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CNN Live At Daybreak
Dennis: The Aftermath; Cuba Concern
Aired July 11, 2005 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back, everybody. It is just about half past the hour on this AMERICAN MORNING. You're watching a special early edition. I'm Soledad O'Brien.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Miles O'Brien.
Coming up, FEMA says it is ready to respond quickly to Dennis. They've learned some hard lessons at that agency. We'll speak to a FEMA spokesman in just a few moments.
S. O'BRIEN: Also ahead in this half-hour, Dennis barreled over Cuba. It left more than a million people without power and without running water, too. We're going to find out just what's ahead for the island nation.
M. O'BRIEN: Let's look at where things stand right now with Dennis and the aftermath of this powerful killer storm. Little more than 13 hours ago, it was a Category 3 hurricane, winds hitting 120 miles an hour, and even beyond that at some points.
This morning, Florida Governor Jeb Bush will fly over some of those areas hit by those powerful and compact winds. In its wake, Dennis left more than 400,000 residents, businesses without power along the Gulf Coast Panhandle of Florida. Overnight, as Dennis moved over land into Alabama, it was downgraded into a tropical storm. Just a little while ago, it became a tropical depression.
S. O'BRIEN: So that means it's time to take a look at the weather conditions right now. Let's get right to Rob Marciano. He's at the weather desk.
Hey, Rob, good morning to you.
ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Hi, Soledad.
Brief recap as to where this thing made landfall. Santa Rosa Island between Navarre Beach and Pensacola yesterday at 2:25 Central Time as a Category 3 storm. Winds reached between 115 and 120. We did have a wind gust reported at Navarre Beach at 121. And that's the highest we saw so far and that, obviously, is certainly enough to do some damage.
Where the storm is right now is where there's going to be some heavy rainfall and it's quite a wide swathe. So away from the coastline, the story changes today from wind to water, and folks who might not normally see a tropical storm system, well, you're going to get it today. Memphis, Tennessee up through Nashville as well, even up through parts of southern Illinois and Indiana, you'll see some heavy rain.
Those red watch boxes you just saw, those were tornado watches that expired last night. But possibly later on today, there will be more issued around this area as we get a little bit of the heat of the day.
All right, here's our Titan Radar and show you a similar venue. A couple of areas that have seen some heavy rain overnight, the Atlanta metro area, another line of thunderstorms heading into the western suburb. So, it was nasty coming in here. And the winds gusting to over tropical storm strength across northern Georgia. And I expect to see similar action across western parts of Tennessee.
And, Soledad, the center of this right now is between, say, Tuscaloosa, Alabama and Columbus, Mississippi at this point and with winds sustained at 30 miles an hour. Again, we go from wind to water today. There's going to be some flooding in spots well north of where this thing made landfall.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes, I think you're right. That's the big story today as how people deal with all that flooding, Rob Marciano.
We should mention that we're going to check in with Chad in just a little bit. He is in St. Marks. We'll see how people there are coping -- Miles.
M. O'BRIEN: People along the Gulf Coast are still trying to catch their breath this morning, understandably, after Dennis came to shore, Category 3 hurricane at the time. But many are still without power and that could continue for some weeks to come.
CNN's Randi Kaye joins us now from Pensacola, latest on the damage and the recovery effort there -- Randi.
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Miles.
The word of the day is lucky. It could have been so much worse here in the Pensacola area. That's what folks are already saying. We did get hit with about 118 mile-an-hour winds, and we did have plenty of damage.
I want to show you just back there, that is the former sign for the Ramada Inn Hotel in the distance there, one of them. I was actually in the lobby at the time and I saw the word Ramada go flying by. That's how I knew that sign was gone.
This sign right here, this is the really big sign from the Ramada Inn. This was just repaired just a few months ago from Ivan. Now it's on the ground. This was the sign that actually hung up there.
And John Zarrella and Anderson Cooper were actually on the air yesterday afternoon when this sign came crashing down to the ground. And there's plenty of glass. You can see the light bulbs and all that in there. And there's even, just along the ground here, this is one of -- it looks like one of the neon bulbs that was actually in there. You can see it's now unusable. But there is still plenty to clean up. The beach area, as expected, was one of the hardest hit. That would be the Pensacola Beach area, Navarre Beach. Pensacola Beach was in the midst of a dune replenishment project. So that's on hold once again. There are construction cranes that have been overturned on that beach, I'm told. Power lines are down. And it's, actually, you can't even get to the beach right now. They're not letting any heavy traffic in there, nothing more than a car right now.
Also, I-10, which was very heavily damaged during Hurricane Ivan back in September, that's the I-10 bridge we're talking about. A man lost his life on that bridge. It's just been repaired as of January with some temporary steel plates. And that may or may not open later today. They're going to have some divers down there taking a look.
But as far as power goes, we know we haven't had power since yesterday afternoon. There's about 101,000 people without power in Escambia County. And, which isn't good, but they do hope to get that power back in just a couple of days. Power lines are down everywhere. Trees are down, as you can see.
But here at the hotel last September during Ivan, they came outside after the storm and there was not a single leaf on the tree. So it seems, I'm no expert, but it seems that because there are plenty of leaves yet, even though these trees are down, that this may not have had the same force as Ivan, at least not right here.
But the curfew is still in place until 6:00 a.m. local time this morning. Governor Jeb Bush is expected to come to the area some time today. It is beginning to rain again. We're probably going to expect some high winds and some rain, light rain, or even heavy rain, throughout the day -- Miles.
M. O'BRIEN: Randi Kaye in Pensacola, thank you very much -- Soledad.
S. O'BRIEN: President Bush has declared parts of Florida, Alabama and Mississippi federal disaster areas, and that makes residents there eligible for a variety of federal assistance. It can include grants for temporary housing and home repairs and low cost loans to cover uninsured property losses and other programs, as well, to help people recover from this disaster.
So here's how that breaks down. Forty-five counties in Alabama, 13 counties in Florida, 37 counties in Mississippi, they are all eligible for a variety of federal assistance.
To learn how you can help those who have been affected by Hurricane Dennis, you can log on to CNN.com. There's information there on how you can help, along with other special coverage of the hurricane season.
Also at that Web site, free video of the hurricane as it happened and a chance to send us your storm stories and your storm pictures, too. All of that is just a click away at CNN.com -- Miles. M. O'BRIEN: In the wake of a disaster like this, of course a lot of people sweep in to try to help out. The federal government is there to assist folks who have suffered losses.
Of course you know only 10 months ago, folks in that area had to deal with Ivan, which, if Ivan was a 10, folks in this part of the world are saying this storm was probably about a 3 or a 4. Having said that, if you've lost your roof, it's the same to you no matter what. And this morning you're curious about how you're going to get some assistance. And that in times past during big storms has been a bit of a challenge.
S. O'BRIEN: It was interesting to hear from the folks from FEMA yesterday where they were saying that they learned a lot of lessons from Hurricane Ivan. And I guess everybody across the board did. People evacuated much faster, which is probably the reason we didn't see as many injuries and deaths, I would imagine. And FEMA said that they learned a lot of lessons in how to stage and, really, how to avoid some of the problems they had last time.
M. O'BRIEN: And of course last season, imagine the series of storms they had to contend with as well. This is early in the season.
Joining us to talk a little bit about the federal response, Federal Emergency Management Agency, is a spokesman for that agency, Marty Bahamonde who is in Pensacola.
Marty, good to have you with us.
MARTY BAHAMONDE, FEMA SPOKESMAN: Good morning.
M. O'BRIEN: When last we checked in with you, there was grave concern the storm would perhaps even ratchet up to Category 5, very powerful. And it seemed like a lot of things worked in your favor here so far to minimize the damage.
BAHAMONDE: Well I think one of the things that really helped was that a lot of people took the advice to evacuate. I was down in Navarre Beach yesterday, and the officials told me that almost 99 percent of the people had evacuated that area. So there really wasn't any people left for injuries or any kind of deaths or anything like that. So I think that really helped the situation a lot, especially for the local officials.
M. O'BRIEN: What is the biggest lesson of Ivan, and for that matter, last year's terrible hurricane season that you're employing this time around to hopefully make things smoother for folks who have been hard hit?
BAHAMONDE: Well I think we have people stationed all over the southeast this year and we have people in Alabama, we have people in Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, Louisiana. All of our supplies are pre-staged in areas where they can move quickly.
Today we're going to be getting out rapid needs assessment teams, damage assessment teams to really take a look at what the immediate needs are to help the state and the counties with anything that they're going to need for today and the weeks ahead.
M. O'BRIEN: Of course folks have short, medium, long-term needs. I mean given the fact that there were some folks who are still kind of dealing with the damage of Ivan when this storm hit, that underscores that point. Short-term needs, what are you dealing with right now? What sorts of things are you addressing for folks?
BAHAMONDE: Well I think right now there's still a lot of people in shelters. There's a lot of people without power. We've got supplies ready for to bring in food, to bring in water, to bring in generators. We have a lot of tarps that we're going to be helping people with, if they have roof damage, to allow them to get back and to stay in their homes. So just those essential commodities that people can start to get their lives back together and don't have to worry about the immediate needs that they're going to be facing in the next couple of days.
M. O'BRIEN: All right, as time goes on and people start, you know, making claims and so forth, is FEMA at a point now where it is still sort of saturated from the last season? In other words, can you accommodate what lies ahead? This is, after all, early in this season.
BAHAMONDE: Absolutely. You know what happened last year, we've processed you know over a million claims and we've handed out over $5 billion. So a lot of the process from last year has really started to move forward, and we're getting into the next phase, the long-term phase. So we're all ready again for the next hurricane season. We've been known for several months now that it's going to be a bad season. And so we're completely prepared for what lies ahead over the summer.
M. O'BRIEN: All right, we wish you well. And you learned a tough lesson last year. Sorry you had to learn that lesson, but I'm glad that it's going to benefit folks this go around. Let's hope we don't have a repeat, though. We don't want that.
BAHAMONDE: Exactly.
M. O'BRIEN: Marty Bahamonde is a spokesman for the Federal Emergency Management Agency. We appreciate it.
Want to take a look at the radar quickly, just give folks a sense of this is what's left of Dennis, now a tropical depression, and you see sort of the sense of it. This is, over here in the corner that's a little bit of Georgia. There's Alabama and that's Mississippi and lots of rain up here in Tennessee.
And just getting to work here this morning in Georgia, if you could bring up that Titan shot again, can show you that there's -- remember we talked about that northeast quadrant of the storm? Well that still kind of applies here. Lots of flash flooding. Right here in the Atlanta area this morning, it was something.
And there was a tornado warning right where I was last night. And you can see there's still some fairly serious, as they say, convective activity all around this area. So these storms, you know we talk about the landfall of the eyewall and as it is a hurricane, the impact is being felt still this morning.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes. All right.
Well a short break is ahead. But still to come on AMERICAN MORNING, why cleaning up and recovering from Dennis may be much more difficult in Cuba. Some of the challenges for Cuban storm victims just ahead as a special edition of AMERICAN MORNING continues.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
S. O'BRIEN: Hurricane Dennis made landfall in the Florida Panhandle as a Category 3 storm. But when the storm hit Cuba, it was still a very strong Category 4 with winds in excess of 135 miles an hour. The damage left behind was substantial.
But as CNN's Havana bureau chief Lucia Newman explains, the worst may not be over.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LUCIA NEWMAN, CNN HAVANA BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): A scene that could be entitled "After the Deluge." Havana residents coming out of their houses, at last, in the wake of Hurricane Dennis to buy bread, their government ration cards in hand. Stores are slowly beginning to open. All over the island, millions of Cubans are still without electricity.
Seventy-year-old Donna Caridid (ph) shows us what's left of her only candle, but is thrilled that the gas finally returned so she can cook this fish.
Everything else in the fridge has spoiled, because we haven't had power since Friday, she says.
Hardest hit by Dennis was south central Cienfuegos Province where the storm entered Cuba and where scores of families are now homeless. The hurricane's savage winds destroyed or seriously damaged thousands of houses. Flooding, too, was extensive.
Emergency teams all over the country are working round the clock to try and reestablish basic services and provide shelter for those who no longer have it. But the housing problem, in particular, is only expected to get worse.
(on camera): The dilapidated buildings here in old Havana and central Havana were drenched during the hurricane. And now, as they begin to dry now that the sun has come out, many will crack and are expected to collapse in the next few days.
(voice-over): With the airport finally open, thousands of overseas tourists who were trapped by the hurricane are starting to go home. But for those who aren't going anywhere, like Jose Contera (ph), there is little relief. A tree collapsed on his decrepit house during the hurricane.
And unless there's a miracle, it won't survive the next one, he says.
And that's the worst part for many, the facts that Dennis isn't the final storm but just the first for this island nation that's almost always directly in the path of these vicious seasonal hurricanes.
Lucia Newman, CNN, Havana.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
S. O'BRIEN: In Haiti, 22 people are confirmed dead from Dennis, 10 people still missing. Floods and mudslides have left this already impoverished nation reeling. Getting aid and food to survivors in hard-to-reach areas is difficult, especially in southern Haiti.
Take a look at this, the bridge there went out. There it goes, as of Thursday in Grande-Goave, when the storm hit. U.N. peacekeepers are worried about the situation that could follow there, as well.
Those who were able to leave before Dennis arrived were smart. Jamaican authorities are reporting only one death attributed to Hurricane Dennis, a man who drowned in a river. Thousands of Jamaicans still cannot return to their homes because the floodwaters still haven't receded yet.
M. O'BRIEN: This is a special edition of AMERICAN MORNING. We'll turn it over to you in a little bit. Our "Citizen Journalist" with your take on Dennis.
But right now, let's take a look at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson Airport as we leave you now. No, we don't have that. We'll get that to you in a little bit. Stay with us for more AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
S. O'BRIEN: Welcome back, everybody.
We've been getting a really nice response from the people who have taken the time to e-mail to us the photos that they have taken while Hurricane Dennis roared through and some of the aftermath as well. It's part of our "Citizen Journalist" coverage.
This picture right here, this is from Heather in Apalachicola, Florida. She says that see where that sign is, I guess the little stop sign from the back.
M. O'BRIEN: Yes, mid left there.
S. O'BRIEN: That's a road right there. And so this is not a river, this is a road. You can see...
M. O'BRIEN: So now you've just got to stop your boat there, but...
S. O'BRIEN: Yes. Flooding is obviously...
M. O'BRIEN: Yes.
S. O'BRIEN: ... a huge problem in Apalachicola, Florida today.
We have another one here. Let's take a look. This is from Heather as well. You can see some of the damage there, some of the debris that was tossed around. And it looks like there's some of the structures have taken quite a hit there.
And let's go to the photo that Randy sent us from South Walton County in Florida, beachfront property. Randy tells us some of the homes here collapsed. Others were pretty close to falling right into the sea. This was taken just two hours after Dennis made landfall. Pretty remarkable.
M. O'BRIEN: It looks like the ground was kind of undermined there, too, in the foreground there. Doesn't it...
S. O'BRIEN: Yes, it sure does.
M. O'BRIEN: ... look like the concrete or the driveway.
S. O'BRIEN: You know I mean Chad was talking about that yesterday, the potential problems that the erosion and the high surf could do, just basically drag out the sand and, you know, eventually collapse some of the beachfront property there. We'll have an opportunity to chat with Chad a little bit later this morning about some of the aftermath.
Thanks to the folks who sent those pictures in.
If you are anywhere in the affected area and you want a photo shown and you'd like to send it to us, we appreciate it. You can send it right to CNN.com/hurricane.
M. O'BRIEN: I think our photographers are worried they're going to be out of a job here with all those...
S. O'BRIEN: Some of these shots are very nice.
M. O'BRIEN: Citizens are doing very nice work.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes.
M. O'BRIEN: We appreciate it. Thank you for sending them in.
In a moment, today's top stories, including dramatic home video out of Canada, fatal in-flight collision at an air show in Saskatchewan. We'll have that story, and much more, straight ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: September 22, 1989, Hurricane Hugo slammed into South Carolina after doing heavy damage to Puerto Rico and the Virgin and Leeward Islands. A record setting 20-foot tidal surf destroyed homes along the southern Atlantic coast. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This photo (ph) that are stationed here. Look at this.
ANNOUNCER: Large portions of downtown Charleston were destroyed and bridges to nearby islands were demolished. Hurricane Hugo is one of the most expensive hurricanes in U.S. history, causing an estimated $7 billion in damage, along with 82 deaths.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
S. O'BRIEN: Welcome back, everybody. You are watching a special extended edition of AMERICAN MORNING.
Let's take a look at some of the other stories making news this morning.
A story we've been following all last week of a body of a Navy SEAL missing for two weeks now has been recovered on an Afghanistan mountainside. A senior defense official says it appears that the SEAL died in a shootout, contrary to earlier Taliban claims that they captured and executed him.
DNA testing confirms that the human remains found in a western Montana campsite are those of 9-year-old Dylan Groene. The official word came on Sunday from Idaho investigators who say they will reserve any further comment on the results out of respect to Dylan's family.
Some amateur videotape to show you, pretty graphic. Comes out of Canada, and it captures a fatal mid-air collision at an air show yesterday in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. Pilots were recreating a World War I dogfight. They died instantly when the biplanes collided with one another. No spectators were hurt.
A thousand people walked to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Srebrenica Massacre. Some 8,000 Bosnian-Muslim men slaughtered by Bosnian-Serb troops. The killings considered Europe's worst massacre since World War II. Two Bosnian-Serbs indicted by war crimes tribunals for masterminding the killings remain at large today.
That's a look at some of the headlines this morning.
Let's get back now to the aftermath coverage of Hurricane Dennis.
Welcome back, everybody. We're coming to you live this morning from the CNN Center in Atlanta. I'm Soledad O'Brien. It is right at the top of the hour.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Miles O'Brien.
Good morning to you.
Welcome to this early special edition of AMERICAN MORNING.
We appreciate you being with us. S. O'BRIEN: Here's a look at what happened with hurricane Dennis while you were sleeping. Overnight and just a short while ago, the system degraded to a tropical depression over Alabama. Utilities officials say the storm has caused power outages to more than half a million customers in the Florida Panhandle and in south Alabama, too.
Florida Governor Jeb Bush and FEMA Director Mike Brown, they plan to visit shelters in Florida today.
M. O'BRIEN: But first things first. The question on many of your minds this morning, how will the remnants of hurricane Dennis, now tropical depression Dennis, affect you today?
For that, we go right to the Weather Center and Rob Marciano there -- Rob.
ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, the scope of Dennis now, Miles, really is expanding. And it goes from that little point of landfall and now it's going to affect millions of people in the way of heavy rains and gusty winds in some spots, and maybe even later today, a few isolated tornadoes. So -- and who are we talking about here? Well, places that you wouldn't think about seeing, you know, a tropical storm or a tropical depression or any sort of tropical system -- Memphis, Tennessee, even as far north as St. Louis, maybe getting up through Indianapolis and then getting through all of Tennessee.
This is where some of the heaviest rains are going to be, and across parts of northern Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi and into the western Carolinas.
This is the radar picture, by the way, as we look at the satellite imagery. You can see the back half of this thing really falling apart. These things obviously need a lot of warm water and once they hit the land they dissipate quite quickly. But there is still a lot of moisture that is with this and that is what we're concerned about today, because it's going to slow down.
It's been a pretty fast storm. But you see the forecast track of the L starts to slow it down here over the next 24 hours. So that will make the rain rain in one spot for a longer period of time. And you don't need to be a rocket scientist to figure that out. That means there's going to be potential for flooding.
Let's talk briefly about the wind speeds and what we experienced yesterday. The highest wind gust out of Navarre, Florida, 121; Mariesta, 102; Pensacola, 93; Valparaiso, 83; and Mobile, Alabama getting into the act with hurricane force winds at 77 miles an hour. Luckily, those winds are done, Miles. But certainly stormy weather is going to continue in the area where you see a lot of color on this map behind me.
M. O'BRIEN: Now, you were talking about gusts. Sustained wind speed at those places was obviously a little less than that.
MARCIANO: Yes, on average maybe 10 or 15 to 20 miles an hour less. But, you know, it's tough to get measurements of sustained winds in many places. So you've got to take those gusts and assume that happened in other places, as well, especially where we saw the damage.
M. O'BRIEN: Yes, and for meteorologists the work is not done. I know it was actually much later that hurricane Andrew was upgraded to category five. They looked at some data that they didn't see in real time.
MARCIANO: Yes, they'll -- the guys at the National Hurricane Center and, more importantly, the researchers will go back, the guys who really are into this, and dissect all the data and, you know, and they may find out, you know, more. Right now the preliminary numbers are 120 mile an hour winds and a category three status.
M. O'BRIEN: All right, Rob Marciano, thanks very much.
MARCIANO: You bet.
M. O'BRIEN: Hundreds, thousands of people, really, along the Florida Gulf Coast retreated to shelters ahead of hurricane Dennis. They were thinking a lot about Ivan, many of them, and it was a good thing they did. Although Dennis was not an Ivan level storm, the area, of course, took a beating, as we've been telling you about that.
Joining us now to talk a little bit about it is Randi Kaye in Dennis's wake.
She joins us from Pensacola -- Randi.
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning again, Miles.
We were hit with winds of about 118 yesterday afternoon. Our hotel is without power, but there's also plenty of damage here to show. I want to show you some of it this morning.
What I'm holding in my hand here, this is a neon bulb and the glass tubing that goes with it. This used to be a part of this Ramada Inn hotel sign, which is now on the ground, this huge piece of wreckage right here. It looks sort of just like -- just a guilty piece of twisted metal.
Let me show you where this was. This was actually way up there on the top of the pole. It was just repaired a few months ago, after hurricane Ivan. It was spinning yesterday. It was a very dramatic scene here. It was spinning. Folks in the hotel were oohing and aahing as they watched it spin, because it's not supposed to spin. And then while John Zarrella and Anderson Cooper were live on the air yesterday, it came smashing down to the ground.
I also want to show you this other sign back there. That was another Ramada Inn hotel sign. That also blew over. That was also a brand new sign, just replaced a couple of weeks ago. I was in the hotel lobby and I just saw the giant word "Ramada" go flying by the window.
So it was a pretty dramatic scene here. As far as other areas of the Pensacola area, the beaches were pretty hard hit. Pensacola Beach was in the middle of a dune project. They were replenishing the dunes after hurricane Ivan came through in September. So there was some construction cranes on the beach. Those are down. Power lines are down. They're not letting any cars in or out of that area.
They're hoping to get a survey there, the Office of Emergency Management, some time today to let folks know how their homes are doing, but they don't expect them to be back in their homes for quite some time.
I-10, the bridge that was damaged by Ivan, a man lost his life there last September, that also may have suffered some damage. There are some temporary steel plates there and they're going to send out some divers, actually, this morning under the water to take a look.
This is some of the tree damage here. The winds, as I said, were about 118, so not as bad as they were expecting, possibly in that 140 mile an hour range. But you can see that they were strong enough, certainly, to bring these trees down, which isn't good. But at least the leaves are still on them and some of them are still standing. We had some gutter damage and some roof damage, but other than that, this area, at least, seems to be doing OK.
We're going to take a drive around a little bit later on -- Miles.
M. O'BRIEN: All right, well, be careful. Wait for daybreak before you do that so you're safe.
But that looks like -- that's a hardwood tree, so clearly there was some serious wind there.
KAYE: I'm sorry?
M. O'BRIEN: Oh, just talking about that tree. It's not -- that's a hardwood. It looks like an oak. So it was some pretty serious wind.
KAYE: In fact, absolutely. In fact, yesterday, this is one of the trees that everybody said oh, that's not going anywhere, that's a live oak, that's going to stay right where it is. Meanwhile, we came out this morning and it's on the ground.
M. O'BRIEN: All right, Randi Kaye, thanks very much -- Soledad.
S. O'BRIEN: Navarre Beach is located southeast of Pensacola. It took a beating, as well. The problem -- the biggest problem there is the power outages, though.
Reporter Jonathan Betz from our affiliate WWL shows us what residents there went through yesterday.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
JONATHAN BETZ, WWL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Florida's scenic Navarre Beach has suffered a direct hit from hurricane Dennis.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Damage to almost everything over here. BETZ: On Florida's Santa Rosa Island, Dennis' 120 mile per hour winds gutted homes and beachside restaurants in Navarre Beach. Furniture and boats now sit on the shores. Ten feet of storm surge washed over the entire island, covering roads and parking lots with several inches of sand. The Gulf's water poured over the main beach highway, washing away the land and turning the road into a waterfall. Much of the highway is either washed out or badly buckled. In fact, survey crews had trouble driving over the shards of pavement.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a lot of damage here in the commercial end, but I couldn't get any farther down the road to really tell what's happened. BETZ: The strong water pushed this television news truck 200 feet up shore, leaving it on its side. Nearby, Dennis destroyed the Navarre Beach pier and it's parking lot. Further inland, Dennis ripped the roofs off buildings and snapped power lines across the Panhandle, damaging homes still recovering from hurricane Ivan's hit last year.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We had some damage with Ivan, but nothing like this.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
S. O'BRIEN: That was Jonathan Betz of our affiliate station WWL.
Coming up just after the half hour, how did those who hunkered down to weather out the storm do? We'll take a look just ahead.
Also, a note. If you are anywhere in the affected area of the storm, you can e-mail us your pictures of the damage. Our address is cnn.com/hurricane.
M. O'BRIEN: As our citizen journalists, we'll tell you what we tell our camera crews, which is don't do anything risky. Do we tell them that? Yes, we do tell our crews that. Safety is the key. We want the pictures, but more importantly we don't want you to get hurt.
Still to come on this special edition of AMERICAN MORNING, lucky and yet not home free. Dennis leaves its mark on the Florida Panhandle. Dozens of cities declared disaster areas.
S. O'BRIEN: Also ahead this morning, streets turned into rivers. A tidal surge triggers massive flooding. We'll find out what the Red Cross is doing today to try to help.
M. O'BRIEN: And staying put and riding out the storm. One family's story is ahead on this special edition of AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
S. O'BRIEN: In the wake of Dennis, President Bush has declared parts of Florida and Alabama and Mississippi disaster areas. The declaration makes them eligible for federal assistance.
Santa Rosa County, Florida is one of those areas.
Hunter Walker is the Santa Rosa County administrator.
Thank you for talking with us, sir.
We certainly appreciate it.
How does Santa Rosa County look tropical depression?
HUNTER WALKER, SANTAS ROSA COUNTY ADMINISTRATOR: Well, it looks -- it still looks like it's been affected by a category three hurricane and trees down, power lines down, a number of homes without power, some roof damage, some -- probably some structural damage in Navarre Beach and on the coast. But in relative terms, after -- nine months after Ivan, we don't look as bad as we could look and we're thankful for that.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes, I guess to some degree these things are always relative, aren't they? What kind of...
WALKER: They certainly are.
S. O'BRIEN: What kind of help do you need now? I mean it's been declared a federal disaster area.
WALKER: Well, that's correct. And one of the things that we need, of course, is just to get the emergency crews in, the power crews in to get power restored and to begin that process. But, quite frankly, the state and federal partners have been helpful. They're getting in the supplies that we need and the logistics and the staging. And so as far as needs, I think that they -- if they've not been met, they're in the process of being met.
S. O'BRIEN: There is a curfew in effect, I understand, and that curfew is in effect until noon.
Are you finding that residents are being pretty compliant?
WALKER: I think they're being as compliant as they can. I mean, you know, it's -- the curiosity, the event went through so fast and it cleared up afterwards, so there's that natural curiosity to go out and see. But we are under a county wide curfew. We are under a declared state of emergency until further notice.
So it's real bullets to us. We do need the people to stay off the roads so that the emergency crews can clear roadways, safe up the power lines and begin the restoration process.
S. O'BRIEN: I had read that there were some 1,600 people who were living, before the storm hit, in these FEMA given trailers.
How did they do in the storm?
WALKER: Well, as obviously they were evacuated from the trailers and placed in other arrangements, at least temporarily, whether shelters, whether with family, friends, that type of thing. So, yes, we still had the back lot from Ivan, but we had no reports of any deaths or injuries and I'm sure there were some of the trailers that didn't fare so well, but their guidance was to get their belongings and move somewhere else.
S. O'BRIEN: So, considering that many people thought that this storm was going to hit with more vengeance than Ivan did, you must be, all of you must really be breathing, to some degree, a very big sigh of relief.
WALKER: That's correct. But, of course, without the Ivan experience, we would have thought this was a terrible experience. But, quite frankly, today the word thankful you used is very appropriate.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes, and I guess when you have no deaths to report, it really sounds like everybody heeded those evacuation warnings, kind of really listened to authorities.
WALKER: They really did. Both sides of it. Those that evacuated, they got out. They got out safely. Those that stayed were properly hunkered down and took the proper precautions.
S. O'BRIEN: Well, you know, as you said it, I think very well, it's all relative. And after Ivan, some of the damage that looks pretty dramatic to us today is bad, but not as bad as it could have been.
Hunter Walker is the Santa Rosa County administrator, joining us by phone.
Thanks -- Miles.
M. O'BRIEN: For more on Dennis, be sure to log on to cnn.com. There you can find all sorts of special features, including free video of the hurricane as it happened. Also, we'll tell you how you can help out folks affected by the storm. All that's just a click away at cnn.com.
Still to come on the program, the after effects of Dennis and how they'll be felt much longer than the storm itself. How to help those who are waist deep or higher in misery and much. We'll talk with the Red Cross and we'll find out what they're doing and what you can do to assist those caught up in this storm.
That's ahead on a special edition of AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
M. O'BRIEN: Well, if you spent some time with us yesterday, we spent a lot of time talking about where the eye of hurricane Dennis was and where it might make landfall. But we also were telling you about how that northeastern quadrant, that kind of upper right side of the storm, is a real problem.
Take a look at this map for just a moment. I just want to orient you here. Number one, that's, of course, where the eye came across about 3:30 Eastern time, 2:30 local time. That's Tallahassee, the capital. And all the way over here, this is right where Interstates 10 and 75 intersect in Live Oak. Remember what I was telling you about, this is the area that everybody gets concerned about, that quadrant right there. Well, in Live Oak they got some problems as a result of all this.
Kyle Meenan with our Jacksonville affiliate WTLV checks in.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It sounded like a vacuum cleaner. It sounded like a giant vacuum cleaner.
KYLE MEENAN, WTLV CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): But this vacuum stretched from the sky, uprooting trees and snapping 150-year-old oaks like twigs.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So my wife and I walked into the living room and talk about walking into open air. The top of the roof is gone. And it's raining inside.
MEENAN: At first light, Moss could see the twister came across the lake just east of his house, barreling to the West.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It came right over our lake house, if you will, right down the walkway and in the middle of our living room.
MEENAN: The good news -- the rest of the home is fine, although wet and muddy, with shards of glass everywhere.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The ridge beam is still intact. So we've got something to build back to.
MEENAN: As the outer bands of Dennis blew through town Sunday afternoon, an army was quietly gathering just up I-75.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They've come from all up and down the East Coast, as far as New York, some from instate, as well. We have water, ice and generators and miscellaneous supplies, forklifts and that type of thing.
MEENAN: And once the most menacing part of this storm known as Dennis is past, those men, women and machines will be moving in, moving in to offer aid and assistance where it's needed most.
Reporting along I-10, I'm Kyle Meenan, First Coast News.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
M. O'BRIEN: All right, thank you, Kyle Meenan.
He is with our Jacksonville affiliate, WTLV.
We want to thank all our affiliates, by the way. They've been a great help through the whole thing.
S. O'BRIEN: Absolutely. A yeoman's duty, as they say.
M. O'BRIEN: Yes.
S. O'BRIEN: Really, I think, doing the bulk of the work, too.
M. O'BRIEN: Remember that tower cam shot, WEAR?
S. O'BRIEN: Yes.
M. O'BRIEN: That thing...
S. O'BRIEN: We went with that with a long time yesterday.
M. O'BRIEN: Well, and I kept waiting for it to fail and it just kept going.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes.
M. O'BRIEN: So, tip of the hat to all of them.
S. O'BRIEN: Absolutely.
M. O'BRIEN: Thank you.
S. O'BRIEN: We also want to thank the other folks who have been helping us out, the citizen journalists who really are the viewers who've been witnessing and witnessed hurricane Dennis firsthand and then took pictures and have sent them back to us.
This is Neill from Seagrove Beach in Florida. This is a sequence of photos from the same spot. OK, so look at this. This one is the scene on Friday. Nice deck, beautiful shot.
M. O'BRIEN: Wow!
S. O'BRIEN: Here is the next one. The same spot Sunday, right before Dennis made landfall. You can see the waves start washing up over the whole beach. And then take a look at this one. Ooh.
M. O'BRIEN: And this one comes from yesterday evening. Look at how the beach has disappeared. And, not incidentally, the deck not quite the same place today, is it?
S. O'BRIEN: No, it sure isn't.
Let's go to a videotape now.
This is from Brenda in Pace, Florida.
M. O'BRIEN: Whoa!
S. O'BRIEN: Wow!
M. O'BRIEN: Jeez, Brenda, I hope you were inside when you were shooting that.
S. O'BRIEN: She's -- actually, she said she shot this from her front door...
M. O'BRIEN: Yes.
S. O'BRIEN: ... just before the eye of the hurricane hit her neighborhood. Wow! That's pretty remarkable.
M. O'BRIEN: Auntie Em, huh?
S. O'BRIEN: Yes.
M. O'BRIEN: Jeez, that's something. That is something, seeing that come through. There's a lot of debris blowing through. We were talking about that because in the wake of Ivan, there still was a tremendous amount of debris around because people were still...
S. O'BRIEN: There's construction, yes.
M. O'BRIEN: ... construction, whatever the case may be, as a result of the wake of Ivan. And that caused a lot of concern, of course.
All right, after hurricane Dennis moved inland, it dumped inches upon inches of rain in many areas. Atlanta got a big dumping, many other parts of the Southeast and Central South. Couple that with those 10-foot storm surges and you have a recipe for flooding a little closer to where the storm came ashore.
For more on that, let's go to Chris Tatum with our CNN affiliate WBMA in Gulf Shores, Alabama -- Chris, what are you seeing this morning?
CHRIS TATUM, WBMA CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning.
First of all, as you -- if you can't already tell, there is an incredible wind blowing in off the Gulf this morning. This was actually going on last night around 11:00. I was down here doing some live reports, as well. This wind has been pummeling the coast for hours. It's been very relentless.
It's such a strong wind that you have no control over it. It literally moves you where it wants you to be and you could actually hurt yourself, I think, if you try to resist it.
Looking out at the Gulf this morning, the water still very troubled. I've been down here since Friday evening. I saw a very calm, a very smooth surf and then, of course, on Saturday the same thing. By yesterday morning it was starting to get a little rough and it looks like it's slowed down considerably since yesterday evening. But still, nothing like it was when it was normal on Friday.
M. O'BRIEN: Chris, it's kind of surprising to me that the wind is still whipping as it is this morning.
TATUM: Well, I'm a little surprised, too, to be honest with you.
M. O'BRIEN: Tell me... TATUM: I'm not a...
M. O'BRIEN: Go ahead.
Do you see much evidence of any serious damage there? What kinds of things did you see as you made your way to your location there?
TATUM: Well, no significant damage that we know of here in the -- along the Alabama Gulf Coast. I say that meaning that there is so much damage still remaining from hurricane Ivan 10 months ago, so many things still have not been repaired that it's kind of hard to know what's new and what's old.
But this storm really was not a strong storm when it came ashore in Alabama. I can tell you, in contrast to that, I went over to Pensacola yesterday afternoon, much closer to the eye of this storm, and arrived in Pensacola just in time for hurricane Dennis' arrival. And a much different story. Incredibly heavy wind, driving rain. The rain actually hurt when it hit you. It had a real sting to it. The wind was so forceful, we actually saw it take the roof off a church. It was unbelievable. There were light poles that I thought were surely going to snap at any time. And even some huge oak trees really like they were struggling to stand against such incredible winds.
M. O'BRIEN: All right, well, Chris, a quick final question for you, because I know Gulf Shores, everybody remembers hurricane Frederick, the way it barreled through there. There was a lot of concern that was going to happen. People must be breathing a sigh of relief.
TATUM: Well, there were -- it was 25 years, of course, between hurricane Frederick in 1979 and hurricane Ivan back last September. People here never imagined they would see another major hurricane so soon. But Ivan taught them such serious lessons about being prepared that most people truly got out, didn't take any chances. They didn't want to tangle with Dennis. Remember, until he actually came ashore, he was a category four hurricane. Ivan came ashore as a strong category three.
So, they didn't want to take any chances and that probably, I won't say in this case it saved lives in this area because, obviously, Dennis was not as strong and did not do as much damage in this area. But had it been what it could have been, no doubt those people and the lessons they've learned from Ivan would have saved lives.
M. O'BRIEN: Chris Tatum, thank you very much, Gulf Shores, Alabama.
TATUM: You bet.
M. O'BRIEN: On a blustery morning there -- Soledad.
S. O'BRIEN: Still to come this morning, it is an on the road assignment that Charles Kuralt probably would never have dreamed of. Hurricane one is what we're calling it. We're going to revisit some of the highlights from Rick Sanchez's coverage of Dennis while he was riding shotgun.
Stay with us.
You're watching a special edition of AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
M. O'BRIEN: Still to come on AMERICAN MORNING, a survivor's story, not once, but twice, from what proved to be ground zero for hurricane Dennis in the Florida Panhandle. A wild wind whipped tale for you, when we return.
Stay with us for more AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
M. O'BRIEN: Just about half past the hour on this AMERICAN MORNING.
The sun coming up along the Florida Panhandle and we're following the aftermath of Dennis for you.
We'll have the complete forecast as the storm is now a tropical depression. It moves on and causes havoc elsewhere.
We'll also take you live to St. Marks, Florida. This is one of the spots that really got hit. Look at this flooding. Meteorologist Chad Myers, naturally, is there.
S. O'BRIEN: Also this morning, we're going to talk to one Gulf Coast resident. She decided not to evacuate, rode out the storm at home. She did the same thing during hurricane Ivan. We'll see how she did this time around.
M. O'BRIEN: Right now, let's check the headlines, though.
And for that, we go to Kelly Wallace -- good morning, Kelly.
KELLY WALLACE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Miles.
And good morning to all of you.
Here are some of those stories now in the news.
A state of emergency is posted in southern Colorado. A fast moving wildfire has quadrupled in size, to more than 8,000 acres. At least 750 homes and other structures are threatened. About 1,000 people have evacuated.
A hail of gunfire ends a long stand-off in South Los Angeles. A man who had barricaded himself in a house with a number of weapons was killed. Police officers shot and killed the man when he came out of the house and opened fire. A baby girl he was holding also was killed, but it's not clear who fired the shot that hit and killed her. One police officer was wounded.
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