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Laura Coates Live
Hurricane Milton Tearing Through Florida, 2 Million Without Power. Aired 12-1a ET
Aired October 10, 2024 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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PHILLIP: We're really hoping for the best for you, Debbi, and for your son as well. I'm glad that you're safe tonight. And right now thank you very much for joining us.
WEBER: Thank you. You have a good night.
PHILLIP: Good night.
And thank you for watching at home tonight. CNN's coverage of this hurricane and how it is affecting the state of Florida continues right now.
LAURA COATES, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Laura Coates alongside Anderson Cooper with CNN's breaking news coverage of Hurricane Milton.
The powerful category two storm is currently tearing through Florida's Gulf Coast. It is right now moving east across central Florida. The once-in-a-century storm made landfall near Siesta Key with winds north of 100 miles per hour. There have been tornado outbreaks, historic flash flooding, and life-threatening storm surge.
You name it this storm has it. I mean, look at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg. The wind has been so strong that the roof is now largely torn off. The ballpark was said to be a shelter, a shelter for first responders. Now, thankfully, a local affiliate reports that no one has been hurt.
We've got a team of reporters, of meteorologists, all fanned out covering every part of this storm as we enter the midnight hour.
I'll begin with you, Anderson, who is live in Bradenton where you have been in the thick of it. And right now we're watching you get thrown by the storm. How are things happening right now? Can you hear us?
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Yes. Yes. I got to tell you, it's really surprising. I mean, it felt like a little while ago it's kind of died down, but we're now by the river. It is now really just pouring up.
Take a look at this. This is a tree that has been uprooted. The roots are still -- the patch of ground it was in is still connected. There's actually like a water pipe that's I guess in part of the root system that is now still connected and pouring water out of the pipe but the trees almost completely knocked over. That's been knocked over by the wind.
We just noticed this. I'm not sure when that happened. I think it happened pretty, just a short time ago. But I don't know, Phil, if you could pan over here, but look at this water. I mean this is like the ocean and this is the riverwalk in Bradenton. At 9:00 the waves started coming over here but we have not seen anything like this until now. It was up to my ankles about 15 minutes ago, I would say. It's now, I mean, with these waves it's up to my knees almost, just below my knees.
And now this water is really, really coming on shore in bigger and bigger waves. So I don't know if this is a gust, and maybe it's good to check in with Chad Myers to see if this is just, you know, a band of the storm, but I'm really surprised to see the amount of water that is now coming ashore when it seemed like an hour ago that the winds have kind of died down but the water certainly has not died down -- Laura.
COATES: Anderson, we are watching all night and seeing this really evolution of how things are going right now. We're watching the wind. It looks like you are getting thrashed. The water level is rising. What's the temperature like? What are you seeing around you? Are you seeing debris that is projecting in any way? What's happening?
COOPER: Yes. So, I mean, the temperature, it was getting very cold about an hour ago. I actually went inside. I changed because I'm just sopping wet. I changed like a warmer shirt. So it's cold. I mean, anybody who's outside, you start to shiver. And our -- let's go, let's check in with Randi Kaye I think in Sarasota. Sorry.
Hey, Randi, what's the situation where you are there?
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Anderson, very much like you. I keep thinking that the winds are going to die down and they just keep picking up and also here the temperature has dropped significantly. It's cold. I like you have changed shirts a couple of times just to try and stay warm. So we are experiencing a similar thing here in Sarasota. We've seen winds of about 102.
We were at the -- we're just nearby Sarasota Airport and the wind tends to come and go, like right now, it takes a little dip in its energy and then it tends to come back. I mean, it was actually pushing me down the driveway of the place where we are. But we have seen a lot of -- a fair amount of destruction around where we are. We've seen this fence which has blown apart. This was the fence that was dividing between -- divided this house to the house next door to us.
But I also checked in with the backyard of the house that we're at in this neighborhood which has been completely evacuated. And there's a tree in the pool. All of the pool furniture has gone to one side of the yard, so that just gives you an idea of the power of these winds that we're seeing.
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But, Anderson, the real concern which we may not see until morning is what the storm surge is like here in Sarasota, in downtown Sarasota certainly because we're only about 20 minutes or so from Siesta Key, where Hurricane Milton did come across and did make landfall near Siesta Key, and so the storm surge coming over those barrier islands where Siesta Key is and then into the Sarasota Bay and then into downtown Sarasota is the concern.
Storm surge expected to be about nine to 30 feet. It's unclear at this point what we're going to see, but we won't really know that until it's safe to go back over to that area. We had to move over here to higher ground in order to avoid basically what you're experiencing there in Bradenton, Anderson.
COOPER: We are, by the way, so waterlogged I can barely hear what you're saying, Randi. But I think we're going to move up land because this is getting ridiculous. I mean, the water is now almost past my knees so let's go back to Laura and I'll regroup. Yes, we'll check -- we'll get to a higher ground.
COATES: Anderson, get to safety. We're watching that wind crash. And let's go to CNN meteorologist Chad Myers.
Chad, what is the tracks showing now? We're watching what's happening in Bradenton. What's going on?
CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, you know, I mean, the bulk of the worst part of this storm, considering that what we see from Anderson is not the worst, is now up in Orlando all the way down toward Kissimmee. And then what Anderson is seeing is the backside of the eye, which is supposed to start calming down, but it's certainly hasn't. What Anderson has experiencing, and you have to kind of follow the lines of the rain, when you follow the lines of the rain, Anderson is right there under the A in Palmetto.
So the wind is blowing off the ocean all the way in a straight line and into that river walk. That's why we're getting that significant surge there. For all day long the wind has been blowing the water out of Tampa Bay. And now, because we're going to switch it because now the eye is that way, now the wind is going to blow the water back into Tampa Bay. We're not going to get six to nine feet, but we will get maybe two to four because now as the wind moves away, changes direction, we start to push that water up there.
So St. Petersburg just had a wind gust to 82. So this is far from being done. Tampa just had a wind gust to 78. I think a big story here is how much rain has fallen. Everywhere that you see purple through here, that's 10 inches of rain or more. And we know St. Pete had 16 inches of which eight fell in two hours. Five hours, five inches in one hour, three inches the next hour, and then it kind of slowed down a little bit.
But there is significant flooding going on here in Lakeland, especially farther inland because it doesn't have a chance to just wash back into the ocean. So it is going to be a flooded mess to the east of Tampa and probably as far east as Orlando, too. Right now, the latest advisory just came in. We're down to 100 but you can see what 100 just did to Tampa and what it did to Bradenton and Anderson Cooper standing right there.
COATES: Let's actually go back to Anderson right now who remains in Bradenton.
Anderson, the wind, the rain is now above your knees with the water. What are you experiencing?
COOPER: Yes. So we've moved from that location. That was just bananas. How much water is pouring over now. So we've moved about, I don't know, 200 feet or so, 300 feet up. So we're on higher grounds but it is just, I mean, that's -- yes, there's a lot of water coming along the riverwalk. I'm not sure how much longer that's going to continue for which obviously Chad will be able to tell us in a little bit.
But it is just the wind is coming from the north. Tampa's -- that's the north, Tampa is up that way as Chad was saying, that wind is coming from the north down here. It will change directions according to Chad at some point. But yes, it's just -- it's an extraordinary thing. I'm really -- I'm really struck. I'm sorry. What was that? Repeat. Let's check in with Bill Weir --
COATES: I'm not sure what's your hearing him say. Go ahead.
COOPER: What are you seeing?
COATES: Let's bring in Bill Weir. We're having trouble hearing you, Anderson, at the moment. Let's bring in. Do we have Bill Weir who's in St. Petersburg? I mean, we see him in front of the camera.
Bill, can you hear us?
BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT: You got me?
COATES: Yes, we hear you, Bill. What are you experiencing?
WEIR: Yes, I got you, Laura. Hi,. Can you see me? Yes. So if anybody has been watching for the past several hours, you've been hearing me harping on about the tower cranes in St. Petersburg that the city put out a warning and said, look, we know this is dangerous, but it takes months to disassemble these things.
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We just don't have the time. So be warned. Well, one of them came down right here on Central Avenue, as you can see. Carlos can zoom in down there. One of the four tower cranes downtown has collapsed in these winds. There's another one sort of right above us, so we're sort of keeping our distance. I hope you'll understand. We don't want to get too close down there. There was one -- you can see the flashing light so one first responder as at least knows it happened. It came out.
But if it looks like it fell into a building on the left side of the street here, smashing into these lofts over here, according to social media. There's some pretty stunning pictures of the damage from that as well. And then of course there's Tropicana Field we talked about in the last hour. That Teflon roof that was ripped to shreds. One of our affiliate reporters gives us a look inside. Take a listen to this.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Something unbelievable to show you. This is Tropicana Field. The roof, a big portion of it, has ripped off. We're looking inside Tropicana Field. We are seeing extreme damage. Actually there was a report we saw in line earlier of a fire and we were waiting to confirm that and now we just made it up to the fifth floor of the hotel we are in and it just -- I mean, it's hard to believe what we're looking at.
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WEIR: Ironically Tropicana Field, Laura, was a staging ground for first responders tomorrow. That plan may be changing as a result of that as well. But you're just getting a little glimpse of the violence of this store between the cranes coming down that roof. Who knows what first light is going to reveal here in Pinellas County -- Laura.
COATES: Bill, can you show us that crane again and the area? Because to thinking about, as you mentioned, the balance of this storm, for it to be able to do that type of damage, that alone the trop, Tropicana Field, but show us that crane area again what you're seeing?
WEIR: Yes. It's really hard to get shot. Whoa.
(CROSSTALK)
COATES: Wow. Just in gauging --
WEIR: -- down the street, I don't get a sense of what we're seeing on there, but it's -- yes, it's late --
COATES: Well, Bill, we are watching right now the wind.
WEIR: The crane is just sort of, if you can imagine -- right. Yes. But if you can imagine this crane was mounted to the side of this tower that's under construction to the right of your screen there collapsing to the left and onto the building across the street hopefully nobody is down here to danger anyone. But just as an indication of the force of these winds.
COATES: Bill, just seeing the power of this storm, we're looking at a sign, obviously still in nature that is just flapping in the wind as if it was a paper in some respects, you've got the destruction, you're describing. We see the forced wind. We even heard you sort of have your body moved from the sheer force of what we're seeing out there.
Anderson was talking about the temperature having dropped. We heard from Chad Myers about the expectation that the water would be repopulating different areas, not the tune of six to nine feet, but maybe two to four. I wonder are you experiencing any levels of water in the area rising or the conditions worsening as you're standing there now?
WEIR: No, actually I think because of the geology of Tampa Bay and where we are in the water, the dynamics of the water moving around St. Petersburg was spared that kind of catastrophic storm surge that we were fearing. It looks like Tampa is getting much worse flooding on the other side out of the bay than we are here. But again, I'm sort of limited just to this downtown area as well.
The wind is just coming and going. You think it's starting to fade a little bit and it kicks back up again with such force it takes your breath away. But yes, that's the state of play right here in St. Peterburg right now, but who knows, this storm has been changing sort of personalities by the hour.
COATES: Bill, please stand by and stay safe. I actually want to go over to Tampa where Boris Sanchez is.
Boris, what are you experiencing over there? And many thought that Tampa would have a direct hit, will get the worst of it. Tell me what you're experiencing on the ground there.
BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely, Laura. There was concern that Tampa would see its first direct hit from a hurricane in about 100 years. Fortunately for residents in this area, the hurricane tilted down slightly, it landed closer to Sarasota, but this area still felt the impacts.
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We were anticipating potentially an eight to 12-foot storm surge. I was in Tampa Bay earlier and we had to get out because the water started pounding against the seawall. The wind was extraordinarily powerful. We got rain that was coming horizontally, slamming into us like pellets. We moved to an area with a higher elevation and earlier tonight we saw the water start to pick up in his neighborhood.
It got as high as the sidewalk, started to come over the sidewalk. It appeared to go into a local business at one point, a car got stalled further down the street, but now that water fortunately, Laura, is stored according to recede and the wind has died down considerably over the last hour and a half or so.
The concern is, again, this is an area of higher elevation. There are other parts of this area that were underwater when we moved from that other location almost five hours ago. So you can imagine those areas are likely inundated. You're talking about a 10 to 14 inch rainfall. That's roughly what Tampa gets between four and six months. It all came down roughly in the matter of a day and intensely as well.
So you're looking at a scenario where tree parts are flowing past us right now and you're looking at a scenario where the debris that was left behind by Hurricane Helene about a week ago, that category four storm that hit the Big Bend area, but with those massive bands that hit areas like Tampa and further south, all that debris was scattered around towns, scattered around Pinellas County, for example. I was walking near a pile of it yesterday that was upwards of 20 feet high.
We saw some of it near appear on the water yesterday. I'm curious to see how residents in that area are doing after this storm swept through -- Laura.
COATES: Boris, I mean, we're thinking about how that debris might be impacting the community. Are you seeing anyone around there? I know earlier tonight you had talked about seeing somebody driving a vehicle, at one point abandoning the car. What can you tell us about the population around you?
SANCHEZ: Yes, Laura, I'm glad to say that that was the last person that I saw and it was close to the height of the storm. So I'm hoping even as we feel wind gusts picking up right now, I'm hoping that that gentleman is OK. He seemed very disoriented.
Earlier in the day, though, we did see what one local official described as a disaster tourists. These folks that came out during the storm in the early initial phases of the storm trying to take selfies and that sort of thing. Officials have been warning about doing that kind of thing ever since the storm indicated, since forecasters prognosticated that the storm was headed in this direction.
They were asking residents to shelter in place. They were asking folks that were in evacuation zones to get out. Fortunately, it appears that most of them especially along the barrier islands, Treasure Island where I was yesterday, most of them did, but there were still some folks that wanted to stay behind. One of them was a gentleman that was on a boat in Tampa Bay and he decided to ride out the storm there. I'm hoping we get good news about him -- Laura.
COATES: Let's certainly hope so. We are seeing that two million people right now, Boris, two million, are without power in those areas. This is unbelievable. Think about the power of this storm.
I want to bring in the vice mayor of Sarasota, Jen Ahearn-Koch.
Vice mayor, thank you so much for joining us. I understand that you are sheltering at your brother's home. You like two million others have lost power and you lost it hours ago. You've been facing 100- mile-per-hour gusts for hours. What has this been like?
JEN AHEARN-KOCH, VICE MAYOR, SARASOTA, FLORIDA: Yes, this has certainly been quite the ordeal, something we've never experienced in Sarasota that I know of. You know, we often have these hurricanes and you see them coming, they go parallel to the coast. They hit south of us or they hit north of us, but, you know, this -- Sarasota was from the beginning slated to be hit and that has been the case in the past.
And it's never really happened, and this is really quite shocking for all of us and it comes on the heels of Hurricane Helene, and so I think for a lot of our residents we're still shell-shocked from that and now this hitting us is quite serious and as your reporter said earlier we'll see a daybreak. What is revealed as far as damage and, you know, what we're going to do with our cities. So that's sort of where we are at the moment.
COATES: It's so unbelievable. Think about as my colleague Bill Weir talked about the violence of this storm, wondering what daylight will bring. And Vice Mayor, I mean, Sarasota was bracing for a storm surge that
was forecast at nine to 13 feet. Do you have any idea of how the city is doing in terms of that storm surge now?
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AHEARN-KOCH: Well, as far as I know, we do have flooding throughout parts of the city but the storm surge is something that people should absolutely take seriously. We're not out of the woods yet. We're still pulling through it. I think that I was told that, you know, as soon as we get out of the back end of this, there still are several hours where folks have to stay inside, stay safe, be very aware that this surge, storm surge is not something to take lightly.
I think a lot of us experienced that during the last hurricane, Hurricane Helene, and we know what it brings. And so, you know, because the eye is past us we are now still in it and still bracing for what may come.
COATES: Vice Mayor, have you heard anything in terms of injuries or specific damage?
AHEARN-KOCH: Thankfully we have not been called for any rescue. I did hear a report of somebody driving over the Ringling Bridge, not too long ago. I think it was when the eye was passing. But I think as your previous reporter had said there are folks who would still go out and, you know, take this as a game and it's not a game. It's not a sport and it's something that we all need to take very, very seriously.
As far as damage goes, for the moment we're not having any reports of anything serious that we know of. I know we've had, like I said, some flooding. We've had power outages. We've had very fierce winds that have taken down trees and power lines. But, you know, at the moment, you know, the city of Sarasota, at least our team, is ready to go. As soon as it's safe, we're going to send in our first in tactical team to assess the damage and make sure the streets are safe because folks are going to want to get back to their homes, those who evacuated.
And we think a large portion of our city did evacuate. We're not sure, it's pretty anecdotal, but we want to caution our citizens to please wait until they get the sign from the city of Sarasota that it is actually safe to be on those roads. So we're ready to go. Our staff is prepared, our police department is prepared. The EMS is prepared. Our public works department is prepared. So we are ready to go and, you know, to make sure that our citizens are safe.
COATES: We certainly hope that remains the case.
Vice Mayor Jen Ahearn-Koch, thank you so much for joining us. We're thinking about your city and the communities around it.
I do want to go back to Chad Myers right now, our meteorologist, to give us a sense of where things stand and the trajectory of Hurricane Milton.
MYERS: Really the people in Orlando and Kissimmee are seeing the worst of it right now. Let's take back to when it was actually making landfall with winds out of the west in Venice at 107, blowing the water on the shore. This is the area that experienced the storm surge. Don't know how much yet, we'll have to wait until things get brighter. We'll have to take a look.
Sarasota, right there with a north wind and then also Tampa and St. Pete with an east wind. You've got all of the eye, almost the entire section of the eye had wind speeds somewhere in the ballpark of 100 or so miles per hour. These two white boxes are flash flood emergencies. There is flash flooding going on in those areas right now, and could be in a dangerous place for you. They don't put those out there. You're just in the middle of nowhere.
There has to be something where it's reported and it is significant flooding in populated areas. Here's your eye for a quarter, all the way up to Orlando. That's where the rain is right now. Back out here to where our reporters are, the wind coming off of the ocean now. That is going to begin to blow that water back on to shore, and Anderson was experiencing it right there. He's in Bradenton, but Palmetto is just right next to it. So there you get the idea.
And the wind blowing back into the bay by the time this goes far enough to the east this wind will be pushing in. Notice at how the wind, how the rain is moving in that direction. That's the same way the wind is moving, too. So as it begins to push back into the bay later on tonight, that's when the bay will fill back up with water. Even though it's a low right now, it won't be for long.
Orlando just had a wind gusts to 62. St. Pete, still blowing hours after this thing went by at 87 miles per hour last hour.
Here's where the rain has been the worst. Everywhere that you see purple has been 10 inches of rain or more. Already on the ground. And we know St. Pete had 16 and that had to wash off, that had to run off, that had to go someplace. We still have winds of 100 miles per hour. This is the latest from the hurricane center. It is still a category two hurricane, even though it's been on shore now for about three, three and a half hours.
It is still packing that type of wind punch and that's what we're going to expect for the rest of the night.
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And then here north of Orlando, that's Daytona, almost up toward Cinnamon Beach, seeing some spots there with 10 more inches of rain expected -- Laura.
COATES: Chad, looking back to that footage that we saw of Tropicana Field with the roof blown off, how strong would that wind have had to be to do that level of damage?
MYERS: Well, we had winds at the surface at a weather station at 106. You take that wind and you put it up higher in the sky with less friction on the ground, no buildings down here, you move that wind higher in the sky and that wind accelerates. It is not 106. It was likely one 120 on top of where that building was. And that's when you get one tear and all of a sudden, it's that weak link. You get one tear and that entire property was going to lose its roof.
Now, the unfortunate part is I saw, I don't know, thousands, maybe, a thousand people out there with cots that were prepared to sleep there because that's where the first responders were going to shelter. Now I don't think that's going to happen. They're going to have to find someplace else, maybe in the hallways, maybe in the mezzanine, maybe under the field. But boy, that's a mess.
COATES: Pretty unbelievable to think about this.
Chad, stick with us. We need to have your expertise today.
I want to get right as well to Adam Lucio. He is a storm chaser who is making his way through Tampa as we speak. We have him on the line.
Adam, you're not too far away. You've been surveying damage in east Tampa. What are you seeing there?
ADAM LUCIO, STORM CHASER, TAMPA, FLORIDA: Yes. Right now we're encountering a lot of flooded roadways, both very slow going for us. And we had to dodge a lot of downed trees. Even some roads signs and -- over highway 50, as we're making our way through the east side of Tampa, on our way to St. Petersburg so that there's a lot of debris on these roadways and a lot of road flooding. And we're still seeing distant power flashes throughout the area. Some of those strong wind gusts are continuing even into this hour.
COATES: We know that two million people right now are without power as Hurricane Milton continues to go through Florida. Where were you, Adam, as the storm hit and what did you see in those moments?
LUCIO: We were in Sarasota, the arena just outside of downtown similar to what we're experiencing in Tampa, we saw a lot of power flashes. Theres a lot of downed trees, a lot of downed wires. There were a couple of sailboats that washed up and for the highway that goes on the west side of downtown, that's a different highway it is. And we had to evacuate where we were sitting there because the storm surge started to come in. So we had to retreat over to our parking garage shelter that we scattered out the day before.
COATES: People are calling this a monster storm. Everyone was bracing. I wonder from you as a storm chaser how this compares to others you've been in.
LUCIO: This certainly ranks up there with some of the stronger ones that I've experienced. One thing that was unique about it was the eye. And we got almost into the center of that there wasn't a lot of rain in the eye and it had a very flat calm eye for about 20 minutes, so and then the backside of that eyewall whipped up really fast. So the conditions were changing rapidly compared to some of the other ones that I've experienced.
COATES: Have you seen anyone that has stayed behind or any people that have not been following the evacuation warnings? Is there a large group of people who did not?
LUCIO: Most -- it looks like most people have gotten out. We've been driving for about an hour and a half now and we've seen I think three cars the whole time. As we were coming down the evacuation lines I saw were some of the biggest that I've ever seen in any storm. So people certainly took it seriously. We did see a couple of people walking around in downtown Sarasota. We were also there for about six hours and, you know, we only saw maybe three people the entire time. So it appears most people they're either hunkered down in a safe shelter or they got out.
COATES: Well, I certainly hope that the morning will bring, you know, the information and safety for communities all across Florida as well.
Adam Lucio, thank you so much. Stay safe.
LUCIO: You as well. Thank you.
COATES: We have much more on Hurricane Milton slamming into Florida, including an update on that toppled crane that we saw in St. Petersburg.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: From kind of the North, I guess Northeast. And the water now is really starting to pour over. If you look at the graph -- whoa! OK, that wasn't good.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[00:34:23]
LAURA COATES, CNN ANCHOR: That was Anderson Cooper getting hit with Styrofoam -- thankfully, just Styrofoam -- Bradenton, Florida. But that was earlier tonight as Hurricane Milton came ashore.
I want to go right to CNN's Brian Todd, who is in Tampa right now.
Brian, the eye is now East of Tampa, but you're still getting hit pretty hard.
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We sure are, Laura. You played that video of Anderson.
I heard Anderson and our colleague, Randi Kaye, talk about kind of a resurgence of the storm, where they were in Bradenton and in Sarasota.
We're kind of getting a resurgence of the storm here in downtown Tampa, as well. The wind is still really pounding us. It is blowing the way -- hold on. Something just shifted above us. There's been a transformer that has blown a few times above us. The street now is without power, and something just shifted above us. So, we have to just really keep an eye out here.
[00:35:13]
I'll talk about the transformers in a second, because that's been a real issue here.
But first, another extraordinary event that we were able to film just a few minutes ago is reverse storm surge in Tampa Bay. We ventured about six blocks away from here, and it was tough to get there, because the roads are so flooded.
We got to the edge of the bay, but we couldn't get right to it, because the water in the road was so deep. So, our colleague, Dougal McConnell (ph), got out on his own, on foot, through the water, a real risk to his own safety, to film the storm, the reverse storm surge on Tampa Bay.
And it was really extraordinary, because it means that all the water, most of it, at least, in the bay, got pushed out to the ocean. Reverse storm surge is a very rare occurrence, we're told. Our CNN weather team and I were kind of talking about what that means. It all got pushed out into the ocean. It looked almost like a dry riverbed.
This video we're showing you of that, it was really extraordinary to see hardly any water in Tampa Bay. It looked like a dry riverbed.
But we are told, of course, that what goes out has to come back in again. That storm surge is going to be pushed back into Tampa Bay. And we're going to see what that does to the actual water levels and see if it kind of tips over the edge of the bay there.
Again, it's still very dangerous out here. The wind is just still kind of crushing us down here in downtown Tampa.
Also, we have some video of a transformer that kind of arced out not too far away from us and, you know, sparks shot out of it.
And that -- that happened in the transformer that's right above my head. Several times, this whole section of the city has lost power. Everything is on -- the hotel behind me is on generator power.
So, you can see, just look at the power. The rain and the wind that's hitting me right now, even as the storm maintains Category 2 status East of here in Orlando, just take a look at what the tail end of this storm is doing to us here in Tampa still, Laura. It's really extraordinary.
It's really rare that you see something of this strength and this duration in one place. And you've kind of -- then you kind of think of that magnifying itself over the entire region of Western Florida, the Tampa/St. Pete area. And it is still pretty relentless at this hour.
COATES: The transformers that you're experiencing. And again, please stay safe. I know you're saying something shifted above you, Brian.
Are you seeing this pattern around the city? We know that 22 million people are already without power in Florida.
TODD: Can't hear.
COATES: But there is -- there's a danger is it -- can't hear us --
TODD: Kind of lost my --
COATES: There's a danger that he's explaining to us about what's happening there. We've lost the audio with Brian Todd.
But this underscores the real danger involved with these transformers sparking out, the 2 million people who are without power right now in Florida. There is a danger there. So, people need to be very, very vigilant, continually.
Hurricane Milton has made landfall. It has triggered tornado outbreaks all across Florida. And this -- this large tornado crossing over I-95 on the Eastern side of the state was one of at least 17 tornadoes reported.
More than 110 tornado warnings have been issued across the state. And sadly, we have now learned that multiple people have been killed.
I want to bring in Sheriff Keith Pearson, sheriff from St. Lucie County in Florida.
Sheriff, I'm so sorry to hear about the loss of life in your county. What can you tell us about the victims there? What happened?
SHERIFF KEITH PEARSON, ST. LUCIE COUNTY, FLORIDA (via phone): You know, the -- earlier today in the first wave of this storm, Milton, came through. Our area's not used to seeing any kind of tornado activity.
We had one tornado pop up. It actually struck our sheriff's office, taking out a 10,000-square-foot red (ph) iron structure that was housing all of our emergency equipment in preparation for Hurricane Milton.
Shortly after that, maybe 20 minutes later, all of our alarms have gone off. All the messages came out there. Our deputies reported at least -- visually seeing six tornados on the ground, ripping through our county in the Northern direction, leaving hundreds of homes devastated, completely totaled.
And it, unfortunately, struck a retirement community that was mainly modular homes, where we did have loss of life. And we have crews on scene right now, working through the hurricane conditions that we're facing right now, to rescue anybody who's still inside there.
I mean, these -- these trailers are just devastated. They're lifted off their foundation. You know, we're not going to get into how many, but I can tell you it's more than one person who's lost their life that we've already recovered.
Again, we're focusing right now on getting all of our resources in there to rescue those -- those individuals that could be trapped inside these homes.
COATES: Is there -- are the rescue operations confined to that particular community, or are you seeing this all around your county?
[00:40:04]
PEARSON (via phone): No, we're confined to about a half -- a half- square-mile radius, although this -- these tornadoes riddled our county. Housing, you know, for miles on end and other counties around us.
But they were fortunate enough to make -- there's no loss of life there, just complete destruction. The loss of life that we're focusing on is a mobile home community that's a 55 and older community. So, we have elderly folks in there.
We have the type of construction -- and it just -- it went right through the middle of this community, and it left a path of destruction there.
Governor DeSantis had sent down the National Guard, which was here within an hour, as well as specialized search-and-rescue teams that specialized in that.
So, we have over 200 people, including our local fire and rescue deputies, people that are out here. And right now, we're -- I'm outside. Our power keeps cutting out. We're facing, I would guestimate, about a 50-mile-an-hour wind right now with gusts pumping up and down.
And it's only going to get worse here. We're on the East Coast. I heard your reporting earlier. That's on the West Coast. So, we're on the entire opposite side of the state of Florida, and we're feeling these effects here. We're having this devastation here. I just pray to God that anybody else who's facing the challenges of this storm could weather through it and be OK.
But our deputies and our troops are going to be out there during the storm, making sure that we rescue everybody who can be rescued.
COATES: Sheriff Keith Pearson, we will be following this. We sincerely hope that people can be rescued and that there can be safety in your community. Thank you so much for keeping us up to date on what's happening there. I appreciate that.
I want to go to CNN's chief climate correspondent, Bill Weir. He's on the scene in St. Petersburg, Florida.
Bill, we just heard from what's happening on the East Coast. Tell me what's going on where you are right now. What are you experiencing?
BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT: I'll tell you what, Laura. Right now, there's a gust blowing against my back I could lean against a wall.
We thought it was dying down. We thought the worst was over as the back end of the storm closes past St. Pete. But it's still got some life. It's still got a lot of kinetic energy. And it's just spreading it all over Pinellas County right now.
We got a little bit closer to the fallen crane here in St. Petersburg. There's one of four of them downtown. I think, according to the city, no injuries in this crane collapse. Thankfully.
It fell off of this building, this high-rise that's under construction across the boulevard and into lofts on the other side of the street here.
Whoa! It is still galing (ph). Spin it around, Carlos. Take a look over here. Let us marvel at the perennial fixture of hurricanes, the disaster tourists, out running around.
Look, we're out here to provide information so people know what's happening in their towns and really to avoid this. You don't have to come out here and risk catching a street sign across the back of the head.
But that's human nature. They haven't even been cooped up that long, so there's no excuse for that.
But this is just one little sample of the physical damage I'm afraid we may be seeing at sunrise, Laura. Between the Tropicana roof getting ripped off. Those are at least the most visual, the most obvious to us right now.
But a couple of years ago, the Tampa Bay newspaper did an investigation, "Tampa Bay Times," and found that this county is the most vulnerable in the entire state to flooding. Something like 700 vital buildings are at risk of flooding in a Category 1 storm. Another 400 in a Category 2.
This came ashore as a 3, as we know, and it's just a freakish sort of bizarro storm in the amount of water it's carrying and its timing, coming after Helene.
So, a lot to go before we get to the bright dawn. Hopefully, clear skies, and people need to be able to assess what's really happened here -- Laura.
COATES: Bill, we're watching this. The force of that wind literally moving your body. Knowing what it's done to the cranes, knowing the urgency of the -- what this violent storm has brought, the water that's coming in.
The fact that people are walking around is always so mind-boggling to me; that they don't appreciate the true danger.
But just talk to us about what you're seeing, because remember, this is an area, I think, that was also impacted by Hurricane Helene. And here you are, not even a week and a half later. What's happening?
WEIR: Yes, that's the thing. It's so heartbreaking. You know, these are the sorts of events. I was just sort of reflecting on the idea that Anderson and I, years ago, we covered Katrina at the same time. And that was a kind of one once-in-100 years sort of lifetime storm; that there were primetime concerts and specials and fundraisers. The whole country was focused on that disaster for so long.
But now these storms come. And we don't have time to absorb the last one.
I mean, the poor -- poor folks in Asheville and all of the devastation of that storm. They need attention, too. They need help. They need linemen trying to get their power on.
But now that this has compounded, one after another, it's really going to test resilience, their definition of disaster preparedness. These bigger storms, more frequent -- you know, one after another on an overheating planet, it's sadly sort of a reality now.
But this is one of those things, as we heard from other guests tonight, if not for Helene, which had set storm surge records and really rocked people's worlds, you know, Floridians who had ridden out plenty of storms and thought, oh, they never hit here, they -- that probably saved some lives. They got out in this particular case.
But in this storm, some people who evacuated the coast -- here you go. Be careful, for crying out loud! People who evacuated the coasts, you know, inland now, have these super cell tornado outbreaks which have already passed through.
I think we better find a little bit of shelter. We thought this was dying down enough and we'd be able to come out and do a little better tour for you. But I think we're going to -- we're going to go find some shelter now.
COATES: Bill Weir, stay safe. Stay safe, please. We're watching you and seeing the force of that wind and, of course, the water out there. Thank you so much for bringing us all of this news. It's so important, but please stay safe.
I know he's talking to people right now, telling them to say inside. Can we hear what they're saying to him?
We have a lot more on our special coverage of Hurricane Milton in just a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[00:51:30]
COATES: We're back now with our breaking news coverage of Hurricane Milton. I want to bring in CNN meteorologist Chad Myers.
Chad, we are following this closely, you so much so. What is the latest tonight?
CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: We still have flash flood emergencies to the East and Northeast of Tampa, and I think that's important, because we're not really getting any on the ground kind of coverage here.
But there are areas here around Lakeland on the way to Kissimmee that have already picked up ten inches of rain this evening alone.
And this large area of purple -- when we have a small area, yes, that can kind of drain off. But when you cover entire counties in ten inches of rain or more, you are going to get flash flooding.
And it is still raining. That's part of the problem. It is still raining. It is still windy. Windy in Orlando. Windy still here in Tampa. Winds coming off the ocean into Palmetto, into St. Pete. We are seeing gusts still around 90 miles per hour.
Look at Daytona Beach, 53. Just had a gust to 80 there. Orlando just had a gust to 47.
So, the storm has not really given up everything of its energy. And we didn't think that it would. We knew it would likely move all the way across the entire peninsula of Florida and still remain a hurricane.
And it is still, according to the hurricane center, a 100 mile-per- hour hurricane still at this hour.
Here's the rain that's still going to come. Still, back up to the North of Orlando and all the way off the coast. At least another four to six inches of rain still to come up there.
So, what else is going on? Well, we still have the wind onshore. Venice all the way down to Punta Gorda, down to Fort Myers. We do know that that's where the surge happened. Didn't happen in Tampa, because the wind was actually offshore here and onshore here. That's how surge happens.
So, we still don't know exactly what happened down there. We likely won't even know until morning when we get some pictures, either some aerials or something on the ground, whether there or was that ten-to- 15-foot surge. It is likely.
This storm was a Category 5 for a very long time, building up that surge. And I used this earlier, and my wife kind of told me I was corny.
But if you take -- not the first time. But if you take a cup of coffee, you take a cup of coffee and you blow on the top, you're going to see little ripples on the top of your coffee. And they're going to blow to the other side of your coffee cup.
And that's what storm surge is. You're just taking wind, and you're blowing little ripples of water, little ripples of water all the way to the coast. And then it hits the coast. And the coast gets in the way, and the water goes up.
COATES: All right. That's a very visual analogy. I like it, but I'm always on the wife's side, Chad Myers. Other than that, I would have been on yours. Thank you so much.
MYERS: Just -- just another dad-joke. You know.
COATES: Well, tell you something. Thank you for being here. Stay with us. We need your expertise.
I want to bring in right now former FEMA administrator for the Obama administration, Craig Fugate.
Craig, thank you for being with us in this moment, when we are seeing Hurricane Milton continue to batter Florida. We don't actually yet know what the extent of the damage is going to be, but we know that more than a million homes and businesses -- in fact more than 2 million -- are already without power.
What do you expect to see as Milton moves through?
CRAIG FUGATE, FORMER FEMA ADMINISTRATOR: Well, power outages will continue to increase. And as we get the heavy rain, we're going to see more flooding inland.
[00:55:03]
And as -- as the meteorologist was pointing out, as this storm starts to pull out tomorrow, we'll start getting a better idea of damages.
But a lot of the rescue departments that have shut down, as soon as they can -- and they won't wait until it's a clear day -- will start getting out, start doing initial search-and-rescue.
And that's, I think, when we're going to find out how much damage and where the biggest areas of impact took place.
COATES: We know the federal government pre-staged some supplies and also personnel, including over 1,400 search-and-rescue personnel, 20 million meals, 40 million liters of water, more than 400 ambulances, 60 DOD high-water vehicles and 20 helicopters.
When would they be able to deploy these resources?
FUGATE: Well, they've deployed some already today in the tornado outbreaks that occurred in South Florida.
The rest of them are in and around the areas, ready to go as soon as conditions permit. And part of that will be at the direction of the state as they identify the hard-hit areas.
We're already seeing reports that, in St. Pete, they've had some significant problems with the water system. Looking at a boil water order.
So, we already know that there are areas where infrastructure has been impacted that will be targets for a lot of these resources.
COATES: Milton, this is coming, Hurricane Milton coming just two weeks after Hurricane Helene.
I mean, I do wonder, from your experience, how much more difficult does that make it for Florida's recovery operations? And frankly, not just the exhaustion of first responders, but the exhaustion of resources needed by those first responders.
FUGATE: Well, in 2004, we were hit four times when I worked for Governor Bush as director of emergency management in Florida. And it really comes down to you just have to focus on a couple of really basic operations: lifesaving, life sustaining, and getting the infrastructure back up.
And try to get that done quickly so you're reset before you get any more disasters.
So, it's something that, unfortunately, Florida's had a lot of experience getting hit multiple storms. It's something they practice. And again, with this storm coming on top of Helene, for all practical purposes, the state emergency team and the FEMA team working with them hadn't really stopped since getting hit by Helene.
COATES: Well, the FEMA administrator, as you may know, Deanne Criswell, says that more than 70,000 people are in shelters right now.
I -- I wonder how long you might expect them to have to stay there, given the power conditions, given what we don't yet know about the destruction of this hurricane.
FUGATE: Well, that's why we're going to tell people to stay where they're at and let the local officials determine how bad and what areas you can safely return, and what areas you're not going to be able to.
People that evacuated in those coastal communities probably are going to have to wait longer. Other residents may be able to return as early as tomorrow, given that they may be going back when there's no power, but their homes weren't damaged.
COATES: Well, FEMA, as you know, is also dealing with rampant misinformation. Misinformation about the federal government's response. They've had to launch a website just to try to debunk the rumors. President Biden addressed it today, this afternoon, as well.
Have you ever seen this level of disinformation in your time at FEMA?
FUGATE: Well, we've seen the need for rumor control. We ended up doing it during Superstorm sandy. But we never really had it at that -- this level, where we have such a diffused information system, where so many people are turning to social media influencers for the news.
And again, we tell people: if you want to so what's going on in your community, tune to your local broadcasters; tune to the people that are talking to the local state officials, because that's where the actual information is coming from about what you need to know in your community.
COATES: Craig Fugate, thank you so much.
FUGATE: Thanks for having me. COATES: I'm Laura Coates with CNN's breaking news coverage of Hurricane Milton.
More than 2 million people are without power across Florida as Milton marches across the state of Florida.
In just the last hour, Tampa suspended emergency services. Why? Because winds in the city topped more than 100 miles per hour. Those winds, they are so powerful that it actually shredded -- shredded -- a part of the roof of Tropicana Field, home, of course, of the Tampa Bay Rays.
It was all supposed to be a shelter for first responders.
One reporter was actually there as the roof was ripped apart.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Something unbelievable to show you. This is Tropicana Field. The roof, a big portion of it, has ripped off. We're looking inside Tropicana Field. We are seeing extreme damage to try -- we had actually -- there was a report we saw online earlier of a fire. And we were waiting to confirm that, and now we just made it up.
