heading back to washington, d.c. a day ahead of schedule. earlier he called irene a historic storm. >> i cannot stress this highly enough. if you are in the projected path of the hurricane, you have to take precautions now. don't wait. don't delay. we all hope for the best but have to be prepared for the worst. >> irene is on track to follow the northeast corridor right up to new england and beyond. cnn is there. reynold wolf is in new jersey, and athena jones is in annapolis, maryland. we will start here in the weather center with cnn meteorologist, chad meyers. chad, give us an idea of where irene is now. >> not too much changed overnight. the storm did get a little stronger, and as it got stronger, you could see the eye. at 2:00 in the morning, you could truly see the eye. now we don't see it anymore. that tells me the storm is being torn up by a little bit of sheer. it's still a 105-mile-per-hour storm. it will not say category 3 or 4 anymore, but don't let your guard down. if you think about what happened to andrew and hugo, they came straight in to the u.s. coast. straight in. there was nothing else affecting the storms, no wind or nothing to turn them. this storm was being pushed by wind the entire time it approached the u.s. east coast, and that caused the turn and a decrease in intensity of the wind and it caused the hurricane itself to be torn up a little bit. now the influence is over and it gets to go straight for a while. it has the potential to regain strength. by the time it hits north carolina, whether it's from almost wilmington, still offshore to cape hattious, see how the cone is getting closer, now north carolina you are in a small cone, and it looks somewhere between moorhead city, and atlantic beach, it's 105 miles per hour. and then if it's inland and it goes into the chesapeake bay, that could cause a surge into the bay, and then the track in the middle, looks like it will descend on the jersey shore, and straight on up and into the new york city area. to the east of there is where all the wind will be. that could be here, even though you may not get wind in massachusetts and connecticut, if it's further to the west, the spin is potentially making tornados for you which could cause just as much damage if not more than the hurricane itself. the storm has gone down a little bit. you will not see the 135 potential anymore, but don't let your guard down, think of what an 85-mile-per-hour storm would do over the city, and still has the potential to do a lot of damage monetarily and physically. >> and in the northeast corridor, we're talking about a lot more potential damage inland, not just hovering around the coast. >> that's correct. the tornados would be to the east of the eye, and back through here through the appellation chain, we could see 10 inches of rainfall in a come of five hours, and that could cause flooding along the western side of the eye as well. >> we will check back with you. let's see how people are bracing along the coastal cities. let's go to the barrier islands there where reynold wolf is. they are used to this kind of drill. what is different this time? >> reporter: at this point, you could not tell it's a bad time in terms of the rough weather. it looks like a tranquil day. a few white caps here and there, but most tranquil. if you pan around a little bit more in this direction, you see clear of the beach, not a soul. that's an amazing thing in itself, here we are in august on a great summer afternoon, and you would expect there would be all kinds of people out here. on any given day in august you have upwards of 250,000 people here, and on top of that you have 57,000 people who live here year round. a moment ago, you saw the flag that happened -- the red flag means no swimming. and one of the reasons why is the by products with one of the systems is you have the big rip currents, and that's going to intensify as the storm system gets closer. you don't see the signs of the rough weather here, look at the video we have of just yesterday. around town, a lot of things getting boarded up. a lot of national chains in terms of restaurants and super markets boarded up because they do indeed know what is coming. long history of storms through the outer banks. in just 2003, fredricka, another eye storm, and we're talking about isabel came through a few miles from the location that knocked down some 2,000 feet of the island and the channels were 15 feet deep in places. if this ends up being a category 2 hurricane, the storm surge could be 7 to 12 feet. and so it could be a pretty interesting scenario to say the least. with the atlantic here, it's warm and water coming on this side, and then the hotel on the other side of the outer banks, you have a series of bodies of water, and the sound and the part eer inner coastal waterway and a one-two punch expected. >> yeah, and it could be 8:00 p.m. saturday evening when they could be in the bullseye. and then on sunday, pleasant point beach. are people taking measures similar to that in bracing for irene? >> reporter: yes and no. we have evidence of folks taking their boats out of the water and boarding up windows. you can see some people are still not he heding the warning. they will see the mandatory evacuation going into effect later, but the out-of-towners coming out to enjoy the last minute of sun. we have some of them with us. we have this family, and all of these guys -- well, two young girls belong to her and the boys are nephews. you are from out of town? yes. >> reporter: you came down here any way. you would prefer, emergency officials, you are not here right now. >> i know. >> reporter: why are you here? >> i had to keep the kids busy. >> when will you head out? >> about 2:00. >> reporter: and officials don't want everybody to head out at the same time. is that something you are concerned about, the strain on the roadways? >> yes. >> reporter: people watching this would say there are so many other ways to entertain the family rather than bringing them out to a place like where we are right now when a hurricane is on its way. >> i didn't go to the beach and stayed on the boardwalk. i didn't want to take chances with them in the water. >> reporter: kids, how do you feel like coming down here on a day like today? >> it's scary, actually. we never really witnessed something like this, like a hurricane. it's beautiful out right now. >> reporter: that's the calm before the storm. >> it's stairy. >> reporter: what are your thoughts? >> not really worried, just wanted to have fun on the boardwalk. >> reporter: i hope you had your fun, and i hope after the live shot you will take the advice of the emergency officials and head out. are you going to do that? >> yes. >> reporter: colleen and her family will be heading out, and hopefully others will take the warnings issued. the governor said this will be a very dangerous storm, a storm that people have not seen here in a very, very long time, and he wants people to heed the warnings. people like colleen feel like they can come out to the beach and enjoy the sun, but once again you don't want everybody trying to leave at the same time and putting the strain on the transportation system. >> among those states preemptively declaring a state of emergency ahead of the storm, all right, thank you so much, jason carroll, from point pleasant, new jersey, and not far from where you are at beach, atlantic city coming from trump entertainment, asking all of the guests there in atlantic city to leave that entertainment. and now let's move to annapolis. a college town. that's where we find our athena jones. what is happening there in beautiful annapolis? >> reporter: well, hi, fredricka. the key word here is sandbags. we just got an update from the city officials that said they expect to see a storm surge of 3 feet, and this morning we heard two to three feet. so you have the businesses around downtown annapolis, and businesses that would have been under several feet of water back in the last serious storms, isabel, in 2003. it's a very low-lying flood-prone zone. we're talking six to eight inches of water of rain between saturday and sunday. we have businesses coming out, residents coming out, and piling sandbags after sandbags into their vehicles. their open bed trucks, when the trucks come up every few minutes, maybe 20 minutes or every half hour or so you see people waiting for the trucks, and rushing the sandbags, and rushing them and throwing the bags on to wheel bare ybarrows, some of them are breaking. one woman said her home flooded in isabel and she will not let it happen again. and one man said last time he did not stack the sandbags high enough, and this time he will get more. nobody wants to gamble. >> people taking irene very seriously. thank you so much. how prepared is the big apple, new york city, for hurricane irene? the storm could shut down subways, and airports within the next 48 hours. we will talk about preparations there next. yeah. 24 bucks later. that hurts. it's not like i really had a choice. snack on this. progressive's "name your price" tool showed me a range of coverages and i picked the one that worked for me. i saved hundreds. wow, that's dinner and a movie. [ dramatic soundtrack plays ] this picture stars you and savings. but mostly savings. out there with a better way. now, that's progressive. you've been stuck in the garage, while my sneezing and my itchy eyes took refuge from the dust in here and the pollen outside. but with 24-hour zyrtec®, i get prescription strength relief from my worst allergy symptoms. it's the brand allergists recommend most. ♪ lily and i are back on the road again. where we belong. with zyrtec®, i can love the air®. where we belong. any questions? no. you know... ♪ we're not magicians ♪ we can't read your mind ♪ ♪ read your mind ♪ we need your questions ♪ each and every kind ♪ every kind ♪ will this react with my other medicine? ♪ ♪ hey, what are all these tests even for? ♪ ♪ questions are the answer ♪ yeah ♪ oh [♪...] >> male announcer: now, for a limited time, your companion flies free, plus save up to 65%. call 1-800-sandals. conditions apply. we're reporting on hurricane irene, but there are other stories we want to tell you about. a maze of circles under the town of tripoli. and yesterday a radio station aired a defiant message from the former libyan leader. an amtrak train plowed into a farm vehicle in nebraska today. the train with the 178 people onboard derailed. their injuries are not thought to be life threatening. the train was headed to chicago. and then the ceremony that had been planned to coincide with the 48th anniversary of the march in washington when king delivered his "i have a dream" speech. organizers have not announced a new day for the dedication. we just looked at how irene could devastate new york city. up next, how the u.s. military is preparing for search and rescue operations for the entire coast. you don't want to go anywhere. we continue to bring you the latest on the breaking news of hurricane irene, and we're covering all the angles. the cnn pentagon correspondent, chris lawrence, joins us now on what the u.s. military is doing to prepare for the worst, what is going on to get the search and rescue operations ready for the entire coast, what is happening? >> the pentagon has now designated 18 helicopters that will be used by fema, and can be used by fema for the search and rescue operations that are a likely possibility in the wake of a storm like this one. some of those planes the pentagon says will also be used for surveillance, to look at damaged areas, perhaps to look for people who are in distress and survivors in those areas. fema has been prepositioning a lot of supplies at several military bases in massachusetts, new jersey, and north carolina. these include things like generators and supplies of water and food and tarps and baby supplies, and things they will need to get out as quickly as possible. they have been storing those at some of the military bases in those three states. the military has been moving a lot of the assets out of the way of the storm so they could then not only be protected, but also be brought back if needed. the air force moved lots of planes out to ohio to get them out of the way. the navy has 38 ships out to sea. this represents about 13% of the entirety employable battle ships. a sizeable portion of the u.s. navy on the east coast has headed out to sea to get out of the way of the storm. what the ships will do is let the storms pass between them and the east coast of the united states, and then they will come back around and follow the storm back around so that they will inbound position if needed to use some of the assets to help people along the coast. >> i wonder, chris, are they going to be relocating the personnel? you talk about the appear rarat but what about personnel? >> a lot of the bases have gone to the constructive weather condition three, which means a weather event is imminent, and they have been locking down bases to secure the equipment, and a lot of the national guard troops in several states have been put on alert, and by one estimate they could be as many as 1,000 potential national guard troops available to all of these governors along the eastern seaboard. in a lot of ways, what the military is doing is sort of getting the assets in place, and then you sort of just have to let the storm come through and then figure out where these assets can best be used. >> thank you so much, lawrence. and stay with us throughout the 2:00 p.m. eastern hour where we will break down on to you to have a survival hit on your own so you are safe should the weather strike. and ben bernanke, did he say what investors were hoping? that's next. ♪ [ doug ] i got to figure this out. i want to focus on innovation. but my data is doubling. my servers are maxed out. i need to think about something else when i run. [ male announcer ] with efficient i.t. solutions from dell, doug can shift up to 50% of his company's technology spend from operating costs to innovation. so his company runs better, and so does doug. dell. the power to do more. an accident doesn't have to slow you down. with better car replacement, available only from liberty mutual insurance, if your car's totaled, we give you the money to buy a car that's one model-year newer... with 15,000 fewer miles on it. there's no other auto insurance product like it. better car replacement, available only from liberty mutual. it's a better policy that gets you a better car. call... or visit one of our local offices today, and we'll provide the coverage you need at the right price. liberty mutual auto insurance -- responsibility. what's your policy? [ male announcer ] they'll see you...before you see them. cops are cracking down on drinking and riding. drive sober, or get pulled over. east coast cities praysing for hurricane irene. let's listen to d.c. mayor, vince vincent gray. >> we want to thank the president for his support in the impending weather event. first of all, we had an extensive weather briefing, and we can expect activity around the hurricane to really begin early saturday afternoon. and that would run into saturday -- sunday, excuse me, sunday afternoon. so roughly a period of 24 hours during which we would experience the conditions of a hurricane. there could be some flooding. we don't know the extent of that during this stage. the department of public works for the last 24 hours has been making sandbags available to people who would like to have them, to address their concerns about the possibility of flooding. we understand the rainfall could be two to four inches. that will not come into the district of columbia. rainfall could go higher, of course. that is still an unfolding situation. we should expect tropical winds, and that would be diminishing early sunday, perhaps winds of up to 50 miles per hour on sunday, and again maybe some flooding into sunday. we had quite an extensive discussion here today. the national guard was here with us, and fema was here with us, a and other federal partners, our utility partners and members of the private sector. the national guard will be at the ready in the event that we need to deploy them. general schwarz was here this afternoon and we worked with them to try and prepare the way for that as well as fema. we have pepco here with us, and i think i will call upon them to speak shortly. with respect to services in the city tomorrow, many of the services that would normally be open on saturday will be closed except for the libraries, and the libraries will be open tomorrow. they normally close around 5:00 or 5:30 or 6:00 on saturday, and whatever the normal closing hours are will be observed on saturday, and in addition to that, the dmv will be open tomorrow if that dmv happens to normally be open as well. they will be open on saturday until, i think, about 5:30. for people who are homeless, normally they would be out of the shelters at 7:00 a.m. on saturday morning. all the shelters will be open for the entire day tomorrow and into sunday through the duration of this hurricane so that people can have shelter available to them should they choose to. and we are also setting aside -- these will be run by dhs also, and we're setting aside for the department of parks and recreation facilities for residents finding themselves needing to vacate their own homes. and that's turkey thicken on 10th street northeast. the southeast tennison learning center, and then capital street northeast southeast, right on the line, and the national guard is making available to us the armory as well in the event we have extensive sheltering needs. i will ask millison west to come up and share with the public tips that would be germane for people to get through this. we also are extending our own communications efforts, beginning at 7:00 tomorrow morning, channel 16, which is one of our peg channels, will be on 24/7. it will be on live starting at 7:00 a.m., and through the duration of the hurricane, providing information to people in the district of columbia. also, we want to encourage people -- there are lots of phone numbers we could give out. we want to encourage people to use 311. 311 can connect people with anyone of the utilities, anyone of our agencies and makes it easier for people. they will be fully staffed here through the duration of the hurricane. all staff that works in the center will be here. jennifer green who is our new director will be available to be responsible for all of that. and also the mpd would have been fully staffed anyway, because of the martin luther king memorial events. they will remain in the same state of readiness because of the hurricane. again, i am sure everybody is aware that the dedication ceremony on sunday has been cancelled and will be rescheduled for a later date, maybe a couple months. we don't have information on that at this stage. and the gala that was scheduled for saturday night has been cancelled as well. the national action network march that was being scheduled by reverend al sharpton has been cancelled, and i think many of you know we were planning a full democracy rally and march tomorrow, and that has been cancelled tomorrow as well and will be schedule for a later point. having that been said, i will ask pepco, because i know there will be questions with respect to pepco, i will ask the representative from pepco to come and speak about their preparation for this. they have brought in a number of additional crews, and increased their capacity tremendously, and we will ask the representative to speak to that. in addition to that, i will have th ramada speak as well. >> we have been preparing for the storms several days now. >> you have been listening to the measures that