Could according to chad myers get that way in ft. Myers. For tampa, which is further north, expecting 5 to 8 feet of storm surge. Im on the Caloosahatchee River roogt now, probably 7 or 8 feet over the river so this little area would not be able to we wouldnt be able to stand here 24 hours from now. Chris, i imagine in the same location where you are, youre not going to be able to be there tomorrow either. No. Similar dynamics that you were identifying. Getting a little gust now. Its picked up, no question. But this is not the real deal as you rightly point out. The water ootzly overwhelmed this area when we got that first moderate band of stormtype rain here. Even though we see the shift in the path of the storm, its projected path, nothings a certainty here no ma matter how much they model. The officials on the ground have said do not come back and if you are in an evacuation zone c, the time between these bands as opportunity, do what you were told, make the choice for safety. Lets get to chad myers. Hes in the, where center. Chad, take us through what we know. Starting with what the poor people in cuba have been dealing with now for hours and what we think is to come. Krigs, the storm came just south of grand bahama into northern cuba. There is an island chain there called the cuban keys and they got destroyed, literally. Theres not much left. Everyone was evacuated from there because the entire government knew this was going to be a 160 storm. Now its down to 125. So a little bit less because so much of the storm was taken out by cuba. And the storm took out part of the island chain here. Certainly some of the lesser buildings. Category 3 going to category 4, not that far from where Anderson Cooper is. Here is another deal with this storm. Were going to have significant winds. The wind speed at key wst will be 129. Naples 137 and ft. Myers. You guys were just talking, oh, we wont be able to stand here because theres wind. Yes, theres wind, going to be water, its going to be 8 feet over your head and there will be waves on top of that. This is deerfield beach. Were already seeing 4 to 6 foot swells here and this storm is 200 miles away. So a lot of things arent going to be going on tomorrow at all. For chris, heres you, youre right downtown. All of this with a sixfoot surge will be under water. Everywhere you see blue on this google earth, that is polygon at 2 meters high so you will be able to see all that water no matter where you are in miami. Theres a lot of highrises in that area. You dent want to be in those highrises. The wind goes up, the higher you go in a hurricane. 136 in ft. Myers. 120 in tampa. Those are the maximum dpuss though that doesnt happen until late tomorrow. Heres how the storm shapes up. It comes off the cuban coast. Look for white circle, the circle of 100mileperhour winds right over the lower keys. Anywhere from big pine key to key west to maybe the tortuor t. Move the into the everglades, slightly offshore, the everglades will enhance this thing because the same thing that happened to wilma, wilma actually got stronger on the way to ft. Lauderdale because it hit the everglades and the water was so warm. That is years ago but you get the idea. Its called brown ocean because even though it looks like dirt, its not. Its water. Then you dp atlanta, awe gus tashgs macon, you will see wind gusts somewhere in the 60 to 70mileperhour range. Were expecting wind into jacksonville, savanna, charleston, all the way to myrtle, expecting coastal flooding here and all the way back across parts of southwest texas as well or west florida as well as we will begin to see this storm finally move away sometime during the day on tuesday. Anderson . Chad myers, thanks for that. If you were out this hour and obviously all throughout the day, its just crucial to try to follow this storm as closely as possible because as you saw this morning a lot of people woke up today and suddenly the storm had moved further west. That meant a lot of folks who maybe thought they had dodged the worst of it or were going to dodge the worstit in tampa, ft. Myers, in naples, they woke up today to a different reti and thats the reality a lotpeople are facing now, do i continue to stay in the area im in in my home or try to make tot a shelter nearby. Theyre opening more shelters in this county, in collier county, but there are a lotpeople waiting to get into a shelter. Drew griffin is outside the germane arena. Thats off highway i75. How many people last we talked you said just estimate, several thousand people Still Standing in line. Yeah. Isle say theres maybe ta 25 00, 3,000, still in line outside the arena. This is the front of the line. These people have been waiting on average four, five hours. Te holdup, first they have to make sure its staffed. A registration form, one for each family, register, any special needs, any kind of thing that might be made aware of, medical staff. Also have to figure out what to do with their pets, get the rules on that, but this line, anderson, as you can see, it just goes down around this arena, wraps all the way around the side of the arena and out into the parking lot. People are being patient. In fact, lets just walk ahead. This guy has an interesting story. Your whole family, right . How long have you been here . 7 30. In the morning. And how many family members . Ten. And this is an interesting family. Obviously you have an ethnic pround. When we showed you on cnn we got the message from pakistan telling us we saw you on cnn. Your family in pakistan knows youre safe, knows the kids are okay. They wanted evidence an now we gave it to them, the evidence. You gave it to them that we are standing here. We wish you luck. Youre almost there, right . Almost there. 5 1 2 hours. Incredibly long wait. And just like where you are, were feeling the increased wind, there was a rumble of thunder about an hour ago, but fortunately no rain. Hopefully they can process all these people just in the next couple hours and get them inside and ready for irma. Anderson . Drew, when you first got there, you were talking to a woman in line who had been separated from her mom, her mom was 85 years old. Somehow got separated. She thought maybe she was further in the back of the line. How confusing is the situation . Are the people on loin getting information . Are folks coming out and telling them whats going on or what the delays are . I have to tell you, the staff and the Sheriffs Department and the National Guard and the state troopers have been great. Theyre all trying to deal with a situation that is quite frankly unmanageable at times because there are so many people. Ambulances have been out here attending to people who have literally, anderson, passed out in line, some of these people. And you can see this, george, if grow up the line here on the left, these are all people who are waiting for their loved ones who are basically work the line for them. So you might see this fellow here in a walker, a couple in the back in a wheelchair, and in folding chairs. They are waiting for their loved twoun catch up with them. Thats what happened to the 85yearold woman. She finally was connected with her daughter. They are going to be okay. And theyre going to be inside this shelter for Hurricane Irma. Drew, were going to go the bill weir in a second but next time we come to you, if you could while wire not on air with you, talk to some people and find out did they decide just this morning with the shift of the storm, is that what made them decide to seek shelter, previous to that, did they plan to kind of ride it out in their homes. Well come back to drew griffin in a little bit. Bill weir is in keilar fwoe. Explain where you are and the igs. We are in a part of key largo, a town this is a wellknown boat harbor here. And this is where we met the gentleman on your show on thursday night, the captain of the saltshaker who vowed to ride out irma aboard his 50foot sailboat. Thats it over there. It says western sunset. Hes actually officially changed the name. Many people concerned about that decision, his wife, his two wiener dogs, we came to check on him. Turns out he had a change of heart as irma got bigger and more pointed towards the keys so his family is now in a motel in okeechobee. They got about 150 miles north of here. But there are still some die hards, still some old salts, about five different families here in this marina who are bunking down not on their boats. We have a pretty sturdy strong structure behind us here with metal hurricane shutters. They feel good about that. And then nearbitis a dive shop thats three stories tall, all stone structures. Thats their plans b and c. But these people are real outliers. In the last 48 hours weve seen a marked shift in attitude down in the keys. These people are notorious for not leaving, for ignoring Evacuation Orders, riding thins out, being fiercely independent. That shifted last night about 6 00. Emergency managers got together and when they came out of that meeting some we had met were shaken. You could see it. And they said this is a whole different deal. At that moment they decided to evacuate the Monroe County jail on stock island that they thought could survive a category 5. Its one of the strongest structures in all of the keys. They said they felt pretty good about it. In fact, thats where their families are going to stay. Instead, they had to frantically move bus with sheriffs deputy escorts 500 prisoners up u. S. 1 to find other places to put them until irma blows over here. Theyve moved their Emergency Management operation from marathon to about 40 miles north of key west up here to key har go. For those expressing concern, we appreciate it here. We have after charting the storm decided to stay here tonight. This is the highest of the keys. Were in a very secure building. And we want to see what happens. We want to follow irma as she pounds ashore here. For everybody else out there, who has the means, please follow the heeds and get out of here if you can. Yeah. Bill weir. Well continue to check with you. Im glad that guy in that boat decided to believe his family. I was very concerned about that from the other night. I dont know if you can hear theres a police car come big with a Police Officer speaking on a loud speaker saying this is a mandatory evacuation zone, telling people to get out. Obviously mandatory means some people arent going to do it, they dont have to leave by law, but they are certainly strongly encouraged there. As soon as the police car starts to come by ill maybe have jay turn the camera around so you can see it. Just get a sense of what its like here. They have expanded the evacuation zone to zone b which previously was not an evacuation zone but they are trying to get more people go. Lets listen to this police car as it passes by. Actually, jay, you wont be able to get it. The police car turned an. They are driving around in centennial park. The mayor of palm beach, mayor, how are things in palm beach, how are your preparations . Palm beach is this is homestead. Im sorry. How are the preparations there . Well, we kind of got ahad had of the curve and i think were well prepared. Taking care of our employees, gotten everybody situated in our new secure facilities, category 5 facilities. We listened our lesson through andrew. Were pleased its taken a bit of a jog to the west. Were ready but were hoping for, you know, less of an impact than anticipated earlier this week. And as you referenced, homestead got hit hard by andrew, so there have been a lot of changes since then in how buildings are built there. Oh, absolutely. I mean, you know, before andrew came through, you would drive through the communities and, you know, maybe 20 , 30 of the residences would have storm shutters. Its quite the difference now. Probably 90 , you know, have storm shutters and the others are putting up plywood. So, you know, i think the community really got ahead of it normally theyre real complacent about doing their preparation and boarding up and getting their supplies, but this year, i dont know if it was because of whats been what we of been seeing for the last two weeks coming out of houston maybe heightened everyones senses, but i think everybody did a really good job. The ones that got evacuated are out, the streets are pretty clean right now, not a lot of traffic. We did have a pretty good squall come through this morning and knocked some trees over and some limbs down. Weve soon a little bit of the you know, what the storm is capable of. But were really hoping for that eyewall not to, you know, come over homestead. Thats what really does the damage. Thats where andrew really got us. We certainly wish you the best and well which can if with you throughout the next several days. Thanks for being with us. Our coverage continues. Well have a lot more here from the west coast of florida. I want to toss it back to chris cuomo stand big in miami beach. Chris . Were going the take a break and be right back. This is a story about mail and packages. And its also a story about people. People who rely on us every day to deliver their dreams theyre handing us more than mail theyre handing us their business and while we make more ecommerce deliveries to homes than anyone else in the country, we never forget. That your business is our business the United States postal service. Priority you were drowning in information. Where, in all of this, is the stuff that matters . The stakes are so high, your finances, your future. How do you solve this . You dont. You partner with a firm that advises governments and the fortune 500, and, can deliver insight person to person, on what matters to you. Morgan stanley. The whole country booking on Choice Hotels. Com. Four words, badda book. Badda boom. Let it sink in. Shouldnt we say we have the lowest price . Nope, badda book. Badda boom. Have you ever stayed with Choice Hotels . Like at a comfort inn . Yep. Free waffles, cant go wrong. I like it. Promote that guy. Get the lowest price on our rooms, guaranteed. When you book direct at choicehotels. Com. Book now. To make something original. Has grown into an enterprise. Thats why i switched to the spark cash card from capital one. Now, im earning unlimited 2 cash back on every purchase i make. Everything. Which adds up to thousands of dollars back every year. And helps keep my passion growing. In every direction. Whats in your wallet . Cnn is tracking the Storm Hurricane irma. Battering the caribbean. Hitting grand bahama, hit kug ba now, moving past, expected to strengthen in the gulf as it heads towards the florida keys and here where we are in south florida. We have dave hole stead with us. Always a pleasure. Cnn contributocontributor, form florida Emergency Management, the director. Right . Yes, sir. One of the things we can bring you is information and insight from experts who understand what is to come. We talk about gusts, sustained gusts, and sustained winds. This is not a science class. It matters because sustained winds of 90 miles an hour are a totally different animal than a gust. And theres also something in between as a dynamic that could cause real devastation. Take us through it. Well, we were talking before about obviously sustained winds. What kind of damage can that do to a building. And thats what were concerned about. Obviously those large sustained winds. However, in between as it dies down and you have gusts, which are typically maybe 30 miles an hour less than that, then you get a sustained gust thats in between those two. And as that moves back and forth, the sustained winds and the sustained gusts, thats where you get kind of that differential where if things have a weakened point, lets say a roof, say an air conditioning unit thats tied to a building, it starts bringing it up and down, starts working on it, those sustaineds winds and those long sustained gusts will work back and forth and can loosen it. A little lit like for fighting metaphoric jab, jab, cross, like the onetwo punch. Absolutely. Thats what we concern ourselves with and thats why the fortified Building Code in florida has been so important, certainly if south florida, the Building Code they implemented. As we talked about, not every building has been brought up to code. It will be interesting to see after the storm moves through both in southeast florida and southwest, the buildings that able to withstand the winds. We heard from the fema director now saying after these storms harvey, irma, and god forbid what is to come after, we have to rebuild better. Thats not just pollyannish optimism. You have to meet the challenges as they are today which is different than what we saw in the past. And youre talking to a very conservative person right here, but i will tell you, Building Codes is the only way go. You cannot change anything until you change Building Codes. Yes, its mshg, yes, you ought to be able to build things where and when you want, but the problem is, you ask us to come in afterwards either through insurance or federal help and rebuild something that shouldnt have been built there in the first place or should have been built better. Now, another practical difference, dave and i are built to stand in the wind. 80, 90 miles an hour, it hits me, it wasnt really moving me. Ive been in these a lot. But it doesnt take much when the wind varies to make you feel instability. And theres an analogy in that for people, the same thing that happens to us, happens to everything else, right . Absolutely. Everything thats yoos loost in the yard, loose near a building, im looking up here and there is air conditioning units that are tied onto this building here, theyre rusted, how rustd are they, well find out when 90mileanhour sustained winds hit them and try to move them and it drops down to a sustained gust and comes back. Will that ac unit be a projectile into another building that may in fact be fortified. God forbid. Last point for right now and then well go to break. Ive been telling people when that band comes see it as a taste, only a taste of what will come some 20plus hours from now when irma is here but also to see moments like this as opportunity. If youve been told to get out, because now you can see, now you can handle things, now you can drive. Is that a fair assess p. I think its fair assessment. Im not so sure about driving. Driving will have to be tens of miles, not hundreds of miles. If off friend inland, ten, 20 miles, absolutely, take break, you see the wind bands die down, get in the kashgs git to that friends house whose home hopefully more fortified than your home. Dave, thank you very much. Well take a brek. When we come back, as weve been saying, chad myers has been