stretch, and who might soon be facing them? well, i tell you we are at five miles an hour. that s better than stationary, but in the grand scheme of things five miles an hour, jake, is still slow when it comes to a moving tropical system. that means hour after hour of just battering the coastline. they are still getting battered in freeport and grand bahama islands. let s talk about the distance. right now the same distance as yesterday from the coastline. 100 miles from fort pierce. yesterday it was about 105 from down in areas of west palm. let s look at this because each time this storm goes through what we call an eyewall replacement cycle. that s where it can only sustain strength for so long. those winds, as it goes through the cycle, extend outward and
strong storm. those orders need to be taken seriously. this storm is stretching over 600 miles across. that is, we go ahead and zoom in, what you will find here is the reason why so many of these emergency management folks are so concerned is because the hurricane force winds stretch 90 miles from the center of the storm. wow, 90 miles from the center of the storm. yeah, that s a lot. if you think about what we are talking about, moving up the coastline, that means almost all of the coastal areas at there point will be impacted by some hurricane force winds. look at this, right now we do have some of these heavier rain bands starting to move in right to where mark potter is and also those winds ramping up to tropical storm status in the 30s and also into the 40 mile per hour range. so this storm is really starting it wined up beginning to feel some of those immediate impacts and we have also had news for those of new new york, also in long island over the past hour, two ours, let s
of weakening it is still a very large storm as we have been talking about for the past couple of days the thing when you look at this storm system it s the overall size of it stretching several hundred miles and its overall size from the north down to the south. then you take a look at the center of the storm. the hurricane force winds stretch out over 70 miles from the center of the storm. that s a pretty wide radius when you look at a hurricane. tropical force storm winds to almost 300 miles from the center. so no doubt the entire east coast from south carolina, which is already seeing outer rain bonds moving in right now all the way up into new england will be feeling the impacts from the storm. on my radar also are these winds 20 to 25 miles per hour here in will mington down to am i rightle beach and down to georgetown as well. take a look here at the hurricane warnings and watches from will mington up to central new jersey, you re under hurricane warnings the mandatory