six and nine feet, possibly of storm surge and local officials did tell us that they do expect this area, this town, st. mark s to be completely flooded at least for a few hours because, again, this water from the st. mark s river already pretty high is going to be kind of washed up here like a snowplow, just pushing all that water with a storm surge. 6 to 9, feet into the town to my right and a lot of low-lying houses and other buildings here are going to be completely inundated with water. so, again, mandatory evacuations are in place. it s getting a bit late to get out right now, used to have a couple of hours left but they are saying that time is running out. whoever is going to stay here is just going to have to be prepared for whatever comes next. we did talk to several residents who are going to stay, they give the same reasons that we have seen many times, especially in this area of florida where a lot of people like to stay during these storms because they are worried that, if
sometime tomorrow morning into the early afternoon. laura? anywhere from 2 to 6 feet of storm surge. carlos suarez, thank you so much. brian todd is here with us in st. mark s florida, where the national weather service is warning that hurricane idalia is an unprecedented event, like no storm ever seen before in that area. brian? laura, in just a matter of hours from now this place where i m standing is not expected to be very safe. we are in st. mark s florida, and local emergency management official told us a short time ago that the entire town of st. mark s is expected to be flooded when the storm is at its peak on wednesday morning. what we can tell you is that we are right by three bodies of water, this is the st. marks river, the walk a little river is just down stream and the apalachee bay is down beyond. you could may be some flashes of lightning over my shoulder as the storm approaches here. because of the apalachee bay has never seen a storm as
reporter: as always, some follow those orders, and some do not. we just spoke to officials at the sheriffs and emergency management agency. they have said this town is under a mandatory evacuation. they have sent deputies door to door, asking people to leave the town. but as you know, you have been through several hurricanes in this region before, a mandatory evacuation means they cannot physically pull you out of the house and take you from your town. if you want to stay, that s your choice, but it means they will come to your door or contact you in another way to strongly urge you to leave and not ride it out. we talked to several people in this town who are still going to stay. we re going to talk to you about what they could be in for in a second. but why is this such a dangerous spot? look at how low we are to the river here. this is the st. marks river. one resident told us the river here is a little higher now than it normally is. we re a few hours yet from the storl. this riv