i told each one of them, my conversation separately, whatever they need. sincerely, whatever they need, contact me directly. joining me now jamie rome, acting director of the national hurricane center. good to have you with us this hour. we saw in the most recent update, the 2:00 p.m. update that the storm was rapidly intensifying. the major concern at this hour seems to be the storm surge and also just how long this storm could sit. what are the areas that you re most focused on at this hour? i think water is going to be the big issue with this storm, both the incredibly heavy rainfall. you can see it starting to sweep over the southern portions of the florida peninsula. and the storm surge near to the east of where the center makes landfall, and those two when they combine together, it creates a lot of flooding issues. speaking the the mayor of tampa in the last hour, she was pointing to the separate saturation that they re already seeing on the ground there that they
plus this hour live near russia s border where russians try to avoid putin s war on ukraine. going there next. the new lawsuit. the challenges president biden s plan to cancel student loan why what it could mean if you thought you would get the loan forgiven. welcome to the lead. hurricane ian barrelling toward florida. it is a category 3 storm meaning ian s winds could reach up to 129 miles per hour. ian is expected to strengthen into a category 4 storm later tonight with winds up to 156 miles per hour. as it churns over the warm waters of the gulf. mandatory evacuations are in effect. airports in tampa and orlando will be shut down. today the governor is warning people should expect to lose power once the storm hits and it could be days or longer before power is restored. parts of cuba lost power today with ian slamming into the western part of that country earlier. already the outer bands of ian are lashing the southern tip of florida in the keys as you can see in th