To an area in pinellas county that is nonevacuation zone. people that don t have any other way to evacuate, don t have anywhere to go, there are shelters available. we opened up ten shelters. and those nine additional ones were opened up this morning. where do they get that information? right now everything is working. the storm is not here yet. where should they go to gather the information they need, to know where they r where they can go if they have pets, for example. i know that some of the hotels and some of the other areas, they re hurricane rated as well hopefully out of the evacuation zone. well, definitely. you bring up a good point about visitors. we want to make sure our visitors are well are looking up their evacuation zone. do that easily at disaster.pinellas.gov for our
Make sure your pet has enough food, has enough water. if you re going to evacuate, go to a pet-friendly shelter or evacuate with a family or friend that will allow your pet to be there. there are hotels that are pet friendly. there s a lot of options. you don t have to travel across the state or into another state. we want you to evacuate tens of miles, not hundreds of miles. that s really good information going tens of miles not hundreds of miles. one of the things that people must pay attention to is sort of the tracking of the storm. but these storms do wobble. so, where is it that you re trying to tell people to go to? if people go to the north, they may get caught up, if they wait too late in that storm surge. absolutely. really all they have to do is go to a nonevacuation zone. so first and foremost, you need to know what zone you re in. if you re in that zone a or mobile home resident, evacuate
So, yeah, you forget about everything honestly, yeah. so, listen, we ve been watching the reaction from some of the people who were there who were being interviewed, and i can only imagine from their reaction that they re still in shock because of how quickly it happened and the pressure they were under and the circumstances they faced. are we correct in that assessment, that people are just in shock and they can t believe it s happening, so a lot of them are giving these matter of fact interviews, and i don t understand how they re doing it when such devastation is all around them. yeah. no, absolutely. nobody suspected this, especially inland like this. as i ve been telling people, i m two miles from the south, roughly a mile and a half maybe, and then five or six miles from the north. and this water came from the north, so it practically just came all across the island. and we just had no idea. i was in a nonevacuation zone. we had dogs so we couldn t go to
It s been a long time, it s hard to know exactly what impact is going to be in this very populated city where there is a lot of development right on the water s edge. craig. all right. there in tampa for us, do appreciate you, sir. we ll come back to you in just a bit if we can. i need to get to former governor of florida, congressman on the phone now. congressman, where are you and what are conditions like? craig, i m in st. petersburg, my hometown on the west coast of pinellas valley. i m in a nonevacuation zone. the conditions are not bad. it s breezy, a little bit of rain. all in all it s not that bad but we know there s a lot more to come. do you get the sense that your constituents have prepared adequately since the storm shifted west? i think there s been an incredible amount of preparation, craig. from the state, the federal, the local level, people have really
Apartments that i can actually see. it does look like people are leaving from this mandatory evacuation area. i ve got it elyou, i was surprised at how many people are still out here. those folks live more in the city. they were telling us that they do feel comfortable staying not just because it s a nonevacuation zone but because they are confident that the structures, the building that they live in will hold up. they have hurricane shutters. they ve boarded up their home, have the supplies to out last the storm. but we were just speaking with the mayor just moments ago. he and every other people in the state of florida would like to see people everywhere get out and get out as soon as possible. i ve got to ask you. so you said where you are is pretty much a ghost town except for a couple people. so you re at apartments or condos. are they boarded up? do they have shutters? take us to the scene. what is it lining out there? well, now it has become a ghost town. before it was a lot