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American Morning

Hurricane Wilma: Category 3

Aired October 24, 2005 - 07:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Entire city is right at sea level. And it is forecast to be an 8-to-12-foot storm surge right over that city. And very concerned about the people there, also, a little bit farther to the south, although the rest of this, Zain, is all the Everglades swamp.
So I guess there is some good news, if there was any good news, that the landfall storm surge did come in a very swampy area. But now very stormy weather for Miami, right up to Fort Lauderdale, winds there could be gusting over 100. Clearly it's still a 120-mile-per- hour storm.

Back to you.

ZAIN VERJEE, CNN ANCHOR: Chad Myers, thanks, as always.

CNN is your hurricane headquarters.

We have reporters all the way through the state of Florida. Gary Tuchman is in Key West. Miles O'Brien is in Naples, Anderson Cooper and John Zarrella on Marco Island and Rob Marciano in Fort Myers.

We're going to continue to track Hurricane Wilma. That has finally made landfall. The center of this Category 3 hurricane hit around 6:30 in the morning near Cape Romano. That is 22 miles south of Naples in Collier County on Florida's southwest coast.

Marco Island is one place that is in the center of the storm, in the eye of the hurricane. You are looking at live pictures where rain is lashing down as Hurricane Wilma pounds down on the Florida coast with towering waves. Seas very choppy, waves crashing on the beaches and devastating howling winds that we've been hearing our reporters talk about. Power lines are down. Many streets are flooded. Damage may be quite severe. But because of the low visibility, it's not really clear how much damage has been done.

Experiencing some of those severe winds, although just moments ago there was dead calm that was described as eerie by Anderson Cooper and John Zarrella. They are in Marco Island. And they join us now -- Anderson.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Zain, it's amazing that how quickly things change. I mean the last time we talked, about 20 minutes ago, we were standing in the middle of the eye of the eye. It was beautiful. It was calming. We were looking for stars. It is a much different picture already. JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes. And the wind is starting to pick up. You can tell. And look at the water. We actually do have water coming up all around us now. It's not much, but clearly it's that backside of the storm, and it's bringing some of this backside water up that Chad was talking about.

COOPER: Yes, Ed Rappaport had been saying they were going to be expecting about 10 feet of storm surge here on Marco Island. John and I looked at each other and said what are they talking about? Thirty minutes ago, this was beach. Now, as you can see -- actually, let's...

ZARRELLA: Yes, it's coming!

COOPER: It's definitely coming in.

ZARRELLA: It's started to come in.

COOPER: It is amazing the difference. I mean, within the last five minutes, really these winds have started to pick up. We're anticipating about 100-mile-per-hour winds, which could happen really in the next 20, 30 minutes.

ZARRELLA: Yes, it's going to happen real quick, because the worst of it is right around the center of the storm, and we're right -- and as soon as that backside comes on us, as it is now, we're going to get the worst of it right away. Starting to lighten up, too, up the sky.

COOPER: Yes, we're getting the first rays of sort of first light. But really, look at the storm surge, this is definitely now just coming in. This whole beach area was completely, really, untouched. I mean, it was certainly wet, but you could see the beach. Now the water is just coming in. We should actually, probably, at this point, move up.

ZARRELLA: Careful. Yes.

COOPER: So let's try to move up onto this location up here. We got a couple of fallback positions to go to. But, yes, how was -- I actually slept for quite a while. How -- but you were up before I was.

ZARRELLA: Yes, I was up.

COOPER: How was it at its worst?

ZARRELLA: It was howling. There was aluminum awnings were coming down, some tops off some of the buildings. Some of the roofing material off the buildings was coming down. The trees all stood up fine. I would suspect we probably had winds around 80, 85 miles an hour at that point.

COOPER: We're basically -- and the winds now coming out of the north, just straight out of this direction. And it's not -- I mean, this is a pretty fast-moving storm, Zain, so we're not anticipating it lasting for too much longer once we get hit. But really, you know we're anticipating some sort of a bad hit any time soon.

ZARRELLA: Yes, yes, any time soon. And it's moving at, what, maybe about 22 miles an hour. It's funny, because in '92 when Hurricane Andrew came across from the other direction, it was moving at 22 miles an hour from east to west. This one west to east, just the opposite.

COOPER: So, Zain, obviously a very different picture than when we last talked to you. And probably in about 20, 30 minutes, it's going to be much worse.

ZARRELLA: Well we're going to have to move up now.

COOPER: And again, yes, we're going to have to move definitely off the beach now at this point.

ZARRELLA: Yes.

COOPER: It's...

ZARRELLA: Yes, it's flooding up now.

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: This is one of those times you kind of wish you had rubber boots.

VERJEE: How many inches?

COOPER: How many inches of storm surge? Well, we're talking feet here. I mean our feet are completely covered now. And we're basically at the end of the beach. You know, the water, which is traditionally probably about a hundred yards out or so, it is now completely here.

ZARRELLA: But the reality is that what we're getting right here now is pretty minimal.

COOPER: Yes.

ZARRELLA: I mean this is nothing.

COOPER: Yes.

ZARRELLA: What they're experiencing further south, where they could get 9 feet, 10 feet, it'd be over our heads.

COOPER: Yes, Chad -- I don't know if Chad is there?

MYERS: I am, Anderson, go ahead.

COOPER: Where are we in relation to the storm? I mean, can you -- are we close to the eye wall?

MYERS: Yes, actually you're only about four miles from the eye wall passing directly back over you again. You had the eastern, northeastern half of the eye wall about an hour, an hour and a half ago. Then you were right smack dab in the middle of the eye.

And now, literally, you can probably see the sparking, if there is any lightning in the western eye wall, just off to your west. I know it's very hard to see anything else in the dark when the rain is going sideways. But it's not going to be long and you're going to get the other side of the eye. And then, for the most part, it will be over.

But I really do want you guys to get out of that water. For one, you guys are holding on to electric power cables and all that, and the water could still come up another couple of feet, and that's too far. So just go to a fallback position and we'll get back to you in just a few minutes.

COOPER: Yes, we got a thing we can get on right over here.

ZARRELLA: Yes, Chad, we had about 55 minutes I counted in the dead calm.

MYERS: Wow. That is truly amazing. Now are you two for two now -- John?

ZARRELLA: What is that?

MYERS: Are you two for two for eye walls now?

ZARRELLA: Yes, two for two for eye walls. That's -- yes, two for two.

COOPER: It's amazing, though, how quickly the water comes up. I mean, this area, again, this is a platform. We're getting on to sort of a boardwalk area. This was completely clear, you know, five minutes ago. It's now, you know, we can get on here. Now we are basically out of the water.

ZARRELLA: Yes.

COOPER: But the beach, the entire beach is pretty much covered now in water. And it's likely to rise here more than that.

ZARRELLA: Here comes that wind that Chad was saying.

MYERS: Yes, there it is.

ZARRELLA: Because that storm is moving so fast. Chad, you're right, it's on top of us again now.

MYERS: You guys don't have any electricity?

COOPER: It's amazing that, you know, Chad. No, we don't have electricity. We have put up -- we have a couple of our own lights. And there are few. You look around. And now, because daybreak is coming, you can see there are a few sort of red emergency lights on some buildings. But, no, there's no electricity, at least on this part of Marco Island.

MYERS: No, I mean is there is no electricity hooked to you guys?

ZARRELLA: There is two people in a golf cart.

MYERS: These are battery lights that we're seeing that are lighting you guys up, right?

VERJEE: OK.

MYERS: OK.

COOPER: Right, yes, we have battery lights on the camera.

MYERS: All right. I'm worried about you guys!

VERJEE: We'll check -- we'll -- Chad Myers, thanks a lot. Anderson Cooper, John Zarrella, thanks. Guys, we're going to continue to check in with you throughout the morning. But a dramatic change there where Anderson and John are.

Let's go to Naples in Florida where Jason Carroll joins us now from Hurricane One.

Jason, what are you seeing? Earlier, you described the strong gusts of winds, heavy rains and power outages. What can you add?

JASON CARROLL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Zain, we have seen all of the above as we enter our way along U.S. 41. The wind is roaring through here. I am told from our weather folks there telling me that what we are heading into is basically the northern eye wall.

If you look outside via our front windshield here, you can really get a sense. At least I hope you can with this type of image of what you see what it looks like to drive into this pounding wind and this type of rain. It's truly incredible. Because what it does is it rocks the car even as you inch along. We're not even moving that fast.

What we've seen along here are trees, you know, every few feet, literally, downed trees every few feet. We're being especially careful of power lines, for obvious reasons, as we move along here. I know we heard Anderson and John talking about what it was like just about 20 miles south of us at Marco Island. I know that they're experiencing heavy winds, but I think what we have up here is definitely a lot worse.

What we're going to be doing is we're going to be moving along this road. We're going to be moving east. We're going to be trying to follow the storm as it makes its way east across Florida.

Zain, in talking to the mayor a little earlier today, he had asked me, he said if you see any people out there, you should be telling them to get off the road when I spoke to him this morning. Fortunately, we have not seen a number of people on the roads out here with us, which is certainly good news. Because that means that a lot of people listened to that evacuation order, that mandatory evacuation order for the area of Collier County, which that is the area that Naples is in.

We're being especially careful. Miles had brought something up a little earlier. He said, Jason, what do you do about flying debris? Well what we do is we stay inside Hurricane One. We try to reduce the risk as much as possible going outside, standing out there, obviously, because it's dark, there's no power, you can't see if something is heading your way.

What we're doing is as we move along, we hear something outside, we pull along the side and we take a little bit of a break, just to make sure. We're trying to stay as safe as possible as we move along U.S. 41 as Hurricane Wilma bears down on Florida -- Zain.

VERJEE: How much flooding are you seeing?

CARROLL: One more time -- Zain.

VERJEE: How much flooding are you able to see?

CARROLL: Flooding. Well, as we've been coming, we've seen minor flooding. It's not going to read with the camera out here right now, simply because it's dark, and the water is dark, so you're not going to be able to see it. But as we come along, it splashes up along on top of the roof or the front dashboard here of the car and then -- but it's minor flooding, not major flooding, minor flooding. Primarily what we're experiencing is high wind, heavy rain. We've seen minor flooding along the way. Nothing major, as of yet.

VERJEE: Jason Carroll reporting from Hurricane One. And Hurricane One is a satellite-equipped SUV. And basically what that does is it allows us at CNN to reach some of the areas that have been affected that nobody else can get to. Jason Carroll is on that. Thank you.

We want to go east now to Hollywood in Florida where Allan Chernoff joins us now live.

Allan, can you describe how it is there for you?

ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Miles, the rain certainly picking up right now. The wind as well. You can see behind me, those trees just rocking right now. But they're hanging in there. Those palm trees really seem to be able to withstand it thus far. Let's see how well they can do as the winds intensify. They seem to have a better root system than the trees on Sanibel Island. Remember those Australian pine trees we've been talking about.

VERJEE: We seem to have lost Allan Chernoff in Hollywood, Florida.

We want to go now to Gary Tuchman who is in Key West. It's the southernmost city in the continental United States -- Gary.

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Zain, used to be the southernmost city in the entire United States until 1959 when the state of Hawaii became the 50th state. And now it's the southern most city in the continent of the United States.

And the reason we can smile and be light about it is the worst is over here in Key West. They got it first. And if you weren't up with us, you were having a good night's sleep. Between 2:30 and 4:30 Eastern Time was the heart of it here, and it was really something else.

Sustained winds of over 100 miles per hour for more than two hours here in Key West. It was just quite a scene. Obviously completely dark, because it's still dark, past 7:00 Eastern Time. But you just heard sounds and noises. And it sounded like jet fighters were flying above you. And that's the sound you hear. You often hear it during a tornado, it sounds like a freight train. Well during a hurricane, it sounds like airplanes flying above you. Of course there are no airplanes in the sky.

At this point, it's hard to ascertain how much damage there is here in Key West, because it's still dark outside. Police are telling us there are serious flooding in various parts of the town to our north. They are still worried about a storm surge moving in. Many homes are flooded.

We're standing next to a hotel called the La Concha. It's a landmark hotel here in Key West. It's been around for about 80 years. The hotel has some flooded areas and is leaking throughout the hotel.

Lots of these buildings behind me, roofs have flown off. Just in the last hour, even though the winds have died down, we've just started hearing parts of the roofs falling off because they've been weakened from the storm.

The fact is 28,000 people live here in Key West. The great majority did not evacuate, despite the fact that a mandatory evacuation order was in effect. But that doesn't mean they drag you out. That doesn't mean they put you in jail. It basically means that you get no services if you decide to stay, no 911, no police, no fire, and most people did decide to stay. Right now it doesn't appear there are any serious casualties.

Zain, back to you.

VERJEE: What were the reasons that most people decided to stay?

TUCHMAN: Main reason most people decided to stay, Zain, is because there has not been a major hurricane hitting here since 1919. People say they have stayed before, they've had no problems and they didn't want to leave this time.

VERJEE: Gary Tuchman reporting to us from Key West in Florida. Thanks a lot, Gary.

We want to go now back to Marco Island to Anderson Cooper and John Zarrella. Marco Island is in the center of the storm, the eye of the hurricane, if you will. They are seeing some great storm surge -- Anderson. COOPER: Yes, it's a really impressive storm surge. And literally, you know, we talked to you probably 10 minutes ago. If you can pan over there, Chris (ph), we were over at the top, just at the bottom of this little ramp. That is now probably under about five feet of water as though...

ZARRELLA: Yes, the waves are breaking right up here along the edge of the shoreline now. And what were they, about 40, 50 feet out an hour ago?

COOPER: It's remarkable the difference just in these last couple of minutes.

ZARRELLA: We've got everything floating up here in front of us. Debris and there is some big piece of...

COOPER: Yes, look at that, it's like a piece of decking. It's very hard to look in a northern direction...

ZARRELLA: And sand.

COOPER: ... in a northern direction where the wind is coming from, because the sand is just picking up and whipping. But we wanted to show you this storm surge.

ZARRELLA: And the water is being blown up that way because that wind is coming out of the north now and it's pulling all that water, as Chad was talking about earlier, just right up on us here.

COOPER: What is also incredible is how close the waves are breaking to us. Normally they would be about a hundred yards out or so. It looks like they are breaking much closer to us. I wonder if we could go out there and just...

ZARRELLA: Look at that little pelican.

COOPER: Look at that. Hey, Chris, look at that pelican over there.

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: Chris.

ZARRELLA: Chris, look here. He's trying to make it out here in this water.

COOPER: It is a very strange sight. Just give you a sense...

ZARRELLA: Give you an idea. Maybe I could -- look at this, the waves are coming right over the top of us here. Yes.

COOPER: And this entire area over here, this is sort of like a little beach house.

ZARRELLA: Yes.

COOPER: This is -- this was completely free and clear a few minutes ago.

ZARRELLA: All this was clear when we were standing in the eye. There wasn't a drop of water up here.

COOPER: It's amazing. There's really no beach left in -- on Marco Island, at least in this stretch of the island. And how much more do you think? Do you think it's likely to go higher?

ZARRELLA: It looks like it certainly could go a little bit higher before that -- as we're still in that backside and we're going to get some more. But because, look at this, look at the water coming in. It's coming in on us even more. So, yes, it's a couple of feet. I'm going to walk out here to see if I can look down the beach...

COOPER: OK.

ZARRELLA: ... and just see how far it is. It's all the way up...

COOPER: Is it...

ZARRELLA: It's all the way up to those condominiums, blowing up into those condominiums over there as well.

COOPER: And it is amazing, as far as the eye can see down on the beach, I mean it is nothing but water. There is really no sand that you can still see. The beach rises pretty dramatically here, so there's not much chance -- at this point there is sort of a natural dune all along here, probably about four or five feet. So the water would have a long way to go before it started to get to some of these high-rise buildings. But the beach is pretty much at least gone at this point.

ZARRELLA: Yes, Mother Nature put dunes in for a reason along the beaches and hurricanes are one of them.

COOPER: It's interesting you know sort of intellectually you can understand storm surge. But until you're standing here, you actually see it, I've always wondered kind of what it looked like up close. I've never actually seen it before.

ZARRELLA: And again, as we were talking, what we're experiencing is really very minor storm surge, as opposed to what they're feeling down the road and what the people felt in Mississippi during Katrina and in Rita where you saw it in Cameron.

COOPER: But south of here, I mean it's much less populated.

ZARRELLA: Yes, until you get to the Keys.

COOPER: Right.

ZARRELLA: But when you get to the Keys, because of the way the coastline is shaped, that water is getting pushed in and it's just going to flood over those Keys.

COOPER: It's amazing, Zain, the difference. If you look at this, this is being as -- this is about to float.

ZARRELLA: About to float, yes.

COOPER: This entire thing here.

ZARRELLA: Yes, it is floating.

COOPER: It's just floating now.

ZARRELLA: It's floating now.

COOPER: It's -- yes, it's an amazing scene here, Zain, and it's likely to get worse before it gets better.

VERJEE: Anderson Cooper, John Zarrella in the eye of the storm on Marco Island in Florida.

Miles O'Brien is in the northern eye wall of the storm in Naples, Florida. We're going to join him in just a moment.

We do want to go, though, to Ed Rappaport, who is the Director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami.

Ed, good to see you. Hurricane Wilma making landfall. We just saw some amazing pictures, some great information we got from Anderson Cooper and John Zarrella. And they were wondering how much higher will the water get and how fast will it rise?

ED RAPPAPORT, NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER: I'm not sure how much higher the water is going to get there. The highest water is going to be to the south of them, as they indicated. And it's going to be in the eye wall area near the southern tip of the Florida peninsula.

And so the storm surge is going to be, from what they're saying, several feet or more, increasing up to on the order of 15 feet towards the southern portion. It will increase some more because the winds are going to be coming more out of the west and that's what's going to push the water ashore. Previously, the winds were more out of the south and east ahead of the center. So expect the water to continue to rise there for the next couple of hours perhaps.

VERJEE: And Miles O'Brien is in Naples and he has a question for you -- Miles.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Hey, Ed, we're really getting battered here right now. I'm curious how extensive the hurricane force winds will be? I saw one of your predictions from earlier saying perhaps a diameter, a disk, if you will, of about 150 miles containing hurricane force winds. In other words, coast to coast in Florida. Is that still what you're seeing?

RAPPAPORT: That's right. And for those who can see what we've got up on the screen here now, the area in red is where we think that there will be hurricane force winds. So really, the entire Florida peninsula south of about Fort Myers to north of Lake Okeechobee will be seeing sustained hurricane force winds, at least Category 1. Category 2 conditions will be confined to the area south of the center, well south of where you are, with a few spots of Category 3 embedded.

MYERS: Ed, this is Chad Myers in the Weather Center. I'm concerned a little bit about Key Largo and Bayside flooding there through the Florida Bay, how that water is just going to get funneled right in to there. And it may not be able to get through and out through the cuts, even through Lake Surprise, that area there, 18-mile stretch, Cardsound Road. What are you thinking as this funnel effect may bring the water up even exponentially, kind of almost getting blown up a riverbed, a river basin, kind of the same idea how it funnels into a point?

RAPPAPORT: Right. But actually you only need tropical storm conditions to flood the portion of the upper Keys, the roadway there. There will be some funneling. But with the center up going to be passing up towards Lake Okeechobee or so, most of the winds are going to be out of the southwest. So there will be some funneling, but not as bad as if the winds had been coming straight out of the west or the northwest down there.

MYERS: OK, very good. That's our last question for you. We're out of time on the satellite. But, Ed, thank you very much. We'll get back to you today.

RAPPAPORT: OK.

MYERS: Zain.

VERJEE: We want to go back now to Naples in Florida where we join Miles O'Brien -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: Well, Zain, I've got to tell you, this is not pretty here right now. And it continues to blow very hard. Haven't sort of seeing a slight change of wind direction. We'll talk to Chad a little bit about that later, get a sense of where the winds are going to be coming from.

We were knocked off the air for a little while, as you know, Zain, because basically the clouds are just too thick. Those towering clouds that you get with a hurricane system, those towering cumulus clouds, the satellite signal couldn't punch through it.

That is why we have such an extensive group of people covering this storm. We've got Chad, of course, in the Weather Center who is looking at things from way up high. And we've got John King down in the south of me in Marco Island who is looking at things there. We've been talking to people at Marco Island, Anderson Cooper and John Zarrella there, telling about the storm surges. They're watching it just build up here.

I can tell you right now that the Gulf of Mexico is getting closer and closer to me. We got first light here. In a little bit we will be able to show you a little more about that.

And finally, to the south, we have CNN's Gary Tuchman, who endured conditions like this while many of us were sleeping overnight, 2:00, 3:00 a.m. local time, Eastern Time. And now, what they're dealing with there is the early part of the aftermath, if you will, getting a sense of the flooding there.

Let's check in with John King who is currently in Marco Island.

John, what are you seeing there now, that storm surge still rising?

JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It's quite remarkable, Miles. We left the hotel, where Anderson and John are, a short time ago, trying to drive south to a town called Goodland we visited yesterday. It's a fishing village. We are on the south side of Marco Island trying to make our way south, but we have encountered some pretty decent flooding here.

I don't know how much you can see, because we're on our video phone technology with satellite phone, so the picture is not as clear as it can be. But I just walked out onto this bridge behind me and the water is knee-deep. And it goes deep as far as the eye can see. We can see several hundred yards, perhaps even a quarter of a mile now that the light is beginning to break down the road, and it is flooded. Some of it is knee-high. Some of it is calf-high.

There's a power line down across the street. And this is the deepest, but it's similar to what we have encountered now for several miles. Trees down. Power lines down. Moderate flooding back toward Marco Island proper. But out here, as we tend to get more south, and obviously we know from all of the weather center and the hurricane center briefings there's more water and more damage to the south.

As we move south, we are encountering much deeper flooding. And again, this road gets you to a small fishing village called Goodland. We tried to get through it. We can't make it through in our vehicle. We're going to check out the flooding here, some of these downed power lines.

And when we arrived here a short time ago, we were in the eye. It was relatively peaceful. The storm has whipped up again and the direction of this water just in the past 15 minutes has changed. So just as you notice there, Miles, in Naples, the storm is picking up again as we get the backside of this storm. The eye has passed. Conditions worsening again. And we're going to continue to try to travel around and check out the flooding and the damage -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: All right, a couple of quick questions for you. I'll do them both at once and you can take them. Are you seeing anyone on the street besides people like us? And are you seeing any major structural damage -- John?

KING: We saw one other vehicle just moments ago, could not tell whether that was a police vehicle or someone else, a newsperson maybe out driving. I just could not tell because the weather conditions and the visibility is poor.

In terms of structural damage, no, we haven't. When we pulled out of Marco Island, just some debris, some metal ripped off buildings and routine stuff you would tend to see, if you will, nothing major yet, a few trees down. But in terms of building damage, we've haven't seen any yet. We've only done a very modest tour of the area.

So I can't say our review is comprehensive by any means. But from first glance, it is mostly the storm surge, which I have to say, Miles, I was in the emergency briefing yesterday, as bad as this is, it is less, at least right now, at least past the halfway point, of what they expected this time yesterday.

O'BRIEN: Well we're glad to report that. It sounds like, given where the eye has hit, a little bit to the south of Marco Island, that puts Marco Island in a little better position than it might have been had the more -- the less favorable part of the storm, the so-called dirty side of the storm, struck it head-on. Of course that is what we saw in Key West. And they are saying this morning that they got significant flooding. Two and three feet of flooding in some places. You're not seeing that kind of flooding, right?

KING: It's about -- if you go out to the middle of this road here where there is a small bridge, if you will, it's a swampy land. That's about up to my -- it's above my knees, so that's two and a half, getting closer to three feet, almost up to my thighs. Most of it here is calf high, so a foot and a half to two feet.

O'BRIEN: All right, CNN's John King. Be safe out there, please.

Let's continue talking to folks in Marco Island. Let's get back to Anderson Cooper, John Zarrella.

Guys, I'm getting sliced by a million razors here, and are you guys there?

COOPER: Yes. It's pretty much the same here. The winds whipping out of the north. I'm hiding behind John Zarrella for safety, as I often do. But it's really picking up. Really, over the -- even the last five minutes. I mean we were watching this storm surge about 10 minutes ago and that is significant. But really the story in the last five minutes has been the wind.

ZARRELLA: Yes. I took a wind reading and got about right at hurricane force at 75 just a couple of minutes ago and it's up from that now I'm sure.

COOPER: Yes, and you really get a sense of it when you're standing out here, especially with some of the lights now in this light, of just how fast it is moving. It's that...

ZARRELLA: Look over...

COOPER: Yes, it's though...

ZARRELLA: If you turn and look at that shot you can really get a sense of what it is like right now. That's pretty telling.

COOPER: Yes. It is just -- you know every time that eye wall comes, it's almost that solid wall of white, that mass. We're about at that point right here. This, the other side of the eye wall, I suppose.

ZARRELLA: Yes. And we (INAUDIBLE) pounded with that sand off the beach.

COOPER: Yes. That's one of the problems. I mean there's a lot of sand in the air this close to the beach. This entire area, the wind has just picked up the sand and is really just whipping it hard. It is a very unpleasant time here. But there is a certain relief that the -- from the fact that dawn is breaking. You at least get a sense of your surroundings more.

ZARRELLA: Yes, we can exactly see what is going on. And you know, given looking around at these high-rises, it certainly looks as if everything is intact structurally on all of these buildings.

COOPER: That's one of the most eerie things, of course, you know when you're home alone or with your family inside your house and you can't see anything outside, you're just hearing the wind howling. Now that dawn is coming, certainly some relief for whoever is remaining here on Marco Island. Though, by all estimates, a good bulk of the people evacuated.

ZARRELLA: Yes, about 90 percent of the population got out of here, which certainly, in light of what we're seeing, was the wise thing to do.

COOPER: Yes. Although I mean they had Ed Rappaport had been talking about the possibility of 10 feet of storm surge. At this stage, I don't think we're seeing that much.

ZARRELLA: No. We probably won't see maybe four or five feet. It will all be to the south of us where the worst of it is. But it's still coming up. It's not let up at all.

COOPER: Now this is an area that really hasn't been hit since 1960 in a direct hit.

ZARRELLA: Yes, '64, a very similar storm, Isabel, Category 2, 110-mile-an-hour winds. And then Donna in '60 was the big one, the Cat 4. So it's been 50 years, 50-plus years.

COOPER: And certainly a relief to a lot of people here that this is a fast-moving storm. It would be interesting to know from, I don't know if it's possible from Chad Myers, sort of how much longer -- that was bad.

ZARRELLA: Yes.

COOPER: How much longer, in this area at least, we're going to be seeing these kind of winds?

MYERS: You know you've got at least another 20 minutes, guys, because although it may go down a little bit, you're right in the eye wall itself right now. And then you'll get a little less as you get away from the main eye wall. But there's an outer eye wall behind that other one where your winds may still gust to 60 in that. So you are in the same direction now for a while, but you're going to be getting what you see is what you get for at least the next 20 minutes.

ZARRELLA: This is about hurricane force, Chad, I think around 75, 80 miles an hour.

MYERS: Yes, without a doubt, John, the latest advisory still had some sustained winds around the eye at 120. You're on what they know as the easy side of the eye, believe it or not. But there is no such thing in an easy side of a Category 3.

ZARRELLA: Yes, no such thing as a minimal hurricane.

MYERS: No.

COOPER: I always love it when Chad uses that term easy.

MYERS: Yes.

ZARRELLA: Yes, the easy side.

COOPER: Yes.

MYERS: Easier. There you go.

COOPER: Well I mean there is -- you know in terms of the storms we've covered, this probably does not compare to some of the more recent storms we've covered. I mean it's bad, but it's not as bad as some of what we've seen.

ZARRELLA: No, no, not, I mean Rita was certainly stronger than this. It seemed much more powerful where we were and you know in the east Texas. And no question, the others were much stronger.

COOPER: Well, Miles, I hope you are not on the beach, or at least away from the beach, because I know the sand there has got to be kicking up as bad as it is here.

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