Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Newsroom
Hurricane Michael Left Florida with Massive Damage; Jamal Khashoggi Still Not Found; Special Coverage, Hurricane Michael; Michael Now Tropical Storm Slamming Georgia; Wall Street Losses Trigger Global Sell-Off. Aired 3-4a ET
Aired October 11, 2018 - 03:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[03:00:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GEORGE HOWELL, CNN HOST: You're watching CNN special coverage. I'm George Howell covering tropical storm Michael, live here in Destin, Florida where the storm the strongest to hit this area in history has left behind widespread flooding and a great deal of damage.
Michael HOLMES, CNN HOST: And I'm Michael Holmes, live from Atlanta. We're also following an international diplomatic showdown with evidence growing that the Saudi kingdom could be responsible for the disappearance of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
HOWELL: Around the world, we begin with hour with the very latest on this powerful storm that hit the U.S. State of Florida. The Florida Panhandle, hurricane Michael, historic in nature already. It came onshore as a category four storm. We surely felt it here throughout the day. It's been a long day.
And right now that storm still on the move inland. It is a tropical storm affecting the U.S. State of Georgia this very hour. Here along the Florida coast it hit a part of the state with a massive amount of storm surge and very, very strong fierce winds. Category four winds near 250 kilometers per hour.
As I've mentioned, Michael is presently in Georgia. It's headed towards North and South Carolina. Two states that were already hit hard by hurricane Florence just last month. Michael was the strongest hurricane to ever strike the Florida Panhandle and the strongest to make landfall in the continental United States since hurricane Andrew back in 1992.
One place was hit especially hard Mexico Beach, Florida. People really felt the impact there. And you see the results of what happened due the winds. The winds there strong enough to tear down trees to destroy homes and buildings and send large pieces of debris flying.
In this video you're going to see it shows the force of the storm. It is intense just sit back and watch this. Yes, the video really capture -- captures is that what you hear there, is what we felt hear these very strong winds from the storm that unfortunately we must report has proven deadly.
At least two people died as a result of the storm. It left hundreds of thousands of people homes without power across multiple states.
Now one place that was hit hard was Panama City, Florida. That's just over to the east of where we are here in Destin.
My colleague Brian Todd was there and has the story of a neighborhood that was destroyed by the storm. Watch this.
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Here in Panama City Beach, this is one of the most devastated neighborhoods in the entire city. This is Surf Drive just a few feet from the Gulf of Mexico, they had the storm surge threat but it was really the wind that did the damage in this neighborhood. Look at this house here.
This was captured on video earlier on Wednesday as this roof here got completely sheared off and just about half the house is missing at least on the top side of it. We're told by the family who owns this place that that area there that was so devastated used to be the living room and the kitchen upstairs, and so now that's completely gone.
The roof, a hunk of twisted metal was blown completely off, tossed about 75 yards down the road and is now embedded in the fence. You can see as part of the wall here was also sheared off.
The family here we talked to them as they came by, a gentleman whose mother-in-law owns this place. They were just devastated at this. They saw this happening on the news. They saw the video being shot as this was going on. Luckily no one was here. The woman who owns it is gentleman's mother-in-law who lives in Missouri. No one was here at the time.
But how we did talk to beach patrol and sheriff's deputies came out here in this neighborhood and they said they didn't have to go door- to-door and they did have to pull some people out of this house. It's not necessarily because they were trapped, but because they needed to be pulled out a house like this that are just uninhabitable that have had the roofs torn off and other infrastructure just completely damaged.
Here's another example of that. This house right here on Surf Drive, again, you know, half the roof was torn off. There's a wall around that corner that was completely torn apart and just fell apart and a lot of debris just got tossed around that house and thrown up against that sliding glass door right there.
We've also smelled gas in this area around the side of his house. That's the hidden danger in this area as our, you know, many things that you come across, especially here in the pitch black.
[03:05:04] These down power lines are especially dangerous right now because without these camera lights it is completely black. If you to try to drive or walk around this area you could easily run into them, that's why officials are saying please do not come back into these neighborhoods. They are having trouble keeping people out of them, though, as people try to get back to their homes or just curiosity seekers trying to get pictures. Brian Todd, CNN, Panama City Beach, Florida.
HOWELL: Brian Todd again, with the storm that certainly left a great deal of damage. And now to our meteorologist Pedram Javaheri in Atlanta with the storm that is still on the move, Pedram.
PEDRAM JAVAHERI, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Absolutely. We know that about half a million of people now are without power across the states of Alabama, Georgia, now on into portions of course of Florida Panhandle as well.
But here goes the storm system. Ninety five kilometer per hour winds, incredibly still some 14 hours after landfall still see some symmetry some organization with the storm system. And as it made landfall the strong category four was still able to maintain a category three intensity into the State of Georgia. The first storm to do so since 1898. An unnamed storm did that back in 1893 coming ashore with category e three winds.
And take a look at this. We have the hurricane warnings that have been lifted across the Panhandle, but 23 million people under a tropical storm warnings. Almost all of the state of our South Carolina and parts of North Carolina and a decent chunk of the State of Georgia feeling the tropical storm force winds 35, 40, 45 miles per hour sustained across that region.
And if you take a look, here we go out towards portions of the Gulf Coast where this made landfall. Just about every single observation site began to fail. Once the system made landfall wind is estimated at 250 or so kilometers per hour at landfall, you notice this, the highest observed before the anemometers or the wind measuring device could obtain was about 209 kilometers per hour before that was destroyed.
And here's what is left of it. Again, there is the center of circulation just east of Macon, Georgia just about to cross into the State of South Carolina and seeing those outer bands of Michael essentially rain on parts of where Florence rain just a couple of weeks ago.
And we do have the tornado watches in effect across Columbia and also in Charleston, South Carolina. So where do we have from here. Well, the storm system has really picked up quite a bit of steam as far as how quickly it's moving, essentially doubling the speed it had as it made landfall.
And now we expect this to move to the Carolinas within the next say, 14 or so hours. And by later on this evening the storm system is offshore of the eastern United States. And incredibly, look at what Michael does here. Enough intensity here, potentially to take it back up to a strong tropical storm, maybe even back up to hurricane Michael.
Again, as moves away into cooler waters and eventually weakens beyond that. It kind of shows you what kind of storm we're dealing with here that begins to kind of push off and away from the United States here. It leaves behind a tremendous volume of water across some of these areas.
Now we know some of the areas Cape Fear in North Carolina that river in particular, finally begin to see conditions returning below flood stage on Monday afternoon after hurricane Florence have moved over this region several weeks ago.
Guess what, the rainfall comes right back on top of this, George, and we're going to see river levels are going to rise again. Fortunately, again, very quick moving system, so once it does rise we expect to gradually come right back down again so it is not going to be a long drawn out event like it was with the Carolinas (Inaudible).
HOWELL: Yes. Pedram, I was over there in Wilmington. I know people there. That's the last thing they want in North Carolina, South Carolina, more rain but it's on the way. Pedram Javaheri, thank you so much.
And from one meteorologist to the next let's go to our colleague Derek Van Dam in Apalachicola for us. Derek, the story there really was about storm surge and strong winds.
DEREK VAN DAM, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes, it was incredible. We saw a truck earlier this afternoon during the peak intensity of hurricane Michael. It was completely submerged from storm surge and then eventually that water receded and it brought the truck along with it. We'll bring that shot later in the morning when we had the opportunity to.
But I am in Apalachicola, this is Franklin County, 85 percent of the homes here without power. Obviously, no communication here as well. Cell phone service does not exist, and landlines are also are having issues as well, so that makes it very difficult for anybody to reach out in case of emergencies to local departments, local emergency officials, the sheriffs.
One thing for sure though, we suffered moderate to heavy damage here. And I just want to give you an example of what we're seeing. Of course, it's been dark since we had the ability to get out so we haven't actually seen the entire scope of what's taking place in Apalachicola, but nonetheless, we have a roof from building nearby. We don't even know where this came from.
And by the way, some of the hidden dangers of being out in the dark after a hurricane like this, especially of this magnitude is not only down power lines that can be laying in the roadways or in puddles that's obviously a hazard.
[03:10:03] But there's a lot of nails that are sticking out of wood that's been thrown about by the strong wind. So you often have to walk in a very thick rubber sole shoes just to navigate the streets here.
And of course emergency officials are telling people stay in your house. There is still the mandatory curfew here in Franklin County because they don't want you to navigate the roadways because you may get stranded, you may get a pop tire from the debris that is still lying across the road. It's going to take several days to clear the roads make them navigable
over this region and allow things to get back to normal. The storm surge, we keep harping on this, George, because that was the most intense part of our day to day. When hurricane Michael came in with its full fierce its full fury it really clenched these teeth into the Panhandle of Florida.
We saw the water rise so quickly where we were located. We did a live shot. We parked our car for 15 minutes, and 15 minutes after had gone by and our wheels were already submerged by the oncoming surge of water that came in from the Gulf of Mexico.
Winds here top to 100 miles per hour that made it to 12 hours of hell for people who decided to stick out the storm and not listen to evacuation orders. Hopefully those people are safe. George?
HOWELL: You know, Derek, as a meteorologist, you know, you're one who tell people, hey, you should evacuate, as a correspondent you're on the ground you're showing people what happens after these storms passed through. What would you tell people, you know, when given the choice to evacuate or you're making that personal choice that some make to stay there ride it out and try to protect their belongings. I mean, what would you, what would you say to them given what you see?
VAN DAM: Well, a lot of times people think, you know, I can ride out hurricane force winds and maybe you do have a nice reinforce building that you feel safe in. But let's be honest here. With the strength of the storm that came through you're evacuating from water. You're evacuating from storm surge.
Water and events like this gets into places that you never thought possible. And that was the case here Apalachicola. The water submerge buildings, it submerge businesses. It got into first level of homes well away from the coast line, so it wasn't just the immediate coast.
So, you know, when we're talking about evacuation, you have to leave, you have to listen to authorities when they ask you to leave because you're really evacuating from water.
HOWELL: Derek Van Dam, live from Apalachicola, Florida. Derek, thank you so much for your reporting. Glad you're safe. We'll stay in touch with you. Another place that was hit very hard Panama City, Florida.
And we spoke earlier to storm chaser and photographer for National Geographic Mike Theiss. Mike said that the winds were so strong they actually blew a freight train right off the tracks. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MIKE THEISS, STORM CHASER: The storm surge did come in and devastate lots of parts of the coastline over the Florida Panhandle, point east of Pensacola -- I'm sorry, not Pensacola -- Panama City which is where I was at Panama City Beach and point east there was really bad.
Right at Panama City Beach itself the surge wasn't too bad because the eye passed just to the right of us to our east. But the wind damage is the big story there. I witness tonight driving around trying to get around the Panama City area. A train that was blown off its track the big, huge iron, you know, metal train blown off its tracks with all the cars behind it also blown off the track.
That is by far the highest example of powerful wind damage I have seen in a hurricane.
HOWELL: For sure, I mean, you really got a sense it is seeing these winds come through feeling and hearing them, this was something that hasn't been seen here in quite a long time. Mike, talk to us about the damage, the extent of damage so far along the coastline, you've surveyed a lot of things, what are your thoughts?
THEISS: My thought to all of that, again, Panama City does the board so far as the extreme storms surge that they could have had but they did get the extreme wind. But point Mexico Beach, I'm hearing really bad things from Mexico Beach from other chasers of storm around that town and it's just really bad.
I mean, we knew this was going to happen we just didn't know exactly where. It's really crucial on exactly where that eye comes in. But it's catastrophic damage on that coastline. And let me tell you further inland it's amazing how far inland the damage is.
There are trees down everywhere. There are power lines that's thrown across the road everywhere. There's people getting stuck in the power lines so they're blocking traffic. There's gridlock. It's only two and a half hours just to get across the town of Panama City today because I had to keep taking different roads to figure out to get over there.
People were walking around in the (Inaudible). I mean this was a very powerful and scary storm for a lot of people.
[03:15:00] HOWELL: You know, that does lead me, you're leading right into my next question. I always think about what do people want right now. People want to know where the storm is. Well, it's over the State of Georgia moving toward the Carolinas.
People want to know can I come back home, especially those who left and they've been watching on. So, given what you've seen and given why it may take you long the Florida Panhandle to, you know, start clearing this damage. What do you think, it could take several days, yes?
THEISS: Definitely several days. Yes. If you're somebody are you're not at your home now I would -- I would spend another day or two, I wouldn't rush back because it's going to take them awhile to open these roads and all you're going to do is create more of a traffic jam. But the emergency personnel are coming in, you know, to help people who are there that need the help.
Give it a couple days because you're not going to be able to move around. There's no mobility. That every -- all the roads are blocked by trees. There's time you can drive around the trees that's laying in the road but then you drive over into the mud that people get stuck in the mud. I mean, it's just the navigation and the driving around that area is
impossible right now.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOWELL: Mike Theiss there with the National Geographical a photographer for them and a storm chaser. We appreciate his time.
And if you'd like to help victims of the hurricane people who have been affected we have several links to charities that you can trust providing relief on our web site. You can go to CNN.com/impact to get more information about that.
But again, we continue to cover the story and follow the damage after this massive strong storm pushed through. And again, Michael, it is a storm that you're feeling there in Atlanta still want to move in on its way toward the Carolinas.
HOLMES: Still potential for damage one way or the other and when dawn breaks there you are going to be seeing the results of what Michael has brought. Thank you, George. Good to see you. And you will be back with more very shortly.
Meanwhile, we're going to take a short break. When we come back, Turkish officials leak more details about the disappearance of a prominent journalist. Ahead, images of 15 Saudis arriving in Istanbul. Turkish media say they were sent in by Riyadh.
Also coming up, a massive sell-off on Wall Street triggers deep losses in global financial markets. We'll take a close look at the European exchanges that have just opened up. Stay with us. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[03:19:56] HOLMES: Welcome back, everyone. An update now on our top story.
The impact of hurricane Michael in the southeastern U.S. At least two people are dead, countless homes and buildings are being destroyed. Trees and power lines are down, and hundreds of thousands of people are without power as the now tropical storm moves inland over the State of Georgia.
Michael made landfall Wednesday as a category four hurricane in Florida's Panhandle just shy of being a category five storm. The winds were fierce, nearly 250 kilometers an hour at one point. Michael is the strongest storm to hit the continental U.S. since hurricane Andrew back in 1992.
Well, Turkey has released more details to back its claim that Saudi Arabia is behind the disappearance of a prominent journalist. Turkish television airing these images of 15 Saudis arriving in Istanbul just hours before Jamal Khashoggi entered the consulate in Istanbul e and vanished.
The Turkish police haven't made an official statement as yet. But Nic Robertson pieces together what is known about Khashoggi's arrival at the consulate and the hours immediately afterwards.
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Four people steps and he is gone. The last movements Jamal Khashoggi was seen alive in public entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul October 2nd. That was at 1.14 pm on Tuesday. What happened over the next hour and three quarters remains at the center of this mystery call to the investigation.
At a little after 3 pm several consular vehicles was seen leaving the consulate. The question now was Khashoggi in one of those vehicles, and if so was he alive. The vehicles pull away just after three in the afternoon. Arriving minutes later at the consul general's house nearby. The dark windowed van disappears from view into the compound.
These tantalizing CCTV recordings leaked to Turkish media have Turkish investigators scratching their heads. How could Khashoggi just disappear. Their investigations are being hampered. Saudi officials had promised access to the consulate hidden behind a high razor wire top wall.
But now Turkish officials say the Saudis are not cooperating. Piling on the pressure are Turkish pro-government national newspaper has published names and pictures of 15 Saudi men who Turkish officials confirm to CNN are persons of interest in Khashoggi's disappearance.
A Saudi source familiar with four of the men confirms to CNN one of them is a former diplomat in London and an intelligence officer. Another is a forensics expert.
CNN has pieced together a timeline for how at least some of these men got to Istanbul. Some left Riyadh at 11.30 p.m. Monday on a private jet landing in Istanbul around 3.30 a.m., hours before Khashoggi disappears. Leaked CCTV recordings show the plane arriving at Ataturk airport at 3.28 a.m. Minutes later, nine men from the aircraft are picked up on cameras going through passport control. They head to a city hotel.
At around 5 a.m. that morning they check into this hotel just around the comer from the consulate. About four and a half hours later they all leave divided into small groups.
Investigators believe they went to the consulate to wait for Khashoggi. CNN has also tracked the second charter jet arriving from Riyadh at a critical moment that day. It lands in Istanbul around 4 p.m. and leaves just one hour later stopping in Cairo on route back to Saudi.
Why is this important? Turkish officials say the other plane that left late in the evening with Saudis on it was checked their bags x-rayed, but we don't know whether the first Saudi plane to leave Istanbul was checked and it left about two hours after that time swept into the consul's residence.
As it flew to Saudi Khashoggi's fiancee was pacing up and down outside the consulate. More and more anxious more than a week after Jamal Khashoggi entered this building to finalize his marriage papers. The mystery of what happened to him continues to deepen.
[03:25:00] HOLMES: And Nic is outside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Nic, you're seeing a lot of congressional pressure in the United States for the Saudis to clear this up. But interesting, not a lot of forceful reaction from the administration itself.
ROBERTSON: Yes. You know, President Trump in the beginning said that he was concerned, Vice President Pence deeply troubled, you know, quite questions needed to be answered, Pence said for the world to see. And Trump saying well, we really don't know what's going on, which kind of flew in the face of the understanding of the moment.
That U.S. intelligence that actually picked up conversations between top senior Saudis about some kind of abduction for Khashoggi. So, that's raising eyebrows. But I think it's the relationship that President trump and the United States has had with the leadership in Saudi Arabia that is now coming under a lot of scrutiny.
And you know, is the president turning a blind eye to some of the things that Jamal Khashoggi, for example, among others, was trying to flag about the new leadership in Saudi Arabia that they were increasingly arresting people, that they were trying to bring about reforms in the country that will widely appreciated in the country applauded around the world. But their methods required closer scrutiny.
So President Trump now finding himself in that position that, you know, there are members, you know, members of Congress and senior senators who are saying look, we need to examine this relationship and you need to be tougher and clearer and clearer on your message with the Saudis.
Present Trump in his part right now is saying look, you know, we're going to deal with it but we need to get the facts and we don't know it's too soon to say precisely what action may or may not be taken with Saudi over this.
HOLMES: Well, of course he has a close relationship with the Saudi leadership and so does his son-in-law Jared. You think you could get some answers. I'm curious is the Turkish government likely to back up the claims we've been hearing with more evidence, harder evidence. There are two countries Turkey and Saudi Arabia that have a fractured relationship at times.
ROBERTSON: They do. Look, our understanding at the moment from Turkish officials the strongest line that they have is that they believe that Jamal Khashoggi went into the consulate and was killed there fairly quickly afterwards and his body dispose off.
I mean, that's the sort of starting point for their understanding when they get into this investigation. So that kind of tells you that they got evidence to support that. And what's being drifted out to the media here is only a small fraction of that.
And it allows President Erdogan to go, you know, one of two directions, either double down on Saudi Arabia or kind of give, you know, allow this to sort of slide, if you will. He's been waiting to have the United States in his back, you know, to support him on this and it does seem to be politically where the Trump administration is sort of slowly having, certainly the mood music around President Trump to the United States is heading in that direction.
But can Turkey really afford having a strange relationship with Saudi Arabia when its economy is hurting so much. Well, President Trump is also partly the answer to that as well because he has double down on sanctions on Turkey. And in part because of an imprisoned U.S. pastor here in Saudi -- in Turkey that he wants to see release.
So what I'm telling you this is a very, very complex picture and a lot of difficult strained relationships at this moment but it still could go in one of two directions. You could have a real split between Turkey and Saudi Arabia, a split that's been growing, or you could see some kind of way around this situation. Because at the end of the day these are politicians looking for what is best for the interest of their countries. Michael?
HOLMES: You know, and the man in the middle as well. Nic, good to see you. Thanks for that. Nic Robertson there in Istanbul.
And we will take you back live to Florida after the break. Hurricane Michael has passed but the people are just beginning to assess the damage caused by the strongest storm ever to strike the Panhandle.
We'll be right back.
[03:30:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GEORGE HOWELL, CNN NEWSROOM SHOW HOST: Welcome back to our special coverage. I'm George Howell live in Destin, Florida. Hurricane Michael made landfall here on Wednesday as a category four storm and we absolutely felt it here along the coast of Florida. Incredible winds strong, sustained around 249 kilometers per hour as of right now Michael is been downgraded, right now it's tropical storm it's making its way through the U.S. state of Georgia and moving also toward the Carolinas.
Michael first hit land in Florida's Panhandle right here Wednesday and it left behind a great deal of destruction in its path. Take a look at this video and it shows you some of the flooding left behind from the storm in the town of Apalachicola. Flooding, extensive there, people will have a lot -- certainly to wait for that water to pass through. The storm also killed at least two people. We understand a man and a child, destroyed buildings, down trees and power lines and it left hundreds of thousands of homes without power. Our meteorologist Pedro Javaheri, is tracking the storm from the International Weather Center in Atlanta. Pedram, what is the latest there?
PEDRAM JAVAHERI, CNN METEOROLOGIST: George, We had seen the storm systems finally and gradually weakened to a tropical storm as you mentioned and I want to show you this, because the intensity and how rapidly intensified from essentially with a low-grade category one on Monday evening to Wednesday afternoon at landfall as a high-grade category four, just 2 kilometer per hour shy of what would be a category five really negligible difference when it comes to the devastating damaging and impact right along the immediate coast.
In fact, at landfall. Michael comes in with the third lowest central pressure of any tropical system to ever impact United States that is of 292 hurricane that had impact United States since the 1850s. Michael comes in at number three, stronger than Katrina at landfall, stronger than Andrew at landfall based on its central pressure with the storms system. And again, here is what is left of this, still somewhat organized. What symmetrical considering the (inaudible) over 13 hours now overland pushing and across the state of Georgia. And notice, beginning to push in now a transition the center of it at least in the state of South Carolina with 95 kilometer per hour wind, in fact that is about 23 million people underneath tropical storm warnings right now.
That means winds roughly 60 kilometers to about 90 kilometers per hour, sustained that over feeling across portions of Georgia and to South Carolina and eventually on dairies of North Carolina and this all really going to transition rather quickly. We have tornado watches in place into the morning hours right now in Columbia South Carolina and down by the coast in Charleston as well and we will expect this to push through into the afternoon, and by this evening, this storm system is out of here and pushes offshore with it a quick shot of rainfall and frankly, this is the last thing you want to see an area that Florence picked up tremendous rainfall just a few weeks ago. We get another 200 to 300 millimeters over the next couple of hours.
So some of those rivers finally been allowed to kind of receive a little bit in the last couple of days are now to see a gradual rise in the next few and we have about a half million customers across the Southeast that are without power as this storm system escorts out of this region with those 90 plus kilometer per hour winds, we expect widespread outages once again across the coastal region of the Carolinas in the portions of Delmarva, but of course it had saturated soil from recent weeks of rainfalls, so it is not going to take much in the way winds to bring trees down across the area.
[03:35:03] But the frontier responsible for pushing Michael offshore also sets the stage here for the coolest weather we've seen across the eastern and southeastern U.S. in about six months' time, in fact temps could dropped to near single digits across portions of Georgia where we know outages. The power outages have been in place. So, it's really another element to think about here with much, much cooler weather. Ahead of us into the weekend with potentially several days of no power in some of these regions as well. George.
HOWELL: That is something to think about up Pedram, thinking that you know, several days from now. Our people may not have power and still so will have to continue to monitor that. Pedram, thank you so much.
One place that was hit very hard Panama City is one of the coastal towns that this storm passed through. Our Natasha Chen was there and file this report.
(BEGIN VIDEO)
NATASHA CHEN, NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT, CNN: And we are under a curfew right now until 8:00 a.m. because officials do not want people trying to navigate in the dark when they are blocked roads with toppled trees and power lines and damage like this where the winds really ripped apart metalized paper taking roofs off of buildings.
Hurricane Michael made history as it lands in the Florida's Panhandle and swept across the Southeast.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK, Michael was the worst storm that the Florida, Panhandle has ever seen. The worst power storms to ever make landfall in the United States.
CHEN: The catastrophic fast moving storm smashed homes and business, knocked out power and inundated grounds with water.
Businesses devastated like the children store in Panama City that was just on the verge of opening.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (inaudible).
CHEN: Just before making landfall. Michael intensified with sustained winds of a 155 miles per hour. Michael became the strongest storm to hit the continental U.S. since hurricane Andrew, 26 years ago.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As my stepfather and brother just watching going.
CHEN: Michael continue to historical past, becoming the first major hurricane to track into Georgia since 1898, but the destructive storm won't be done anytime soon. Michael continues to pack powerful winds and threaten people lives. Michael's wake are left to pick up with the monster storm left behind.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There is going to be an amount of damage that we have not seen, you know in the living memory.
CHEN: We got an emergency alert on our cell phone all night talking about a boil water advisory, talking about his curfew and warning people that violators of the curfew will be arrested. In Panama City, Florida, Natasha Chen. Back to you.
(END VIDEO)
HOWELL: Natasha Chen, thank you very much. Again we mentioned Michael has weakened, it's a tropical storm now as it moved inland, but it's still quite has a punch. In Georgia, the storm continues to dump a lot of rain. It's knocked out trees and power lines caused a great deal of damage there as our Scott McLean reports.
(BEGIN VIDEO)
SCOTT MCLEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hurricane Michael has now come and gone, we are now at the backside of the storm, the window it has switch directions, but it continues to howl. There's some especially strong gust coming through in the rain is also coming down, luckily though for this area. This is been much more of a wind event and less of a rain event. We've not see the catastrophic flash flooding that many had feared in this part of Georgia, but the wind has certainly lived up to the height. In fact, it was strong enough to keep first responders from responding to 911 calls for several hours. They would not go out, if winds were beyond 35 miles per hour sustained.
Now the county here is actually asking private citizens to borrow four wheelers and ATVs for first responders to use to try to get to those backlog of calls, especially in some of those areas that might be tough to get you with down trees or downed power lines. There are also other challenges, the power outages are widespread in this area it could be some time before the lights are back on. The good news though is that there are utility companies. Many of them from out-of- state standing by to try to get the lights back on as soon as possible, but we will not know the full extent of the damage here until morning. Scott McLean, CNN, Albany, Georgia.
(END VIDEO)
HOWELL: Scott, thank you very much. The storm surge out here that is what allow people we are talking about surprised by the intensity of it. And here's the thing officials roar about life-threatening storm surges, walls of water, meters high, sweeping the shore. Our colleague, Tom Foreman explains how.
(BEGIN VIDEO)
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Everyone worries about wind with a big hurricane hits, but water is the thing that really causes the most damage. Specifically, the storm surge and there are several reasons why could be very bad this storm. Compared to the East Coast, were you tend to have, a sharp shelf drop off of the coast which will hold some of the water back on the Gulf Coast tends to be a little bit flatters, the water could just rush right in there and just keeps going.
[03:40:08] And if you look at this map from the Hurricane, you get an idea of how much could be at stake here. America, Apalachicola, Florida here and you see all of that red. That's where the flooding is really intense, but let us put those colors into a real world perspective. If you talk about blue, which is a smallest amount, that is only about a foot, that is not really a big problem for most homes out there, but as soon as you get to yellow that we have three feet or more. That's enough to do damage to almost any car outside. Depending on the elevation of the house that could be coming in the front door, by the time you hit the orange color.
Now it's as tall as me, six feet tall unless those houses is considerably of, it is probably gonna be taking out the bottom floor electronics, furniture, fixtures, wallboard, flooring and all sorts of damage there and then when you do that red color, nine feet or more. You may even be in to the second floor of some homes out there and you actually have the damage -- to the danger of structural damage to the home. If it stays there long enough so what are we talking about just people on the coast. No, we could be talking about people, who are dozens of miles inland, because the storm surge can follow creek beds and open areas and swamps and marshes and just keep going. So far that a data analytics from out there called core logic estimates in this storm more than 84,000 homes could be damaged by the storm surge.
(END VIDEO)
HOWELL: Wow. That is just terrifying and sobering in our example of what could happen here. Michael, storms like this definitely give your perspective of the storm seem to be getting bigger, stronger at this one. This category for almost category five that left quite an impact here, Michael.
MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN NEWSROOM HOST: Yes. You are right. I was covering them a year ago down in Dominique and (inaudible), Antigua and I know you had been covering for a long time too. They are getting bigger and they are getting more fierce. George, great reporting as always. We will check in with you in a minute. Meanwhile we will take a short break. When we come back, Asian markets post a huge losses and here is the big reason, the stunning plunge day on Wall Street. It was follow the leader, when we come back, we go to London for a look at how this is affecting European markets. We will be right back.
[03:45:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: All right. Back to our top stories, the impact of hurricane Michael at least two people are dead, countless homes and buildings are being destroyed, trees and power lines are down hundreds of thousands of people are without power. Michael now downgraded to a tropical storm, but moving inland from Florida to Georgia still packing a punch. Michael made landfall in Florida's Panhandle region on Wednesdays as a category four hurricane, wind's fierce nearly 250 kilometers an hour at one point. A video that shows damage to a shopping center and just have a look at that incredible. This was in the town of Calloway, this Florida near Panama City.
Michael was strongest storm to hit the continental U.S. since hurricane Andrew in 1992, at least 10 people were killed in a child is missing after flashfloods on the Spanish island of the (inaudible) in the Mediterranean. Two of those who died were British. According to the U.K. foreign office. Emergency services say several other people are still missing a heavy rain and flash flooding, leaving behind lots of damage. Many cows were washed away in the fast-moving water.
Residents swept water and mud out of those houses as the flood subsided on Wednesday leaving roadsides scrum with wreck vehicles and beaches covered in debris.
A Chinese intelligence officer has been extradited to the U.S. where he will face charges of economic espionage. Yanjun Xu was arrested in Belgium back in April. He made a court appearance on Wednesday in Ohio in the U.S. is accused of trying to steal trade secrets from aviation companies in the U.S. One of those companies G.E. aviation in Cincinnati, Ohio cooperated with the FBI in the investigation. The Trump administration has now been cracked down on China's theft of intellectual property. Wednesday huge losses on Wall Street set off a wave of selling in
financial markets around the world as so often is the case. Have a look at the snapshot here at major European exchanges which open about 45 minutes ago. All of them began in the red and are still pointing downwards. Now the global sell-off began hours earlier and you can there, same thing all three major markets there ending their trading day deep in negative territory.
It is true that all financial markets tend to go up and down as a matter of course. But the sharp decline on Wednesday of all of the major U.S. indices and around the world was alarming. In fact, the Dow plunged more than 830 points was the third biggest one-day points lost, not percentage loss, but points lost in history.
Let us go to our Anna Stewart now in London to get a better view of what is happening there. Good morning to you. What is behind this falls, one of (inaudible) out there?
ANNA STEWART, CNN PRODUCER: Good morning Michael, look, from investors today I expect to see to the point down again. And as you can see, the European market have joined in the sell-off. Now there's been a little bit of comeback. It was opening down over 2 percent, I mean it has now come back slightly from that, but it is likely to be a slightly rocky day. Now a lot of this is down to U.S. interest rates. We have some really strong economic base, we have some bullish comments and all this had investors' concern or expecting rates to rise, may be faster than expected.
That is to prevent overheating and inflation it all very much understood and normal, but of course, there are other things that play, the IMF, this week said that global growth is (inaudible) we also had this U.S. China trade tensions. We also had a record market high for almost a decade. There has been a bull market run for some time now. So, as you said the markets go up and down. Is this a little more stock market correction, we had a few within that 10 years or is this new normal?
HOLMES: Let us talk about the fed. Donald Trump criticizing the Fed again calling it crazy this time, enough of those time as we say. Speak to how unusual for a president to comment on Fed policy.
STEWART: Michael, it is kind of extraordinary for a president to make comments about Federal Reserve, particularly when it is really lambasting it. Just take a listen to what U.S. president Donald Trump said yesterday.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What do you think of the market sell-off?
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I think the fed is -- I-- -- is making a mistake.
[03:50:05] I think the fed has gone crazy. So you could say that is a lot of safety net, it gives you a lot of margin, but I think the fed has gone crazy. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ok. What about (inaudible)?
TRUMP: No, I think -- it is the correction that we've been waiting for a long time, but I really disagree with what the fed is doing. OK?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
STEWART: I mean, actually it is a correction we've been waiting for a long time, OK. But calling the Federal Reserve crazy, pretty unusual. Central banks in Democrat country are independent from politics, from government, from leaders for a very good reason for a very good reason. It doesn't come as a surprise. This is not the first time we heard comments like this on a campaign trail. He told everyone it was a low interest. I would say we have had a little bit of balancing from the Treasury Secretary, Steve Mnuchin, who said that markets go up, markets go down. I see this as a normal correction.
HOLMES: All right, interesting day ahead for you there in London. Good to see you, Anna. Anna Stewart.
Still to come here on the program, hurricane Michael now one for the record books. We'll look at impact of the strongest storm ever to hit the Florida, Panhandle.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOWELL: Welcome back to our coverage of hurricane Michael. I'm George Howell live in Destin Florida. This storm made landfall as a category four storm here in the Panhandle of Florida on Wednesday, catastrophic and unprecedented.
Right now that storm is still on the move inland. It's hitting parts of the state of Georgia as a tropical storm. This video shows the damage, damage that it's already caused in Crawford County, Georgia, with toppled trees and damaged vehicles. Here along the Florida Coast, it hit this part of the state with a great deal of storm surge and very strong winds. The winds here at 250 kilometers per hour, just shy of becoming a category five storm. Hurricane Michael was proven to be a deadly storm as well. We understand that at least two people have been killed as a result of it, the storm was a fast-moving storm as it came ashore. We felt that here, the winds, the rain, it moved very quickly, very quickly and left certainly a mark that many people will remember here. Here is a look at how the storm felt how it sounded as if pushed through Florida just a few hours ago.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now the storms here is not safe to travel cross Panhandle. If you are in a coastal area. Do not leave your house the time to evacuate in coastal areas has come and gone.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You could see the homes here. The homes are built very tall to offer protection, most some of them built since hurricane Dennis in 2005. And people here know, that when they come back it likely won't look the same. We don't know how long would be able to stay here, because the flood water are expected to come from the Gulf and start cascading in this direction.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A county is no longer responding to calls. Because the condition at the point and certainly in certain parts of the county are just too dangerous.
[03:55:00] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Really deteriorating here in the last few minutes. A lot of rain coming down now, but the rain is really not going to be the issue at least initially it is going to be the wind event here. Creating storm surge.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is definitely the strongest that I felt all along. The raindrops almost feels like needles on my both hands right now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Look at the streets behind me, you can see, we have measurements within the past hour, about six and half feet above low tide. So high tide has not even occurred yet and this water is still filling in this area.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The wind is simply hitting in your face right now. Like small razor blades. The power is out, we heard transformers explosions of all across this part of Panama City Beach, where we are.
Imagine that hitting you, you know in a 100 miles an hour or even hitting your car if you are trying to drive.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The storm has made landfall, just hit the northwest of Mexico Beach. And here is Mexico beach right there, you can see the center of the storm is making landfall right there.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The tension of this came upon this area very quickly, 150 mile an hour winds just two miles an hour shy of being a category five, would hit landfall at Mexico Beach just east of here.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOWELL: That is look at what happened. And if you'd like to help people who been affected by this hurricane is now tropical storm Michael. Here is what you could do. Visit our website @cnn.com/impact, there you can find a link to show various ways that you can offer your assistance here. Thank you for being with us for our special coverage here in Destin, Florida, I'm George Howell.
HOLMES: George, good to be with you on this program, I'm Michael Holmes, the news continues next with Max Foster in London, you have been watching CNN and will continue to.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
