Kilometres South West of cape canaveral. Making its way across florida. The new leader has delivered his national address since he became leader injanuary. He called on the people of taiwan to be courageous and brave amid escalating tensions with china. He pledged to defend the islands sovereignty. It makes most of the well s advanced chips. Lets speak to a political Scientist And Assistant professor at taiwan university, and a nonresident fellow. Thank you forjoining me. First of all, the speech, what have you made of it, what do you see is the most important Top Lines . What we have often important Top Lines . What we have often heard important Top Lines . What we have often heard from important Top Lines . What we | have often heard from William Lai since he came into office was a bit more of a snarky tone and how he addressed china and relations. We saw a Tone Change in the Speech Today where we saw far more pragmatic level headed language in regards to Cross Trade Relations and th
Barreling down the Gulf Coast straight into floridas West Coast. 120mileanhour winds and violent Water Pummeling the bridge. And this is santa Bell Island where floodwaters appear to be swallowing a house. And in Fort Myers, a tornado rips through neighbourhoods, obliterating properties. The winds are ferocious, the storm churches unstoppable and floridians are worried. Lets go to her senior correspondent in tampa. Steve . Jesse, we see rain come down in sheets. The wind is starting to pick up as well, we could see anywhere from 616 inches of rain here that has been going steady for the past six hours. The Storm Surge is another concern here in the tampa area. This could be a Worstcase Scenario depending on where the storm actually makes landfall. We could see up to 10 feet of Storm Surge here, anywhere from 15 feet along other parts and along the coast. When it gets over 40 miles per hour, they cannot come out and rescue and right now it seems to be hovering right about that range. Th
Being felt everywhere. It has come in as a category three storm with 120 mile per hour sustained it went even higher gusts according to the national hurricane center, we are talking to Rental Rain extremely dangerous wind. What is being described is lifethreatening Storm Surges that are now pounding portions of the state. At this hour, a Lifethreatening Flash Flood warning has just been issued for nearly 2 Million people. That includes tampa, saint petersburg, and clearwater. You just saw Bill Weir in st. Petersburg. You could see all of that developing there right now, over half 1 Million homes and businesses have lost power with conditions deteriorating by the minute this storm has also spawned a Record Number of tornadoes, all across the state of florida, far beyond where the storm has actually making direct hit tonight, there have been 19 confirmed tornadoes. So far, the sheriff Of St. Lucie county has just confirmed that there have been multiple fatalities after an outbreak of tor
That Storm Surge could be the worst part of this storm. So we will be on that during this hour. Ill be watching. Thanks alex. Thank you. We are going straight to bill karins. Msnbcs meteorologist. Nbc News Meteorologist for the latest on the situation there. Bill, what can we expect now in florida . This is when all the damage is happening. We cant show you where the worst Storm Surge is. But we know it is moving in. We have had reports of a ten foot Storm Surge in sarasota. As we go down the coast, all the way to naples, its been at least five to six foot Storm Surge. That is higher than helene in most cases so we have new significant damage that is being done tonight. As the storm is moving inland. The winds are still pushing that water against the coast. It is still rushing in. The other thing you will notice, the black line is the center. Just north of the center which has been the past five hours over tampa, torrential rain. We are talking two to three inches per hour. Now that is