refuges that are there. one of our major wildlife hospitals is on sanibel island in southwest florida. so pure devastation right now. let s talk about rescue and relief efforts. i assume there s going to be people that need to be rescued in fort myers, likely naples, likely sarasota. tell me about those efforts and when will they likely start? well, one of the concerns is the evacuation orders may not have been residents who railroad not in the direct coastal region. southwest florida, we ve been through hurricanes before and through the last several ones, even hurricane ian irma citizens were able to hunker down and ride through the storm. the storm surge warning is where the devastation is. that storm surge turned out to be real. those evacuation operations look like they re going to begin tomorrow morning when first responders can get out and it s safe. the winds are still high.
where we are in orlando. i can tell you conditions have been getting worse since early this afternoon. now we re starting to see those winds picking up. the rain has been consistently falling down but when you ve got the mixture of those two you ll start to see debris getting tossed around on the ground, pieces of the palm trees on the roads and you ll probably hear the wind around me. what s interesting about orlando is right now there s a lot of people who came here from southwest florida evacuating that area looking for safety here in orlando but what happened, yesterday those hurricanes warnings actually expanded inland and decided to include orlando. so people hunkered down here riding out the storm here as well. so the hotels are sold out in a lot of locations. people are spending what they wanted to be a vacation trip indoors because the disney parks are closed today and tomorrow same with universal studios, in fact disney reports the guests are being asked to shelter in place w
concern from the national hurricane center, is that, as the storm moves north, those winds are going to switch and slam the water back into tampa bay. so that s why they have that storm surge alert in effect for the tampa bay area, depends on exactly how that switch happens and how quickly it happens, because it will come flooding back in if the tide happens to be right and the wind shift happens to kind of, you know, make that happen. sean: all right, bryan, very informative and helpful. thank you for that report. we appreciate it here on more with where this hurricane will be going from here, the founder of weather bell.com, our good friend, also the official meteorologist of the sean hannity radio show joe bastardi is with us. joe, you actually about 24, 30, 36 hours ago said there s a possibility this might come in more south than we think, meaning below tampa. you ended up being right in your call. let s talk about how bad well we had
me as a citizen to have the president and his party suggesting that republicans are pro hurricane? the climate s been changing since the beginning of time and if you really cared about the climate, what you would be doing is you would be supporting common sense energy policies that produce a clean and efficient here in the united states. sean: all right, i ve got to thank you. steve miller we appreciate it. governor also, please, our prayers to your daughter, thank goodness she had a successful operation and she is recovered and recovering, we send our best to you. we go to orlando where multi media journalist katie burn is standing by. katie orlando about on to be front and center with the storm. coming in now with reports. i have friends there, writing me at this time saying winds are picking up and it s about to hit. yeah, you know, we just heard from our charles watson talking about how the storm is moving northeast and, hey, that s right
right across the expressway. it would be the worst blackout in u. s history, nearly 3000 people losing their lives in the wake of the storm. and david. the peak winds from the storm are expected late saturday. fiona could be near hurricane strength when it arrives here in puerto rico, along with concerns about the power grid, there is real fear of mudslides with up to a foot of rain expected in some areas, david it s going to be a long 24 hours here, alright victor kendall leading us off from puerto rico. victor thank you. let s get right to senior meteorologist rob marciano tracking the storm again tonight for us. hey, rob. hi david. after getting knocked down just a little bit. the inter nown strengthening mode once again as it gets into the caribbean right now, right over guadeloupe, about 250 miles to the east of saint croix. tropical storm watches have been upgraded to tropical storm warnings for puerto rico now and the u. s virgin islands. a lot of rain coming into puerto rico, p