all of this. i m going to get to it. i ll see you tomorrow night. thanks. this is don lemon tonight, and i m in orlando florida, and being here, what s really amazing is the amount of water. as i said last night, this has been a water storm. it s all about the water. it s not about the wind. this hurricane dumped so much water on the state of florida. what you see behind me, these trees are usually under water behind me, so people would normally be walking behind me on this path. but now, if you go there, you re at your own risk. the destruction it s caused here is amazing inland, and it didn t even see the worst of hurricane ian. their whole neighbors, homes, everything people had in the world under water right now. also, it s important to talk about the bravery of the first responders risking their own lives, rescuing strangers, some of them people who stayed in their homes that were at risk. i went out on a small boat with orange county fire and rescue today. we talked wit
hour. the category 4 storm is currently barreling across southwest florida with winds up to 150 miles per hour. more than 1.5 million people in the state are currently without power, and that number is growing. but the most imminent and life-threatening concern is the storm surge. some areas seeing 12 to 18 feet. to give you an idea of just how severe that is, a meteorologist for the national hurricane center says no one alive has seen 12 feet of storm surge in that area, and many areas could take years to recover. just take a look at this surge today. the dangers are a reality for many who chose to hunker down and wait out the storm despite the evacuation orders. take a look at what family told nbc affiliate wbbh as their house flooded. so this is ft. myers beach on cutlass drive. it s four of us. four of us? on cutlass drive. and you re on the second floor already? yeah. six of us in here. do you have do you have a roof? 15 feet of water now. there s 15 fe
all of this. i m going to get to it. i ll see you tomorrow night. thanks. this is don lemon tonight, and i m in orlando florida, and being here, what s really amazing is the amount of water. as i said last night, this has been a water storm. it s all about the water. it s not about the wind. this hurricane dumped so much water on the state of florida. what you see behind me, these trees are usually under water behind me, so people would normally be walking behind me on this path. but now, if you go there, you re at your own risk. the destruction it s caused here is amazing inland, and it didn t even see the worst of hurricane ian. their whole neighbors, homes, everything people had in the world under water right now. also, it s important to talk about the bravery of the first responders risking their own
much worse. the thing about it, ali, i can remember riding out a category 3 hurricane wilma, which was a couple months after hurricane katrina hit in new orleans. we were in south florida with wilma. reporter: that s right. the thing that s terrifying is the sound. it was us and the little kids playing the flashlight game because we had no power and trying to ride it out. you remember hearing what sounded like hell on earth. everything whipping and whipping. this is a watery hurricane. it s slow and causing lofts surges. reporter: you re right. reporter: that means when the water recedes, your car is destroyed, your my house flooded. this is a lot more to me like the kind of damage you saw with katrina. reporter: that s exactly the right point. one of those big hurricanes sounds like a constant freight train for hours. yes. reporter: it gets into you. it s terrifying. that s not what we heard today. this is mostly a water storm. in america water storms are more