Category two. Instead he exploded in veracity to a category four. Its going to cause a huge amount of damage. Our hearts go out to those folks. Sandra thats it for us. Special courage continues here on the Fox News Channel with Shepard Smith. Hurricane michael, its on the way and it is expected to be historic. Im Shepard Smith on the fox news deck. Often in programming including outnumbered will not be seen today. Hurricane michael is a major category 4 storm set to make landfall somewhere around Panama City Beach, florida. It is expected to be the most powerful storm ever to hit the region. It is but an hour or two away. Lets get a live update from the National Hurricane center in miami. Back to the National Hurricane center, this is ken graham on the operant center. Its noon eastern, 11 00 central. The latest information on the Hurricane Michael. A couple of things to make note
here, the latest information we have wins still at 150 miles power. The pressure has dropped. We have the H
140 mile-per-hour storm, going to take time to wind down. the winds in savannah and charleston could easily be over 100 by the time it gets there. we ll get a new update at 5:00. the plane is flying back and forth. they send back data every ten minutes, they are looking at the winds every 30 seconds. we ll have that as soon as it comes in. thank you. a 13-foot storm surge, folks. florida s panhandle bracing for hurricane michael s impact. already we are seeing the impact. derek van dam in florida with more. reporter: good morning. just terrifying to hear what chad was talking about. the reconnaissance aircraft finding the wind gust of 139 miles per hour. this is the real deal. we are in apalachicola, the big bend of florida s panhandle. i want to show you the virtual ghost town that is apalachicola. you see lights blinking in the
area forecast to take the hardest hit. we have live coverage from destin and apalachicola on the panhandle, and from the weather center where we start with chad myers. good morning. what is on the way? good morning, dave. 140 mile-per-hour storm with higher gusts right now. flight-level gusts at 159 miles per hour. no one lives at flight level but the brave men and women in these planes deserve credit from all of us to tell us what s going on. they ve been bringing updates all night long, and they re flying through storms that i would never get in an airplane. there goes all the way from new orleans to tampa. there s going to be more surge flooding in tampa again today. we re getting up into the high tide, you re 2.5 feet above here. we talk about all the surge that s going to be here, but there s surge along the coast, as well. look at the size of the higher, colder cloud tops. this is from mobile. certainly all the way to apalachicola.
home. you need to prepare for the eventuality that all of the roads will be closed today. we ve seen people getting scare ed at the last minute, get in get scared at the last minute, get in the car with kids, and have trouble. in about 20 minutes you ll have another update. thank you. florida panhandle s bracing for the impact. already we re seeing the storm s effects. derek van dam live in apalachicola with more. reporter: good morning. the mayor of apalachicola trying to lead by example. evacuating himself and his family. look at the deserted almost ghost town behind me. one low-pressure car. seems as if someone decided to ride out the store. there are news personnel and emergency personnel still roaming the streets here. of course, mandatory evacuation.
alone, when you talk about fort walton beach, destin and panama city to the each, apalachicola. we re going to have issues of course with this landfall beginning sometime we think mid to late afternoon tomorrow. now, tomorrow morning the tropical storm force winds move in. but landfall should be between 3:00 and 6:00 p.m. right now the track in the national hurricane center have the landfall as a 3 but it is possible still to have 4. we can t worry about 3 or 4 because it s bringing with it a major hurricane status that is going to move by quickly. this is not going to be like harvey. it s not going to be like florence and drop a lot of rainfall. but what it will do is bring more of a punch and more of an impact than florence ever did at landfall. if you could just go back, i just want you to talk again about the storm itself kind of reorganizing itself and making that circle. okay. let me explain is this way. yesterday, anderson, the maximum winds were 40 miles per hour. by yester