eye of the storm and those conditions will change very, very quickly. florida governor ron desantis a short time ago giving a briefing issuing that warning at this point it s time to stay inside and hunker down. joining us now live from tampa is nbc news correspondent marissa parra. good morning. what are you seeing there? reporter: willie, good morning. so, we are currently in what s called zone a, the mandatory evacuation area in tampa and you ll see why in just a moment because if you look over there, this is what happens when a car tries to drive through the evacuated zone. you can see tampa bay has completely washed over onto the road. this is a main road that we saw cars driving through even last night with ease. there were many cars that were driving through here, but obviously this is now the water is taking over a lot of the roads and this is something we have seen throughout the morning as we ourselves have been trying to assess the situation. if you look further down ove
good day, everyone. i m andrea mitchell in washington. following the destructive path of hurricane idalia. the eighth major hurricane to make landfall in the u.s. in six years. take a look at the stunning view of idalia from space courtesy of nasa. we are expecting florida governor ron desantis to give an update in a half hour on all the preparations. we will bring that to you live, of course. joining me now is marissa para in tampa. talk to us about the tampa region and what s happening just north of it. reporter: yeah. good afternoon. we are in what s called zone a. this is the mandatory evacuation area. you can probably tell why, for good reason. you can t even tell the difference between the road here this is bay shore boulevard for those of you familiar with tampa. it s a main thoroughfare. you can see that there s really no difference between this and
so this line has literally taken me two hours. i ve been waiting for two hours. it s been hot, as you know so not very fun. yeah, i had to go to three gas stations to get this gas, and fortunately, though, i am not a homeowner where i need to sandbag the house and so forth. reporter: hillsboro county is ordering a mandatory evacuation for anyone in zone a here or in mobile homes and homes in low-lying areas. you can see the sheriff s office here making that announcement driving through neighborhoods this afternoon. eight shelters in the county are already open for people to come in and the county is reopening sandbagging sites tomorrow morning first thing, the city of tampa also reopening sandbagging sites and will keep them open as long as the weather allows. trace, back to you. trace: and for florida, here they go again, kylie jones live for us on scene. kylie, thank you meantime a court date is now
make sure your pet has enough food, has enough water. if you re going to evacuate, go to a pet-friendly shelter or evacuate with a family or friend that will allow your pet to be there. there are hotels that are pet friendly. there s a lot of options. you don t have to travel across the state or into another state. we want you to evacuate tens of miles, not hundreds of miles. that s really good information going tens of miles not hundreds of miles. one of the things that people must pay attention to is sort of the tracking of the storm. but these storms do wobble. so, where is it that you re trying to tell people to go to? if people go to the north, they may get caught up, if they wait too late in that storm surge. absolutely. really all they have to do is go to a nonevacuation zone. so first and foremost, you need to know what zone you re in. if you re in that zone a or mobile home resident, evacuate
part of the tampa bay area and tranquil. hot and humid. all we have is a light breeze. this spot is going to look dramatically different in 12 hours. the outer rain bands will hit this afternoon and wherever you are tonight in the state of florida is going to be where you ride out the reality of hurricane idalia, a historic storm for the state. the big bend where we expect landfall have never had a category 4 hurricane hit the big bend ever in history. that s possible. right now the national hurricane forecast has it as a category 3 storms with winds stronger than 120 miles-per-hour. let me tell you the water out there is so hot reaching almost 90 degrees. straight gasoline for this storm and could see it reach category 4 strength before landfall. get out as people have asked you to leave. zone a has been evacuated. the problem with this area is