on the west coast side it s entirely the opposite. the water is actually retreating. you do not want to be on the beach when that water comes back. it comes back in fast and furious and can turn into a deadly situation. it is going to come back. as that storm makes its way north crossing over the main peninsula, that water will come back in. that, jake is when we ll start tows some of the biggest storm surges for the west coast of florida. and we have a lo the of individuals, including our onil kyung la. the courages will sustain that way before she finally starting to conditions get better in miami. that s for most people. it will remain bad for hours now
this is something they warned people, if you are ignoring the mandatory evacuation, trying to be on the street and get injured you simply will not get any help. jake, that is what is happening here in miami beach. we are anticipating conditions to deteriorate throughout the day. and the reason we re doing this is to try to send a message to the west side of the state that it is coming your way and is going to get worse. jake? it looks absolutely horrific. once i was in a 110-mile-an-hour wind and it felt as though my face was being blown off my skull. describe for us, if you could, what it feels like to be in this. reporter: this is not 110-mile-per-hour winds. we re hitting about 80 or so. and it hurts.
morning from the sunshine state depict slashing wind and rain, bent and broken trees, pounding serve. irma is expected to spend the next day and a half tracking up the west coast of the state of florida, naples, ft. myers, sarasota, st. petersburg and tampa face the greatest danger, it looks like. frankly, irma is so large and powerful, there are life-threatening hazards on both sides of the peninsula. it will be tomorrow afternoon before it crosses the panhandle and then hits georgia and alabama. 46 million people are in the path of this storm. tens of thousands are in shelters this morning. for many of them, it s too late to get out and it s only going to get worse. reporters in key west and major cities along both east and west florida coasts this morning. we ll start with kyung lah in miami beach, getting hit with