major hurricane. any upgrade from here and we're talking about a category 3. the issue is that the storm has really got its structure together over the last several hours which is allowing it to continue to rapidly intensify. so welcome into fox weather. we'd like to offer a special welcome here at the top of the hour to our viewers on fox news channel. i'm ian oliver and i'm jane minar fox news is your hurricane head coaches and so many of you watching the development of idalia fox weather with you have every step of the way on every connected tv device, also on your phone 24/7 with the free fox weather app. again idalia to reach category 4 intensity at land fall. >> we have you covered with our extensive team coverage on the ground tonight folks in place across the southeast as the faster forward motion of this storm is expected to bring hurricane conditions well inland but as we mentioned, idalia is expected to reach major hurricane status tonight. it could be at any minute at this point. fox weather meteorologist bob van dylan completes our trio monitoring conditions live from clear watch beer right now bob i know you've been dealing with these outer bands, what's it looking like right now? >> i think right now ian the strongest outer band is affect us right now and this will probably be the last big one that goes through before it finally edges away from us because the center of circulation, the eye is moving past us now past our latitude moving in that direction but right now we are caught in a major squall. so we have the tropical storm force gusts, we have the heavy downpours, and we're watching high tide in about a half an hour from now and if that wind shifts around from the southeast where it's been for most of the night to the south and south wested we're going to see that storm surge roll in here. that could be a good 4-6 feet, ian. >> yeah, bob, as you mentioned, the eye of the storm it's about, call it 110 miles off to your west, off the western shores of pinellas county. it's at your latitude but as it moves farther off to the north now you're stuck with that onshore flow which is going to push some water on shore and into the bay and with that high tides as we've got the blue moon tomorrow, jane, this is going to be a big issue. >> moon makes it worse but bob i want to ask some of the bands tracking offshore have winds gusting up to 60 miles per hour. how are the conditions there as the wind picks up on the beach? >> you know, we felt about 40 mile per hour gusts. we had that in saint pete. that was about an hour ago and that last rain band went through. this is feeling a little stronger even though we're kind of funneled in. i'm in the open but there's some treesen a a couple buildings. but you can see when it picks up. hurricanes are weird. when you're standing in them, it's not a constant wind in your face. it kind of blows at you, lets you gofundme blows at you, lets you go like that. so it's a little rocking. so far's not rag shifting me off my feet yet but with these rain bands coming in, if we get a 50 or 60 you'll see me rocking and rolling just a little bit. but so far jane 41 is the highest gust i've seen and that was at the airport just down the street. >> things will continue to go downhill from here watching the wind shift high tide coming in about a half hour to an hour sore so and that could spell trouble. >> we're already watching the higher than normal tides as you mentioned because of the astronomical tide but with the push of water from the offshow flow we'll be watching. bvd we'll check back with you. the latest on idalia high end category 2 storm, as i mentionedy grupp grade from here we're talking about a major hurricane that will be our first to make a major hurricane land fall funnel the 2023 season. that's a live look from tallahassee, the state capitol which, as this storm progresses farther off to the north at a pretty good clip, a hurricane warning in effect for tallahassee. this storm will be racing inland during the morning hours, and as it does so, it's going to bring those hurricane conditions all the way up into georgia. so here is the latest. this is the midnight advisory, typically they only come out every three hours but when the center is easily tracked by doppler radar we can thank the adad the national weather service novembers tampa bay, we get these hourly updates. so its motion is off to the north at 17 miles per hour. look at the minimum central pressure, that has been dipping fast over the last several hours. after that well-formed inner core was able to form throughout the afternoon and first part of the evening. the max winds at 110, again, when that gets bumped up to 115 we're talking about a category 3. on its way to what the national hurricane center and what we believe the forecast models had been hinting at that. this is likely up to category 4 status before it makes land fall on florida's big bend. the last time that this happened it was in cedar key levy county, hurricane easy back in 1950, so 73 years ago is the last time we've had anything like this. you look at the past seven hours, the yellow or the gold here, that's the united states air force reserve and the c 130, they're sampling the storm. you also have the noah hurricane hunters based out of lakeland linder airport right there sampling this and they've given us crucial data and what they've been finding each pass into the center of the system is unfortunately lower pressure and stronger winds. you've got that inverse relationship. you want to talk about rapid intensification, here it is. earlier today it only became a hurricane this morning, idalia. earlier today we had a low-end hurricane this morning, about 80 miles per hour. now we're up top 110. so we went from 75, the baseline for a hurricane, up top 110 and we're expecting this intensification to continue and quickly. here's the wind field you have tropical storm conditions occurring on florida's west coast but the intense inner core about a hundred miles off to the west of pinellas county and 150 miles south of the big bend. now the issue is you have this motion off to the north at about 17 miles per hour. that's going to bring that inner core to the big bend, or perhaps curving through the northern part of the nature coast here probably by about 7:00 a.m. tomorrow morning. from there, you're moving through the skinniest part of florida at a good clip, likely at that point up to about 20 miles per hour. this is going to quickly bring hurricane conditions toward places like georgia, arcing up the coast hurricane conditions possible along the coastline up into the carolinas. so this storm will have a next chapter after it makes land fall as what we're expecting to be a devastating category 4 hurricane. let's go back out to fox weather meteorologist one van dillen on clearwater beach where the wind is picking up. bob we've been talking about sure the number, the actual metric for the wind speed, that matters, but so does the direction. you mentioned that shift from the southeast to the southwest, that's what's going to start pushing water into the beaches and eventually into the mouth of tampa bay. >> that's the interesting part, too. it all depends on when that happens. we've already seen the water come up. i want you to look behind me right there, you see that little puddle right here, that's high tide so high tide peaks out about 12:30. so at 12:34 here it's already running high because of the super moon, about a 2.5 to three foot high tied today tomorrow a little over three feet because of the king tides that are rolling through here. but up to the south is what we're thinking is where that surge is going to start. i haven't seen it yet because the winds are still in my face out of the southeast and it's picked up. this is going to be the heaviest rain, this is certainly, ian, the biggest rain drops we have seen all night. we're right now in the big tropics, right? there's no doubt about it. big fat rain drops, squally conditions, the reign's in your face, starting to chop up the water big time. we have not seen that shift around though for the winds. when that happens, we're going to see the storm surge come roaring in here and it could be quick. we're talking 4-6 feet. the record here at clearwater beach is a 4-foot surge and that wasn't even with a hurricane that was with a nor'easter back in 1993 when it pounded it with snow in the wintertime. this could rival that. also the record for the tampa bay, ian you used to work here we know four feet, we could probably see that as it funnels in here. you think about what a storm surge is, if you blow in your cup of water it creates the ripples, that's like a mini storm surge, now put that on a global scale, the wind blowing right over the water channelling it into the tampa bay area, and it's not going to let it loose until that wind shifts around and says, go right back out again. that could be a long period of time. because the way this storm is coming in parallel to the beach, we could see that thing with the southwest winds for at least 12-16, maybe 18 hours. that would keep that water elevated, for sure. and here we are. this is the strongest rain band that we have seen so far today, it's the biggest one, the fattest rain drops and, yeah, nothing water proof when you have 45 mile per hour winds. ian. >> yeah. so it's a soggy bob van dillen no question. i worked down there bob back in 2020, that was the hurricane season that never ended, we went through the regular name list into the greek list, and it was eta, that was a tropical storm roughly the same distance out from where idalia is, that kicked up a surge of 3-4 feet in the bay and a lot of folks kind of slept on it because it was just a tropical storm and we were on what felt like our 50th named storm of the season. so, yes, that's the issue. >> so true. >> bob you told us when the wind shifts you're at the high tide cycle right now but this high tide won't be able to flow back out to the bay so that's kind of the cumulative effect that becomes the problem knifing the day tomorrow. >> yep. and we've been watching clear water bay behind us, which is clearly a smaller body of water but that's been riding high on this side as the wind's been pushing into us for the entire evening. it will be interesting to see exactly when that wind shift occurs and how high that storm surge is going to get. you know how it goes, a little bit of a storm surge comes in and then it comes roaring in right behind that. so i haven't seen that yet but like they taught us as kids, never turn your back to the ocean or the gulf. i'm not going to be doing that because i can see what's going to happen if that wind shifts and the wind is this strong. >> bob, we're getting into the of the night now i know evacuation orders have been put in place especially for clearwater beach. what's it been like the last couple of hours? i'm hoping people heeding the warnings, has it been quiet as far as people in and around the area? >> you know what? there's been people -- the nature of these storms, you get a rain band come in, it rains like it is right now, the wind picks up and then it clears on out and you're like a little dry slot because there are dry rain bands, right? when it clears out the beach kind of fills up again. i know it's past midnight now but right about dark it was packed. started to rain, everybody left, dried out again, they came back. so not a lot of people heeded any kind of of an evacuation, at least here, as far as i can see. and if those winds get above 40 miles per hour, like they are right now, they shut down those bridges. so you can't leave. also, another interesting thing, we had the police out here, too, and i asked them, i said, are you going to pull people -- the surfers were amazing, in here up until dark. i asked are you going to pull these guys out? no, they don't care. as long as it's good weather they're going to stick around. as soon as it turned bad they said they were going to leave and everybody's on their own. they turn on their lights let everybody know they were leaving the beach around dark and they left and haven't returned. so that's the way it is. people are on their own right now. if they didn't evacuate, it's too late. >> that's the danger of storms like this. you get the lull and it brings everybody to see what's happening outside. bob we'll check back in in a minute but i want to check in with our team, nicole valdez live from the tampa convention center as floridians brace for idalia's land fall tomorrow. nicole, what's the latest there. >> well, jane, all the rain bob talked about is now moving over the tampa bay area. we're just along the river walk here so you're league over at the bay. this is an area where the storm surge threat is really top of mind. i will point out not only the rain that we're seeing, but just how strong the wind gusts are slowly becoming. take a look at the palm trees. you'll start to see really the way that they're swaying and the strength here is becoming visible. that is the key here. as i move over towards the bay area, i want to point out that while we haven't started to see the real storm surge just yet we are already seeing a good amount of water pull off as we approach really the edge of the river walk and that's just because of all the rain we've had over the last few hours as it continues to fall so this rain continues to build we'll already have an inch orb two of water on the ground when the storm surge really begins much so if the forecast really comes to fruition here this could really become a significant problem and you'll notice here the boats in the distance are already protected and prepared for what's to come. we're starting to see them rock as the waivers start to pick up along the tampa bay here. they're sort of protected because of two things. one, not only that storm surge really rising the tide here but as the waves and winds start to become a problem, those waves will start to hit up against the dock, so that's sort of to try to protect them and keep the damage to a minimum. but we know that, again, it's this water that really is the focus of the story here and what officials are really concerned about, especially when you have such a vital resource like the only trauma hospital in the tampa bay area sitting on an island that is in a zone a evacuation area. thankfully there are some tools that they're bringing in to play with this storm to try to really prevent a catastrophic event here. the fencing you can sort of see across the bay here, we got some video of earlier today, essentially flood barriers that are now post up across the perimeter of tampa general hospital, mainly where their power source seems to be and around really their main entrances. it's called aqua fence. the company who developed that sort of barrier says it is actually built to only strengthen the more the water starts to build up. so the pressure from that water actually creates better tension on some of the outer rods and is supposed to better protect something like a trauma one hospital from seeing a significant or catastrophic flood event to keep, of course, the doctors and patients inside there as safe as possible. but, jane, this is really going to be the place to be to see some of the really bad storm surge, if it happens here around the bay. it's not just the coast where bob is, not only the river walk here behind me, tampa -- excuse me, bay shore boulevard is an area that we know consistently floods here around downtown tampa. so it's an area that police are driving up and down. they're trying to make sure no one is driving, no one is walking. the bridges here again are still open, as bob mentioned, but they could close if wind gusts pick up to a point where they're not safe to drive over. but we are seeing emergency crews around the area, whether their sirens on maybe helping to get people out if they haven't already or trying to just monitor to make sure people are not out because at this point it is probably going to be too late very soon. >> yeah, nicole that aqua fence protecting barrier around the hospital is such an important innovation as we go into storms like this. good to see that people are heeding the warning. we'll check back in with you in a couple minutes, nicole valdes live in tampa. we talk about the storm surge especially for tampa bay and ian you spent a lot of time in tampa you forecasted down there and it is one of the most vulnerable places in the country for taking on storm water. >> it is the most vulnerable metro area. she mentioned bay shore boulevard i lived by there, you spill a glass of water and it floods, it is vulnerable. that's the entire tampa bay itself which is shallow shaped like a mitt and catches all this water but that can be said about the entire region the big bend and the nature coast. >> not just how the topography kind of shifts as you talk about the mitt in tampa bay, this a big catcher's mitt for a lot of this water but also too the way that the ocean floor kind of slants its way down into the deeper waters of the gulf because of that slow receding down to the lower depths, it allows this water to continue to pile up as the storm comes in. >> the shallower water piles up more easily so you have the shelf that extends out a couple hundred miles. you can be about 200 miles out into the gulf of mexico. you're only in about 300 feet of water, then you go down florida and it's two miles all of a sudden so it does get deep but the shelf is very wide and makes this entire area. this was an unfortunate update from the national hurricane center with the 11:00 p.m. update, they bumped up the max surge, which we're expecting across the eastern part of the big bend, jane, where you're seeing all this red, that's where we could see surge, a reasonable worst case scenario up to about 16 feet. >> and that's not just immediately along the coastline. this surge can go miles inland, even at this depth, which is what's so scary about this part. we haven't really had an impact of this magnitude in the big bend of florida really since -- decades. >> yeah, across the reliable period of record, at least. now, the subtle thing here as we're showing you, again this is a reasonable worst case scenario talking about cedar key, a wonderful community that sticks out into the gulf of mexico. thorned this portion of florida's coastline isn't where we saw bob dillen, the beaches, south from there top five american beaches to the siesta key those are barrier islands. this is very marshy and it's low lying which is going to allow this water to extend quite far inland. this estimate, 12 miles. >> which, in a lot of ways is okay because it can kind of catch that water in a safe place and this a lesser populated area. >> yes. >> but still you have those individuals who have made their home there and so those evacuation orders being put into place and hopefully they've heeded that. the concern for seeing idalia come into the big bend is also going to have to be, you know, the time line of the tides. we talked about that in clear water, we talk about that in tampa and for the big bend this could be the difference between seeing that 16 foot of storm surge. >> this is going to be the one particular concern jane, early afternoon hours tomorrow, that high tide cycle with the storm having just made land fall, the strong onshore push of water, again thanks to our viewers watching right now on fox news and on some of the affiliates across the country, we're fox weather we're going to be tracking idalia every step of the way. >> that's why we're your hurricane headquarters we'll be here all night keep you abreast of the new updates coming from the national hurricane center and on the ground full team coverage on the field, tallahassee florida could see those big time wind gusts as dale i can't is set to head into really the northern big bend. >> and awaiting the next hourly update from the national hurricane center, as soon as we have it you will. >> that's right. for now take you to the stats, here's what we know with idalia right now. a 110 mile per hour wind category 2 storm. we're awfully close to major category strength forecasted to come potentially any minute as we continue to await the updates from the national hurricane center, the forward movement at 17 miles per hour, it's a fast-moving hurricane. we've got much more coming up here on fox weather, a companion network to fox news, continuing coverage on all your favorite connected devices. stay with us right here. to duckduckgo on all your devie duckduckgo comes with a built n engine like google, but it's pi and doesn't spy on your searchs and duckduckgo lets you browse like chrome, but it blocks cooi and creepy ads that follow youa from google and other companie. and there's no catch, it's fre. we make money from ads, but they don't follow you aroud join the millions of people taking back their privacy by downloading duckduckgo on all your devices today. >> back on fox weather taking a look at hurricane idalia category 2 storm expected to become a major category 4 hurricane at land fall come tomorrow morning. already ringing out a ton of rain, tropical storm force wind gusts along the western coast of florida, tampa included there. we're going to continue to watch as the impacts go downhill. watch into those outer rain bands too kind of lift up into jacksonville into southeastern georgia they're expected to see the impacts as we go through the day tomorrow. >> ian: jane this was the fear, this structure is here we saw that eye emerge earlier this evening. everything this storm needs to not just maintain its intensity but to get even stronger, in between now and the 130 miles it has left over the gulf of mexico, unfortunately that's what we're expecting in between now and then. we're at a category 2. any upgrade here is a major hurricane up to a 3. at land fall we are expecting this to be a category 4, and this particular portion of florida's coastline doesn't have any storm of reference on the period of record. >> jane: first time on record, in fact there were officials in the area saying don't take this one lightly. you know, you don't -- i know florida sometimes, you know, we think we've been through this before but of this magnitude especially in the big bend in the northern nature coast there, you've never seen anything like it. i mean, that rapid intensification happening as we've gone through the day today was forecast right on par of what we were expecting to see. 9:58 is that current pressure and we're awaiting the new update from the national hurricane center should be coming up at the top of the hour here >> ian: yeah, this we had hurricane hermine in 60 ended florida's long hurricane drought, somehow they went 05 to 2016 without a hurricane making land fall. >> jane: hurricane scenes can be funky sometimes it can be new orleans texas that takes the hit year after year but how erie is it that now we have idalia that replaces irma six years ago and then ian named last year. the "i" named storms. >> the "i" storms retired faster than any other. but even and irma were storms that cut into southwest florida. irma a bit off to the south and that put places like tampa bay and the regions we're looking at here where we're expecting the worst storm surge with a bit of "verse. >> jane: reverse. >> ian: back with irma andlesser extent ian tampa bay to empty out. >> jane: exactly, this time around we're not expecting that curve south of tampa bay and that puts like tampa bay clear water region especially up in big bend into a much more dangerous position. here's the wind speeds, we have gusts right now but we have an offshore wind. >> ian: that's the key. >> jane: that's the key at this hour keeping the storm surge at bay, especially saint marks, crawfordville right along the coast there. because those winds are blowing off the land, we're keeping really any of the flooding potential at this hour due to just the plain old rain that's coming down. but in a place like say island view park you start to get the push of wind on the north side of the storm and now you might see the impact of some of that water being pushed in from those winds. >> ian: jane we talked about the big bend down the marches we showed you a moment ago toward crystal river yes it is more marshy but there are rivers that extend inland, the water gets pushed up and you see the surge, if you've been there three sister spring, fantastic fresh water spring that empties out into the crystal river, you can kayak and see the manatees, there's oysters up that way. these are places where many floridians love to visit facing the worst of these threats when you have what's soon to be a major hurricane just about a hundred miles off shore. >> jane: you can see the wobble of that pin hole eye as we call it. and pin hole eye, too, a sign have an intensifying storm. when you get that smaller center that clearing just a touch, the deep convection around the eye right now sitting 90 miles southwest of clear water saint pete. >> ian: inner corresponds can strengthen more quickly they can weaken but there's nothing to weaken the system. >> jane: warm weather and that has been the danger all season. >> want to check in with caroline elliott in clear water right now. what are you hearing and seeing as the dark of night has come really to the area. >> reporter: yeah, right now we're overlooking downtown saint petersburg and the only driver we've seen on the road for the last several hours are police officers as people really seem to be taking these warnings seriously as far as staying inside as that wind and rain started to pick up. we also know right now we're about a quarter mile away from the water, and in the last hour we started hearing reports of 30-foot waves in the saint pete area. again, very wild ocean by this graphic that we're seeing. and more inland, seeing those same conditions, right? that wind, that rain, as sideways rain in some instances tonight, and the lightning starting as hurricane idalia gets closer to florida's coastline. talking with business owners and homeowners on the ground we're hearing mixed reactions as to how people are preparing. we know a lot of people are taking this serious and we know that because a lot of these hotels are packed, some are even sold out. but we also know that some people did not take this warning seriously, and did not evacuate even when they were told to. guys? >> ian: caroline, a recent gust where you are in saint pete up to 53 miles per hour so certainly be safe, we'll be checking back in with you. that's fox news multi media report of caroline elliott. thank you. >> jane: want to take you through the timing of this storm, what we're expecting to see not only in the coming hours but as we open up the day tomorrow where land fall is pretty eminent as we go through the early part of wednesday. >> ian: that's the issue it throttled back a touch the latest speed in this positional update fruity the national hurricane center was at midnight. it's moving off of just east of due north at about 17 miles per hour but as you kind of eyeball test look where this is going. you only have this small portion of northern florida. this is a sprawling system that will quickly move off to the north. it's expected to still be a well-formed cat one moving across southern georgia. >> jane: which is incredible because earlier forecasts were keeping it at maybe tropical storm strength and i think in the little time that we've really had to prepared for this, how quickly it's ramped up, there might be some people who have maybe let their guard down but now as we go into the main event, you really need to make sure you're hunkering down into place especially in these overnight hours. we were talking with our one van dillen live on the beach in clear water, he said a couple people are coming through to the beaches when the rain let up and that's the danger that, with these tropical storms, it draws a lot of eyes, draws a lot of hey i want to check it out and see what's happening but weather can turn like a dime and especially in a system like this which is rapidly intensifying. those rain bands, while they're just offshore, they've got wind gusts easily upwards of 60 miles per hour more heavy rain too. >> ian: folks that live in florida even if you've been through numerous events like this tropical storms and hurricanes, this is a bizarre setup in a sense, we were talking about this with fox weather specialist brian earlier a set of meet logic conditions that looks more like october which the tampa bay area is more vulnerable late in the season because we have this powerful front to the north which ends up kicking this east along the georgia and carolina coast lines. >> jane: interesting to see how everything's been connected. initially i think what's also helping keep idalia off the coast of florida, too, don't forget we had franklin a major category 4 hurricane in the atlantic, that set its sites off to the west of bermuda. the outflow of that storm helping to push this into the warmer waters, the gulf, over the last couple days. >> ian: this is the tornado watch that's in effect up and down the peninsula, the western half the peninsula right to the spine of the state. you always have a lot of spin, of course, with any land fall and tropical system but we had -- that was another aspect of this. >> jane: those intense bands earlier today. >> ian: yeah, earlier late season, it had more of a subtropical look with the arcing that came over the top and went down south. and that went west to east across the peninsula jane. i think naples portions of collier county there was like six tornado warnings. >> jane: flooding rains happening in naples and fort myers i think two areas that maybe are looking at this storm thinking okay, we're in a good spot, we're not expected to see the worst of the impacts but the flooding rain and the impacts made it to the east coast, too, up the 853 leaving miami was a real stretch this evening. >> ian: right. these are the hurricanes warning where we're expecting hurricane conditions, you see that up across the nature coast here and up to the big bend, but if you look above the banner, there you go, hurricane warnings that extend all the way up into southern georgia because of what we were talking about, the fast forward motion of this system. there won't be enough time for it to spin down with the friction over land before it moves up into georgia. >> jane: yeah so you need to be alert hunkering down as the morning opens up we're going to be seeing that really strong major category 4 hurricane potentially making impact there. >> ian: looks like we have video coming in out of a lucia county nearly all of florida seeing impacts from hurricane idalia. let's bring in fox 35 orlando reporter patrick perez. he's live in va lucia county. patrick what are the conditions now because we were just discussing some of these bands that moved from west to east across the peninsula, both sides of the state have been feeling these impacts >> reporter: ian i have to tell you for the most part tonight has been pretty calm except for probably within the past hour or so the wind has picked up. i want to show you some of the palms swaying in the wind. i know it's hard to see because it's dark out but hopefully with the street light next to it you can see what i mean. we did have an outer band hit this area around 6:30, 7:00. it did bring with it some wind and some rain but that has since dissipated and it's been calm. again no rain some of the wind now picking up but otherwise not a problem. the problem today has been the surf in this area. if we can i want to show you some video of what daytona beach looked like earlier this afternoon because the surf was so rough, the life guards had to fly a red flag, a single red flag to indicate at that the rip currents are dangerous especially in these conditions and tomorrow they're meeting to discuss whether to fly two red flags which would mean the beaches here in volusia county will be closed to the public. of course all of this action by the water has brought out a lot of people. we saw people coming out by the parking lot overlooking the water. we also met up with a woman who had evacuated from new port richey and traveled all the way here across the state to volusia county to take refuge here. she did the same thing last year. here's what she had to say about what she went through when she got here. >> i was by myself in a little town house down here and it got a little scary because they had tornado warnings at one point and then the winds were really bad, the storms were bad. you hear banging. but, you know, i've been through hurricanes before so i made it through. . >> reporter: several inches of rain that we are expecting in the coming hours are not going to be anything like what she saw last year with hurricane ian but no doubt that still has kind of spooked a lot of people who went through what they did last year. so that's the case here. we've also spoken with other people who say this is the first time they're experiencing some sort of tropical cyclone this season on this part of the state. so they gathered the materials that they could. they say they they've got movies lined up, all these different activities as long as of course they don't lose the power ian. >> ian: patrick that was a frustrating exercise for folks last year as ian cut in and then folks that came from the west coast felt the impacts on the east coast. this an entirely different setup so certainly some refuge on the other side of the state. fox 35 orlando reporter patrick perez thanks for joining us here on fox weather >> fox weather is a companion network to fox news, we welcome you in if you're watching us tonight. we have continuing coverage on all of your favorite connected devices. we're everywhere you are and you can find us 24/7 right here on fox weather. tonight we are watching idalia every step of the way, a storm that is expected to be a category 4 at land fall early wednesday morning. keep it here with us on fox weather. ♪ mara, are you sure you don't want -to go bowling with us tonight? -yeah. no. there's my little marzipan! [ laughs ] oh, my daughter gives the best hugs! we're just passing through on our way to the jazz jamboree. [ imitates trumpet playing ] and we wanted to thank america's number-one motorcycle insurer -for saving us money. -thank you. [ laughs ] mara, your parents are -- exactly like me? i know, right? well, cherish your friends and loved ones. let's roll, daddio! let's boogie-woogie! >> ian: welcome back to fox weather, we would like to extend a special welcome here to our viewers on fox news tonight with a simulcast also on a number of affiliates across the country as we track what we're expecting to soon be major hurricane idalia i'm ian oliver. >> jane: and i'm jane minar, fox news with you every step of the way every connected tv device and check in on your phone 24/7 download the free fox weather app. idalia impacting all parts of florida, billy woods joining us on the phone. billy thanks for joining us this evening. you talk about what your office is doing getting into the final stages of this storm and what it's been like so far. >> you know, the bands are beginning to reach us here now, and we've had some good rain that's beginning to start. obviously we're going to get an awful lot of those hard bands. but luckily the storm, as you all already know, shifted a little back to the west, taking that hurricane warning off of our central of merion county but it's still part of the west part of marion county. floridians know to get ahead of the ball game, teams are put in place, our hot lines are active. i know that the 20-some hot lines that i have running right now, they've been active all since about noon today, and the teams are out there. but, you know, i never look at merion county as large as we are we have to have it spread out throughout the county so that when we do have any serious issues with trees down, power lines down or people flooding, or trapped in their homes, these teams have to be able to get to them quickly and clear the waters for first responders once the storm is over. >> ian: sheriff i've been lucky to live in kentucky and in florida, and marion county in kentucky they actually look a lot more alike than i think most folks that haven't lifted that part of florida, it's horse country. it's beautiful landscape. you're away from the shoreline so the biggest threat with this being the storm surge isn't a consideration. what were you posed concerned about moving through the overnight hours tonight and through the first part of the day tomorrow for your portion of florida? >> well, really my main concern is obviously they have already put us on the high alert for tornados. we're susceptible to tornados not evenly having a hurricane threat, and most people who have never experienced tornados know they're unpredictable, they pop out of nowhere, and that's where we get our most devastating damage, the homes get destroyed. and right now, what has me truly concerned is, you know, i've got six shelters open and the population in the shelters are actually sitting very low, which tells me a lot of citizens decided to stay in their homes. and if these tornados do hit, i'm hoping that we don't have people injured, i hope we don't have any deaths, but that's one of my major concerns. and then as we go into the morning is, you know, you mentioned the flooding. i'm hoping, especially in the glen ellen area and the river, the rainbow river and everything else will come out fine and flooding, but glen ellen's going to be hit heart. and then i focus not only our county but our focus will have to turn to our neighboring counties, levy gilchrist and dixie that we're going to have to go and help respond to. >> jane: sheriff you talk about how the shelters are looking low as far as how many people are riding out the storm at home. for those of us listening, what advice do you have for them? what about 911 operations as they go through the night. what's the best practice if they find themselves in a dangerous situation? >> well, they're there, unfortunately. and if these winds are going to be as high as they are, we're not going to be able to immediately respond. one, if they start getting flooding they need to find the highest part of the home that they can. if that means the roof top that means the roof top. if they have any form of a hand radio, they need to carry it with them, because the last hurricane we had down south, it my team that got on the radio of an elderly woman that wass on roof down in lee county. and because she reached the hand radios here in merion, we were able to get rescue to her and get her off the roof of her home. so that's -- my advice is this. if they have any form of a hand radio they need to take it with them. if they feel that they're getting -- if they have any phone connectivity they need to immediately call us and in that scenario dial 911 call the com center. anything else needs to be information >> ian: sheriff we know land-falling tropical systems especially ones of this intensity present a number of threats and we'll be watching for any of those bands for rotation as they're pivoting on through. we know it's going to be an uneasy night we appreciate your time. the merion county sheriff billy woods thanks for talking with us here on fox weather. >> thanks for having me. >> ian: best of luck moving through the night. we do want to check in with the fox team on the ground in florida. fox news reporter matt finn joins us live from tampa. matt how are the conditions there? we know we're close to a high tide cycle and we are we're concerned about the high tide cycle moving into the early afternoon hours tomorrow. we saw your shot pop up. you've got some big waves behind you. >> yeah, we do, we're in saint pete beach which is about 20-30 minute drive west of tampa, this is one of those barrier islands very popular tourist destination and over the past 60 minutes or so we've seen this water line dramatically shift towards us, i don't know, maybe 20 or 30 feet perhaps it is the high tide, perhaps the surge, a combination of both. but we have seen the ocean slowly consume a large portion of this beach. now it's kind of sitting at a standstill, and that's basically what's been happening all night long. the weather has been dramatically fluctuating here. i've been standing out here when it's downpour and intense winds and right now it's a lull whether it's rather quiet and completely dry. took off my rain coat. we have he a been seeing that on and off,r hour has been different. but we're watching the wind right now kind of pushing the water inward and a little bit northward so that's the conditions right now in saint pete beach. this is part of the zone a mandatory evacuation because it's one of the lowest lying, if not the lowest-lying area in the tampa bay area, and so anybody who remains here in this area now is basically on their own. governor desantis has warned that if you reach for the phone, emergency responders may not be able to help you. back to you. >> jane: matt just behind you we saw what looked like perhaps police, emergency personnel on the beaches there? >> reporter: yep. >> jane: has that been happening the last couple hours? what's on the ground with what they're advising people to do? >> reporter: the sheriff's vehicles have been driving up and down periodically. we also see what are perhaps security or personnel from one of the many hotels and sprawling resorts that are on this beach. you know, right now would probably be a fairly busy time for tourism. in fact the resort where we're staying at, this he told us that they had to finally ask everyone to leave yesterday. so people might have normally been out for a late night walk here right now, but it's basically a ghost town. apparently everybody has cooperated with the evacuation zone. we've covered hurricanes, here comes the rain again. we've covered hurricanes right here in this area before where we've seen flooding, you know, push into the residential areas, push into the commercial areas. it's extremely prone to that. we're likely going to see some of that again based on the water line that we're seeing right now, the rain on and off here in saint pete beach. back to you. >> ian: yeah, we'll be watching for that moving through the overnight hours tonight and into tomorrow. that onshore flow persists so the water stays high and that's where that surge risk becomes a bit prolonged through the overnight hours early part of the day tomorrow. fox news reporter matt finn, thanks for joining us. >> jane: we have a lot more coming up here on fox weather your hurricane headquarters, stay with us. we're expecting to get the new update from idalia coming up in just a few minutes from the national hurricane center. ♪ ♪ >> ian: welcome back to fox weather, this is our continuing coverage of hurricane idalia, an intensifying, right now category 2 storm which is awfully close to becoming a major hurricane, a category 3, unfortunately we are expecting this to reach category 4 intensity before it makes land fall tomorrow morning. the big bend region of florida, that will likely be sometime around 7:00 a.m. so what you're seeing here is the latest information from the national hurricane center because this center, in through here, you can see that well-formed eye, is easily detected by doppler radar we can see it out of tbw the national weather service office radar in rus kin florida. we're getting hourly updates from the national hurricane center so it's ten of right now, we'll have some new information for you in just a matter of minutes. you'll have it as soon as we get it. right now a category 2 storm, it could be in a few minutes we get that upgrade to a category 3 which will make this a major hurricane on approach to florida's gulf coast. so right now, as we're looking at the sprawling size of this system, it's about 300 miles across. that inner core has organized and then intensified over the last several hours, a period of rapid intensification did occur, and we're expecting this to continue to get stronger until it makes that land fall, call it this morning now, we're about six hours out. both of these flights have now completed, it's the noah hurricane hunters, which are based out of lakeland lindor airport and the united states air force reserve that fly out of biloxi, they've been giving us critical information with these flights throughout the day today and the past few days. the air force, they just took off out of biloxi, they're en route so we'll be getting new data in from them and as soon as they arrive and start transmitting that data we'll bring that to you right here on fox weather. a special welcome to folks watching us tonight through the overnight on fox news channel. this is a three dimensional look at the structure of idalia and look at that, on the northern and western side of that inner core, the eye wall, you can see the vertical development to these storms. keep in mind we measured that we have cody bro, that's what a hundred miles offshore still? yeah, so we're scanning this at a very high altitude and cody is showing you here this eye is about 11 miles across. it's been that tiny pin hole that emerged earlier this evening. the issue is that when you have small inner cores to haines, they're more prone to rapid intensification, becoming stronger and quickly, to a much lesser extent we saw this over on the southern texas gulf coast with harold which used its final hours out over the gulf of mexico to become a significantly more intense. this is a whole different ball game here. this is what we're expecting to soon be a major hurricane on up to a cat 4 when this makes land fall in the big bend. and you can't see some of these bands extending -- yeah. you can see all of them with this three dimensional look as we're looking tilted down. it was the initial band earlier today kind of reeked havoc all the way across the peninsula, numerous tornado warnings from naples all the way over to the opposite side. in fact earlier today, miami dade had a tornado warning, severe thunderstorm warning with a tornado possible. so this has been a storm that is spawning even hundreds of miles displaced from its center of circulation, very powerful thunderstorms. there is the wind field which we just measured to be something like 300 miles across. at least when we're talking about the precipitation, the rain associated with the storm system. the inner core is still about a hundred miles off shore but unfortunately that's what's heading farther off to the north. and on the dirty side, the advancing side of this storm system, you've got the forward speed, which is up to almost 20 miles per hour, working in conjunction adding to the actual winds from the storm itself. so that's why we're seeing the greatest threats on the advancing side of this system. so for that reason, this presents a significant threat, and we're just a few moments out from getting the latest information, jane, from the national hurricane center. >> jane: yeah, and you take a look at the forecast cone there, i think we want to take you through the timing of this storm because overnight, you know, these outer rain bands are going to continue to quickly approach, you know, where we're expecting to see that land fall. tampa, of course, has already been through the thick of it over the last couple of hours as that rain has filled in. it's a category 2 storm now but that rapid intensification expected by land fall, that's a category 4 storm, and then because it's such a thin piece of land between, you know, the gulf coast and then the florida/georgia line expecting to see the impact of at least a category 1 hurricane in southeast georgia. >> ian: right. and the issue here, outside of being horribly susceptible to storm surge in that mitt, the big bend region and down the nature coast, saw pine trees which do not hold up well at all. we saw that farther west in the panhandle with hurricane michael. these snap off and that's going to lead to significant power outages. that extends all the way into georgia, when you have these hurricane force winds. this is going to be a huge amount of real estate that crews were going to have to work to restore this power. for folks that lose it, it could be out for a while because of the size of the job that that's going to be. >> jane: yeah, you talk about that but you also talk about how the impact is going to come especially across georgia and into the carolinas, as this storm kind of hooks eastward, you talk about the wind fields and how those winds are going to be wrapping up from the south. we could potentially see a worsening flood threat especially for a place like savannah charleston into the low country of the carolinas not just from the flooding rain expected to come from idalia but also too the push of those southerly winds on shore could bring in a little bit of storm surge especially in our vulnerable spots for like the charleston bay. >> ian: oh, yeah, you could get a push of water over on the atlantic side. the latest forecast in some of these areas even into the low country up to about four feet but inland with this fresh water flooding from the heavy rain, this is a big problem and that's what we were talking about earlier with kind of this bizarro meteorological setup that looks like it should be october with the powerful front. we've had the fall preview in the northeast, that front finds its way to the appalachians and will squeeze out some of that tropical moisture. >> jane: i spent a lot of time in georgia and i can tell you that ars part of the downtown that floods very quickly under that very likely risk of flooding even up into columbia which saw flooding rains from storms earlier this week. so these are vulnerable spots that as hurricane idalia starts to push its way up into georgia and the carolinas, are really going to be locked into hours worth of flooding rains. at at this point you have the tropical storm force winds that continue to extend outwards from the center, that's going to lead to more power outages, downed trees especially with the saturated soils. this really unwelcomed, you know, middle part of the week as we go wednesday into thursday. >> ian: yeah all of that green represents flood watches that run up through the carolinas as this system brings with it several inches of rain. this is a look at our exclusive fox model, there you go with what we're expecting to be that major hurricane at land fall. this is lunchtime tomorrow jane. >> jane: and i want to point out the tornado risks that could come with these outer rain bands that shift inland from charleston into columbia into the carolinas. this outer rain band as the storm is kind of interacting with land, the friction of the forward movement of this storm is going to bring in that severe weather component so you need to make sure you're keeping your fox weather alerts turned on, have those notifications of the danger that could be coming as we go throughout the day. keep your phones charged up because of course the fox weather app is with you the whole step of the way. >> ian: look at the intensity of this, this is 6:00 a.m. thursday morning, that area of low pressure as it is as that point, call it 36 hours from now still moving up the coastline and eventually back out into the atlantic. so we still have chapters left to be written with idalia, no question, but the threat in the short term is a major hurricane on its way toward the florida coastline in the big bend, we'll be tracking it all night right here on fox news and fox weather. stay with us. ♪ >> ian: welcome back. florida is on alert tonight. hurricane idalia rapidly intensifying as it barrels toward florida. idalia now expected to be a category 4 storm at landfall. its impacts are already being felt in some areas, but the real danger is still to come. >> and floridaians are bracing for the potential catastrophic impaints, life-threatening storm surge as hurricane idalia locks in on land. right now, 5 million are in the forecast cone and millions more are facing dangerous threats from the storm. >> jane, we just got a new advisory in fromhe

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