this hour, and on the ground frenzy in the state. millions under mandatory evacuation orders. the entire state faces flash flooding. and then record-shattering storm surge, water officials say as high as 18 feet. enough to swallow two suvs stacked one on the other. one official warning if you are caught in that surge, you simply will not survive. let s get straight to our correspondents on the ground binning with beginning with bill weir. what are you seeing and what are you told to expect? reporter: this whole community is really bracing for the worse. the new numbers this morning sunk the pit of the stomach everyone here, trying to think about a 17 foot storm surge. and we re on the back side of the storm and this is sort of the reverse storm surge. locals never see this exposed seabed here. we re looking at crab traps and oyster beds blowing around in the wind with the rest of us here. but of course the water as the storm comes ashore will fill in fast. and we re next
They have staged and ready to go. if you are in southwest florida, stay inside until the storm passes. it may appear to be calm at some point, you may just be in the eye of the storm and the back side of that will get very, very nasty. this storm is expected to move across central florida and exit daytona beach some time on thursday. we have already seen around the state tornado warnings issued far from where the hurricane is entering in southwest florida, and those warnings will likely continue until this finally leaves our state. so even if you are not in the direct path of the storm, you need to take all tornado warnings seriously and you need to take appropriate precautions if that is happening in your area. the florida department of transportation has just announced fort drum, turkey lake service plazas on the florida turnpike are now closed. obviously they will try to get those open as soon as they can, we have 200,000 power outages reported throughout the state of florida, but o
0 from the shoreline to the back bays and also to rivers inland. so, know your high tides. we are looking at the images, increasingly dire. stay inside as the storm approaches and wreaks havoc, pray for the charlotte county community and the rest of florida as we toss it over to america reports. john: any moment now we are expecting an update from florida governor ron desantis as the eyewall of hurricane ian begins to move on shore bringing with it the potential for catastrophic damage. hello, john roberts in washington. sandra, welcome back. sandra: good to be with you, sandra smith in new york. america reports, a quickly developing situation, ian expected to make landfall between 2 and 4:00 p.m. right now packing top winds of 155 miles an hour. that is just a couple miles shy of a category 5 hurricane. john: when you get that high it does not make much of a difference. forecasters warning of the storm surge could be as high as 18 feet as the eyewall comes on shore. sand