pulling governor desantis off the 2024 campaign trail. to avoid straining security resources in the storm ravaged areas, it looks like he will not be meeting the president today. we have live fox team coverage rick fox weather multimedia journalist katie byrne on the ground and live overt florida congressman michael wall standing by. first lucas tomlinson light at the white house. lucas, what more can you tell us about what we expect for the president s tour today? president biden and the first lady landed in gainesville just a few minutes ago. there airborne on marine one and touring the devastation in live oak which is located about halfway between tallahassee and jacksonville. before leaving for florida president biden spoke to reporters on the ramp at andrews. [inaudible] i do not think he is going to be there. we are going to take care florida. now a spokesman for governor desantis had the governor will be in dixie company today which includes harsh she would be 20
we are tracking hurricane idalia. let s take a look at the map, just to show the scale of what has been happening. there it is moving up towards florida. this morning florida time it hit and now it it has moved on to georgia. we canjust take a look at its path on the graphic here. it started bottom left, the red dot this morning, right now it is closer to the pink dot towards southern georgia and thenit dot towards southern georgia and then it will move on upwards, up towards those yellow dots and out to see in the days ahead. that confirmation we just heard, the worst storm to hit parts of florida in 100 years. take a look at some of the damage, some of the pictures have come in as the winds blow. the rain comes down, of course the risk from the storm surges. so huge amounts of sea water heading inland. lots of destruction, lots of people without power. a quarter of a million people in florida lost power and had it reconnected. another, without power right now. lots of fligh
impacted by the storms bands and we are seeing that particularly in the northern part of the state. so are seeing that particularly in the northern part of the state.- northern part of the state. so far there have northern part of the state. so far there have been northern part of the state. so far there have been 262000 - northern part of the state. so far there have been 262000 and - northern part of the state. so far - there have been 262000 and accounts that have lost power, have been restored. and there are more than 250,000 accounts that are currently out of power and in need of restoration. as you imagine the counties that have the highest percentage of power outage other counties that were in the main pathway of the storm, dixie, suwanee, madison and jefferson and columbia. utility workers are actively working to restore power in all affected areas. they have started doing that is soon is it was safe to do so. those restoration efforts are ongoing. we do anticipat
the diplomacy will go. and a 56 year dynasty comes to an end in gabon another coup, the eighth in former french colonies injust the past three years. good evening. idalia s power has waned some as it heads towards georgia, but maximum sustained winds were still over 100 miles per hour. and it s worth remembering a storm s category doesn t necessarily indicate how much damage there will be. this storm surge that was pushed into the big bend area of the gulf coast peaked at 15 feet high. and that area of north west florida acts like a giant baseball mitt, it s flat, it s low lying, there s every reason to fear that the waters will have washed right over it. the federal emergency management agency said idalia is the strongest storm to make landfall in this part of florida in more than 100 years. more than a quarter of a million people in florida and another 100,000 in georgia are without power right now. the national guard and the federal emergency teams are staged ready to re
combining to push the tides higher and prompt this warning from officials around tampa. we have some rivers that are set to crest to pretty high. might look sunny. might be the calm after the storm. the winds and rains have subsided. that surge is delayed. just look at this dramatic video from cedar key early this morning. a resident there calling it almost apocalyptic. a bed and breakfast flattened with some condos almost fully sub merg submerged in water. massive wind gusts knocking out this billboard close to where our own nbc s gabe gutierrez was reporting. wind gusts, i m told, are over 100 miles an hour. we are really feeling the brunt of this storm. good day, everyone. i m andrea mitchell in washington. following the destructive path of hurricane idalia. the eighth major hurricane to make landfall in the u.s. in six years. take a look at the stunning view of idalia from space courtesy of nasa. we are expecting florida governor ron desantis to give an update in a