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CNN Live Saturday

Hurricane Jeanne Bears Down On Florida Coast; Gonaives Aid Lines Descend Into Chaos

Aired September 25, 2004 - 18:00   ET

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

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


CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Carol Lin at the CNN Center. Welcome to CNN SATURDAY. Here's what's happening right now in the news. Hurricane Jeanne is moving closer to Florida's Atlantic Coast and expected to make landfall tonight. Right now, it's a category 3 major hurricane with sustained winds of 116 miles per hour.
And seven people are dead after an U.S. air strike in Fallujah. Multinational forces say the strike targeted a meeting of terrorists. Supporters of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi were said to be in the building that were hit. However, doctors say some of civilians killed included women and children.

A U.S. commander in Afghanistan expects insurgents to step up the violence there as elections get closer. Lieutenant General David Barnow (ph) says terrorists can't be allowed to destroy the hard work of millions of registered Afghan voters. Elections are just two weeks away.

Keeping you informed, CNN, the most trusted network in the world.

I'm sure you've been watching this throughout the afternoon. This hour, we're going to begin with yet another weekend of preparations and evacuations in Florida. Hurricane Jeanne is closing in and once again, residents are boarding up and packing up. The storm is expected to come ashore in about six hours somewhere between West Palm Beach and Melbourne. Florida governor Jeb Bush is urging residents to seek shelter.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. JEB BUSH (R), FLORIDA: Soon, at some point, the highway patrol will be leaving to go to safety and maybe in the next few hours depending on how the winds pick up. This is not the time to be traveling. The evacuations should have occurred already and now is the time to find a safe place and stay there.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: Well, earlier today, Jeanne battered the Bahamas with ferocious winds and rain. You know that island chain is still recovering from Hurricane Frances, which just passed over three weeks ago. And Jeanne has caused a lot of chaos in Haiti. Take a look at this damage. It struck as a tropical storm a week ago causing massive flooding. The death toll has now passed 1,300 and those who escaped harm are being more -- are becoming more desperate for food and clean water. We're going to get a firsthand account from Haiti, from a Haitian journalist later in this program.

But in the meantime, we have reporters stationed all along Hurricane Jeanne's projected path. We're going to start with our own Anderson Cooper live in Melbourne.

Anderson, you're becoming our hurricane guy.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: It's like deja vu all over again. Carol. Yes, Melbourne, Florida yet again hit. I mean it was hit by Frances on September 5. Now, just a few weeks later, it is going to be hit again. This place is right in the path of this storm. And as you said, Carol, we're about six hours away from when the height of the storm is supposed to be right around here.

Already, the winds are picked up. I mean the winds were starting to the 30 miles per hour range. It's really nothing. But if you look behind me, that's the Indian River, which is sort of like the Intercoastal Waterway between Melbourne and Melbourne Beach. It looks like the Atlantic Ocean already. I mean there are white caps out there. That bridge over will be closed down after winds exceed about 45 miles an hour or so. But that's a barrier island out there, Melbourne Beach and Indian Beach. There are already people who are not evacuating. I mean, this whole area is under mandatory evacuation and there's going to be a curfew in effect.

But there -- I got to tell you there are a lot of people who have decided, you know what, it's just too much hassle. I'm just not going to do it. I've done it before. And I've actually I've never seen it. I mean with the last three hurricanes, that we have been down here covering; the towns have been ghost towns. I mean boarded up, no one around. I got to tell you, there are people walking around the streets here in Melbourne. Domino's Pizza was open until like an hour ago. A few places are boarded up. But I'm very concerned. I got to be honest with you about how ready this town really is for this storm. There are several thousand people, we're told, in the county already in shelters. That number is far lower than it was for Hurricane Frances. A lot of people, Carol, are just sick of these storms and just don't want to move out.

LIN: Yes, but they know from Charley and Frances what can actually happen during a hurricane. So what are they doing? Are they just hanging out in the living rooms tonight or are they actually trying to take some precautions around their homes?

COOPER: Well, you know, that's the problem. I mean with Frances there was such concern about it. It was a category 4 storm. It slowed down a little bit, 105 miles an hour winds it actually hit Melbourne. And there was, I mean honestly, not a lot of damage. I mean it wasn't like Punta Gorda with Charley. So I think a lot of people, they heard those warnings, they evacuated. They came back. They saw their house. You know it was more or less OK, a few shingles maybe missing. And they decided, you know what, it's not so bad. These warnings maybe are a little bit overstated. We're just going to ride this one out. That is a big concern because this storm -- I mean, Frances was 105 and weakening when it hit land. This is 115 right now and may be getting stronger as it hits landfall. So, there is real concern. I mean, there are people boarded up. A lot of homes are boarded. But I'm really surprised and I've literally seen -- I saw some people out jogging about an hour ago. And, you know, you want to roll over and go up to them and say, you know, get off the street, you know, find some place because this storm is coming in less than six hours.

LIN: Right, right. And for all the hurricane -- just in the last six weeks, you know 70 people have been killed in the state of Florida, so something definitely to be taken very seriously. Anderson Cooper, once again, you're going to be very close to this eye of this latest hurricane.

Right now, we're going to move on to CNN's Gary Tuchman in Fort Pierce.

Gary, are you finding the situation there the same? Are people feeling complacent about this?

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Carol, we're in the exact same spot that we stood in three and a half weeks ago for Hurricane Frances. This is the Fort Pierce City Marina. When we were here last time three weeks ago, there were about 75 to 80 boats in the water. They were all destroyed except for one boat during Hurricane Frances for this part of the marina. You can see behind me the wreckage of one of the boats.

The day after the last hurricane, 30 or 40 were piled into this pier right here. Other sunk. They cleaned up much of it, but still, there's so much to clean up and they now have another hurricane coming. Right now, torrential rain in Fort Pierce. The winds have picked up now to about 35 miles per hour.

And here in Saint Lucie County, they're expecting the eye to come close again. It was about 25 miles to the south during the last hurricane. There's a chance it could get even more damage this time. That's what officials are telling the people who live here because obviously, this is a stronger storm. Hurricane Frances was 105 miles per hour winds. This is now 115 and possibly will go higher.

Power is already out in much of St. Lucie County. It was out for the last two hours in many homes. There's a curfew in effect tonight at 8:00 Eastern Time. No one will be allowed outside. They are being warned they're going to be serious police -- they are going to arrest people and take them to jail if they spot them outside. They don't want a possibility of looting or people getting hurt because of the weather.

What's very unusual about this hurricane being back at the same place in three weeks, there's still a lot of damage from the last one. Trees down, light poles down. This marina, you can see fences down, trees down. And now, they know that one of the big issues they're going to face is the damage from the last hurricane blowing around during this hurricane.

Carol, back to you. LIN: Gary, I know it's hard to hear me because the winds are starting to pick up there. I asked you earlier, as Anderson has been seeing people out on the streets in Melbourne even just hours away from when this hurricane is supposed to make landfall. Are people where you are, are they feeling complacent about this?

TUCHMAN: Well, Carol, I do hear you now and I hear your question perfectly. And I can tell you here in the Fort Pierce marina area, which is in the downtown section of the city of 40,000 people; we have seen no civilians walking around. And we saw the same thing last time, no one walking around. People in this area near the water and the Intercoastal Waterway and we're a half a mile from the ocean right now, they have evacuated the area. I can tell you, although, shelters in this area, in Saint Lucie County, last time, they reported 5,000 residents in the shelters. Right now, they're only up to about 2,000, so fewer people have gone to the shelters.

LIN: All right. Thanks very much. Gary Tuchman reporting live there.

Well, our coverage does continue right now with CNN's John Zarrella. He is standing by in West Palm Beach -- John.

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN MIAMI BUREAU CHIEF: Hi, Carol. And just like Gary Tuchman, I'm standing virtually in the exact same spot I was three weeks ago today during Hurricane Frances here in West Palm Beach. Behind me over here, the Intercoastal Waterway, Lake Worth. Across the water there is, of course, Palm Beach. And we have been getting hit now. The weather, of course, beginning to go downhill. Winds gusting here into the mid-30s now.

And one of the things, of course, of big concern is, for example, these palm trees back here that you can see, that's still damage from Hurricane Frances three weeks ago. And, root systems have been weakened on a lot of trees. There's likely to be damage to these kinds of trees that they didn't fall during Frances. Perhaps, with this hurricane, it's certainly stronger. They might do that. And wherever you look, we took a tour out into the Palm Beach, West Palm Beach area a couple of hours before this all kicked up and you could see the debris that still lines the streets along in the West Palm Beach area, not only the debris in the West Palm Beach area, but the blue tarps on a lot of the roofs that are out there. And of course, with this kind of wind picking up, chances certainly are that a lot of people that the blue tarps protecting the holes in the roofs that were caused by Hurricane Frances are going to lose those tarps. And with the steady rain and heavy winds that we're likely to experience here later, they might again be faced with a situation where they have even more damage than they had before.

The streets, of course, deserted for the most part here although just like Gary Tuchman, we've seen joggers out there. We've seen cars on the road. And we're seeing the same thing in the shelters today. It started off pretty slow. There were only a few thousand people in the shelters earlier today. They can hold up to 27,000 people here in Palm Beach County in the shelters but what they had were about 11,000 as of about 2:00 this afternoon. The emergency operation center told us a little while ago that they're already beginning to get phone calls from elderly people who decided to stay and now, they want to get out and they're asking for help to get out. And, of course, with the weather deteriorating as rapidly as it is now, it's not likely that anybody's going to be able to get anywhere to help them in the not too distant -- well, certainly, for the foreseeable future until this thing blows through. A lot of accidents reported on streets. Too many cars, the EOC is telling us. Too many people on the streets, Carol, who don't need to be on the streets but unfortunately, are out there -- Carol.

LIN: All right. Thanks very much, John. John Zarrella reporting live in West Palm Beach.

Our meteorologist, Jacqui Jeras, is tracking the storm from the CNN Weather Center.

Jacqui, we've now seen our reporters from north to south, right about where you've been warning us that Hurricane Jeanne is going to hit sometime in the next six hours.

JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: That's right and I can't emphasize enough, Carol, this is a dangerous storm. This is a major hurricane, a category 3, winds of 115 miles per hour. And the pressure has been dropping consistently over the last six hours. Now, we haven't seen that translate yet in terms of seeing our winds increase but we are likely going to see the winds increase once the hurricane hunters fly back into the storm and take some more measurements. So be aware that this could possibly be a weak category 4 before it makes landfall. And people need to be inside at this time. We're already getting wind reports around 45 miles per hour around Fort Pierce and stemming down towards West Palm Beach. And we are expecting those winds to continue to increase.

These outer bands are now making their way on shore at this time and some of them are also showing signs of rotation. You can see especially within this area, those little swirlies you see are sheer markers, indicating rotation. And now tornado warnings have been issued for Western Indian River County and Okeechobee County until 6:20 for tonight. A tornado watch is in effect for the entire area until midnight. We'll likely see that extended well into tomorrow.

Now, we are concerned about this eye wall and the timing on that. When can you expect it to make landfall? That's what's going to be the worst part of this storm, on the leading edge here. There, you can see Port Saint Lucie right where Gary Tuchman is, coming in at -- just after the 9:00 hour. Down towards Fort Pierce, near 10:00 and then Vero Beach just before 11:00 for tonight. And you could expect those winds to be around 100 miles per hour if not stronger at that time. We're going to see the squalls that are moving on shore right now. Those winds will be increasing as they move through, probably on the order of 40 to 60 miles per hour.

So the forecast track of Jeanne has changed a little bit. It has moved a little bit farther and off to the west. The location that we're expecting it to make landfall is about the same, south of Vero Beach and likely north of West Palm Beach. But it does get much closer towards the Tampa Bay area and almost making a little hook here into the Gulf of Mexico before it continues to push on up to the north and to the east, riding around that area of high pressure.

Here are those winds I was talking about. These are sustained winds, not to mention the gusts. Thirty-one miles per hour in Melbourne, 17 in Fort Pierce, 28 in West Palm Beach. And you can see 25 miles per hour in Orlando.

The forecast winds, you can see them increasing for tonight. The hurricane force winds extend out about 70 miles from the center of this storm and that could expand a little bit as this storm is expected to continue to strengthen and grow just a little bit. And you can see those strong hurricane force winds possibly making their way towards Tampa and to Gainesville and then weakening as a tropical depression as it moves up to the north and to the east -- Carol.

LIN: Boy, it looks like from your map, Jacqui, that just about everybody in Florida is going to be affected somehow by this hurricane.

JERAS: It's a big storm again just like Frances, just like Ivan, about 400, 500 miles across.

LIN: Remarkable. All right, thanks very much, Jacqui, and thanks for being with us tonight and tracking this storm.

We want to go to the area where Anderson Cooper was just reporting from in Melbourne. Brevard County, sheriff's department, public officer Yvonne Martinez is on the telephone with us.

Yvonne, just taking -- just hearing from our correspondents out there covering people who are saying they're not going to leave. They're walking around the streets. The winds are picking up and they just don't care. Do you have a big problem here?

YVONNE MARTINEZ, EOC BREVARD COUNTY, FLORIDA: Well, it's a concern. I can tell you that our shelter population is a lot lower than what we saw during Hurricane Frances. The numbers just for comparison, we have today 3,857 in our shelters now, 3,857. During Frances, we had more than 8,000.

LIN: These people who are walking around, driving around right now, we're six hours away from this hurricane making landfall, can't your officers go and just pick them up?

MARTINEZ: Well, all we can do is advise these people, and we have, that as of right now, we're passed that time where they need to be in their homes, in shelters, and in their safe spot where they need to ride out this storm. We're passed that spot. We are beginning to feel tropical storm forces winds that will be intensifying throughout the evening. Hurricane force winds as early as 2:00 Sunday morning.

So we have a concern because there were a lot of people who didn't evacuate. We feel that they have gotten into this false sense of security because they evacuated during Hurricane Frances, came home, saw that their homes were not damaged so they figured, well, we can ride this one out, too.

LIN: Right, right.

MARTINEZ: But you just can't take chances like that because you're really taking chances with your life.

LIN: Right. You're saying and in fact, just a couple of hours ago, Governor Bush was saying you are at the point of no return, that people who haven't evacuated now have to stay put. But you -- so you are actually saying no matter what the circumstances, an elderly person having a heart attack, a young couple maybe with a baby who decided not to leave and suddenly are panicked, you can't do anything for them right now?

MARTINEZ: At this point, it's on a case by case. Our emergency personnel will not respond once the winds reach 55 miles an hour or above. We're still, you know, marginal. We're having some gusts at that point. But it's unsafe for emergency personnel to respond to those situations. So, you know, when you decide to stay and you panic at the last minute, you're at your own risk.

LIN: Right. We're adults. Yvonne Martinez -- and certainly people have had enough experience in Florida to know what is ahead of...

MARTINEZ: They should know better, yes.

LIN: You bet. All right, Yvonne Martinez, we will hope for the best...

MARTINEZ: OK.

LIN: ...Brevard County, sheriff's department.

Stay with CNN for the latest details on Hurricane Jeanne. In fact, I'm going to have live continuous coverage starting at 8:00 p.m. Eastern and throughout the night. So look for live reports from Florida and our weather center as it tracks Jeanne, as the storm stalks the Sunshine State throughout this night. Six hours, this hurricane is going to make landfall.

Jeanne, in the meantime -- you want to see what Florida is in for? The crisis in Jeanne's wake in Haiti. There are hungry. There are homeless people and they are taking the law into their own hands.

And up next, the violence in Iraq is so routine but not for the soldiers walking the beat. We're going to show you our view from the front lines.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: We're waiting in the next few hours for Jeanne to make landfall on the east coast of the state of Florida, but already, the Bahamas took another blow from Jeanne. It swept through there and the city of Freeport was hit pretty hard. Alexander Williams, Freeport's emergency administrator is on the telephone with me right now.

Alexander, give me an idea of what the status is because you're still feeling a lot of the wind and the rain from Jeanne?

ALEXANDER WILLIAMS, FREEPORT GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATOR: Oh, yes. We have been bombarded by high winds and torrential rain now for the last four hours. We have had reports that came in. Tidal surges have flooded some of our communities. The Grand Bahama International Airport is under water. And we had to evacuate persons from all of the coastal areas into shelters.

We are presently operating some 12 shelters and we have more than a thousand persons in those shelters. Reports -- we are being bombarded now by reports as this onslaught continues of roofs being blown off and collapsing and houses being flooded. And we have to activate our emergency search and rescue teams, which have been at it for the last two hours.

LIN: And added to the last two hours, have they found anybody dead or alive?

WILLIAMS: No, no. We have not. We have not. There has not been any report of anyone -- any loss of life. But, of course, we have to rescue persons with medical troubles that were stuck in houses with roofs torn off. But so far, all has gone very well.

LIN: Anybody missing?

WILLIAMS: No one missing so far.

LIN: So far, you've been pretty lucky then.

WILLIAMS: We have been pretty lucky. We have taken the necessary precautions. We have learned our lesson well over the years and most recently from Hurricane Frances. We were just out of Frances before this one came.

LIN: Right, right. Well, what's going on in the Bahamas is just a preview for us here on the continental U.S. Alexander Williams, thank you very much.

WILLIAMS: You're welcome.

LIN: A very different situation and certainly a very different story when we talk about Iraq. The tick tock of killings and the attacks in Iraq, it takes on new meaning while we wait for news about the hostages and wonder whether even January elections in that country are actually possible.

Now, American commanders tell CNN they are striking hard to stop militants, in particular in Fallujah and Samara. Well, today, 14 Iraqis were killed in separate military operations and 10 others were wounded. And an air strike targeted what the coalition called a known terrorist meeting site connected to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Now, at least seven new recruits for Iraq's national guard were killed and several others were injured in Baghdad. They were being driven through the city in an Iraqi national guard van when it was attacked. They were identifiable.

Moving on north of Baghdad, an Iraqi police captive was killed in a drive-by shooting near Baquba. This happened as hundreds of Iraqis held a Day of Unity convention. The group debated ways to end the violence. What an irony there.

Now, the fate of a British man held hostage in Iraq still remains uncertain today. An Islamic Web site claimed Kenneth Bigley had been killed. But British authorities say that claim could not be verified. A Muslim delegation from Britain is in Baghdad hoping to appeal directly to the militants holding Bigley for his release.

Jack Hensley's family had a memorial for him today here in the United States. Now, he and American Eugene Armstrong were both beheaded by those militants. All three were being held hostage together.

"It was better than it was a year ago." That is a quote. Despite the ongoing violence, that's how some U.S. soldiers see the situation on the front lines in Iraq. Our Jane Arraf is traveling with U.S. troops in Tikrit and brings us a progress report but from a soldier's perspective.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JANE ARRAF, CNN BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): It's a different view at ground level. American soldiers actually fighting the war in Iraq aren't paying much attention to the debate raging over it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Friendly. We came here -- we came here to do a job and like I said the job we're doing is pretty much good.

ARRAF: Sergeant Parker's job is a lot more than getting shot at or shooting people.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I got to take a picture of the store and the...

ARRAF: Most aren't paying attention to politics, either.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a good neighborhood?

ARRAF: Specialist Jamie Rice (ph) from Ohio is turning 21 this week. It's the first time he'll be able to vote, but he doesn't plan to.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's a tough choice right there. I really haven't been able to follow the news at all, so I don't know which way to go.

ARRAF: Soldiers say the streets they're patrolling are safer and more prosperous than they've been. Here in Saddam Hussein's hometown, the 1st Infantry Division spent a lot of time getting to know the people whose city they're living in. First Battalion 18th Infantry Company commander Aaron Coombs stops to talk to a carpet dealer to get his view on life here. He tells the captain that what they need are jobs.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have money. People can work and get money. Life can be better.

ARRAF: It's still dangerous.

CAPT. AARON COOMBS, U.S. ARMY: It's not a daily gun fight here in Tikrit anyway but it does happen. It's still a very lethal place.

ARRAF: Two weeks ago, the company medic was killed near here. But with so much else going on, the steady drip of deaths doesn't seem to overshadow the progress they believe they've helped make.

COOMBS: I think if you talk to a lot of people, even here in Tikrit, somebody who's honest with himself will tell you that things are better although there are problems than there were a year ago.

ARRAF: Most of these soldiers say that makes it worth it.

Jane Arraf, CNN, Tikrit.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: We have also much more on Hurricane Jeanne tonight, which is heading to the United States. We're going to take you to the most deceptive part of this storm, the calm within. We're going to show you actually what's like to be inside the eye of the hurricane as Jeanne makes landfall.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: We're following Jeanne but we also have some other stories across America. For example, the deadly fire in Chicago last night where four kids were killed. And fire officials say there weren't any parents at the scene. A fire department spokesman describes the blaze as suspicious and says an arson investigation; maybe even a murder investigation is under way.

And CBS, the network, is canceling a 60-minute story on the rational for war in Iraq. The network says it would be inappropriate to broadcast that report so close to the presidential election. This on the heels of their embarrassment about possibly using fake documents that were indicting to President Bush's war record.

Also, Oprah's free cars turned out to be pretty expensive. A lot of people who got those free cars during the show's season premier are complaining that the cars are actually going to cost them several thousand dollars in higher income taxes. Since each car was worth about $28,000, that means $7,000 is going to be taxable.

All right, getting back to Hurricane Jeanne, it is on a steady march for the east coast of Florida. Let's check in at the hurricane center where our veteran, Max Mayfield, director of The National Hurricane Center, is standing by in Miami.

Max, what is -- when do you expect Jeanne to make landfill?

MAX MAYFIELD, DIRECTOR, THE NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER: Well, Carol, the center will probably arrive on the coast sometime around midnight. On the forecast track, if it's a little bit of south of that, somewhat earlier. But if it's a little bit to the right, it's a little bit later. But main thing, we're already getting gusts to 47 miles per hour in Palm Beach. The conditions will really continue to go downhill between now and the time that the core crosses the coast.

LIN: Well, give us a perspective on how dangerous this hurricane can actually be given that it's the fourth. I mean that's really what's kind of interesting about it.

MAYFIELD: Well...

LIN: It's not as slow as Frances. It's not as big as Charley. So is it as deadly or more deadly?

MAYFIELD: I think it could be more deadly. Frances that hit, basically this same area a month or so ago, was a category 2 hurricane. This is a category 3 hurricane. The No. 1 hazard will be the storm surge; will likely be four to seven feet near and to the north of where the center is crossing the coast. So we're probably talking the northern part of Palm Beach County all the way up to the Cape. And then on top of that, these very large and dangerous, breaking waves. They have a buoy offshore of the Cape there that had a report to 29 feet here about an hour ago. So when those large waves get up to the coast and break, that's what's going to cause all the damage. Then you have to worry about the winds spreading inland along with the rain fall and some tornadoes.

LIN: All right. So what are looking for? What's interesting to you in the next six hours before it makes landfall?

MAYFIELD: Well, you know, we're certainly hoping we don't see any additional intensification. The main concern here is that the folks particularly on those barrier islands, we hope that they have either been advised of those local thresholds in the mandatory evacuation areas and hopefully, those people have indeed gotten out.

LIN: All right, thanks very much, Max. Max Mayfield, we'll be talking to you throughout the evening, as well as Hurricane Jeanne makes its move. Thanks very much. Max Mayfield with The National Hurricane Center.

All right, we've got much more ahead on the hurricane. We've got reporters positioned all up and down the state of Florida and the best experts on hand to tell you what's going to happen next. Stay right there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: Welcome back. I'm Carol Lin and here's a quick look at what's happening right now in the news. Hurricane Jeanne, that's what we're covering this hour, battered parts of the Bahamas today and is now barreling towards Florida's Atlantic Coast. It's a category three major hurricane and the sustained winds right now are pretty close to 115 miles per hour. And already when you take at these pictures in the Bahamas, it ripped off roofs, it toppled trees, and knocked out power. It's a pretty bad situation.

Now, forecasters are predicting that Jeanne's going to make landfall probably about midnight. I was just talking with Max Mayfield from The National Hurricane Center. It's going to be somewhere between West Palm Beach and Melbourne. But already the winds are picking up. The outer edges, the outer bands of the hurricane are already along the Florida coast and millions of people have had to leave their homes under a mandatory evacuation.

And a week after Jeanne slammed Haiti, the situation there is really deteriorating. So far, more than 1,300 people have died mostly due to the flooding and rioting and looting is also on the rise as people grow more desperate for food and clean water.

There's nothing like a hurricane barreling towards the continental United States that gets CNN's Anderson Cooper out in the field so fast. He is in Melbourne, Florida, where Hurricane Jeanne is expected to pretty close make landfall there -- Anderson.

COOPER: Yes, Carol, conditions are deteriorating actually pretty rapidly. It's funny, about a minute ago, you said the outer bands of the storm are starting to hit the coast. And then when you said that, I heard it in my ear and I thought, what is she talking about. I'm not seeing that. Literally, a few seconds later, boom, we just got this big sort of squall coming in, really the first of the heavy rain just starting to come in. Visibility, I mean, you -- I don't know if you remember, at 6:00, about a half hour ago, you could see the barrier island. You could see Melbourne Beach. You can no longer -- you can just faintly make it out on the horizon. The winds, the visibility is dropping rapidly.

I'm here -- Chad Myers, CNN meteorologist with me.

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: We're doing this again?

COOPER: I know, God, yikes. What are the winds right now?

MYERS: We had 44 just now. We're a little protected right here by this little bit of palm tree here we have. But I'll you what, 44, 45, that's just now getting to tropical storm strength. When you talk about hurricane strength winds, tropical storm strength winds, 39 or better is now a TS. So now we have Tropical Storm Jeanne and soon we're going to get Hurricane Jeanne, then Cat 1, Cat 2, Cat 3.

COOPER: It's interesting because when you and I were out here for Frances, you know -- it seems like just yesterday -- it was September 5, there really wasn't much rain. Do you anticipate a lot of water this time?

MYERS: Yes. There's a lot of water on radar and its' blowing sideways obviously. You can see it on the water just like last time. You could see the island and then all of a sudden you couldn't the island because it was in fog. It probably wasn't fog obviously. It was the rain headed our way. But I noticed -- and I heard you talk about this earlier -- the people here are not taking this seriously. People are still driving to the island to the barrier island over that very large bridge there and I see their lights headed out. It's too late to do stuff now. You can't put up a sheet of plywood at 44 miles an hour. You can't protect your property.

COOPER: And that barrier island, I want to explain to people because the water -- I mean, we were out there in good conditions. The water was 20, 30 feet off from some of these houses. I imagine that beach has already washed away in some places.

MYERS: Well, 6:00 was high tide officially and 1:00 a.m. is low tide or somewhere around 1:00 a.m. So that's going to help as the real eye or the biggest winds get in here. The water's actually going to be trying to recede on its own because of the sun, the moon and the real tides. But obviously the storm surge is going to push that water back up onto the beach.

COOPER: How bad do you think the winds are going to get here tonight, for you and I?

MYERS: I don't think that -- we just talked about a little bit of a right turn possibly with this storm and if that turn right is right here where we're standing will be 130. No question.

COOPER: One hundred thirty mile an hour winds right here?

MYERS: Yes, absolutely. Yes, and it's not going to be pretty. And even though it's 115 right now, it's in that Gulf Stream and that Gulf Stream is so warm. There is no sheer at all out there. No wind blowing the tops off the storm. And when that sheer doesn't exist and that water is warm, the thing gets bigger and bigger. And I think easily 115 and 130. And a couple of gusts even hurricane center forecast saying gusts to 160. Not out of the question right in the north side of the eye wall, so that's dangerous.

COOPER: Right, and people aren't taking this seriously. That's definitely true. I mean still we see people out. I mean literally there are people in sort of flimsy built houses about 20 feet away from where we are right now, you know. And they're kind of just boarding up now. It's, frankly, a little bit too late for that, Carol.

LIN: Yes, a lot of optimism out there in the face of a potential disaster. We'll see what happens. Thanks, Anderson, Chad.

OK, we're going to check in with CNN's Florida affiliate, WJXT, Adam Landau is keeping an eye on Jeanne's approach in Daytona Beach.

Adam, a little geography lesson. We were just talking with Anderson and Chad up in Melbourne. Where are you in relation them?

ADAM LANDAU, WJXT REPORTER: Well, we're up further to the north, about 100 miles, I'd say. And if you want to see something, we can show you behind us just how the wind is really whipping up the surf here. And you can see literally the beach is falling to the ocean. It's amazing to see up and down the coast here as the beach is literally washing away. This, of course, all started with Charley. Then there was Frances and now, of course, everyone here is worried about Jeanne.

There are 120,000 people in the Volusia County around Daytona Beach that are supposed to evacuate their homes. The concern is though that people aren't. And shelters, we're told, a lot fewer people are now there for this storm than there were for Frances. In fact, we talked to people who said, look, we made it through Charley, we made it through Frances, we just can't do it again. We're going to bunker down at home and we're going to do the best we can.

We're expecting winds to maybe reach about 70 miles an hour here. If that happens, you're looking at a lot of the area that would be damaged right along the beach. These hotels have been hit extremely hard. Many of them shut down because of Charley and they don't expect to reopen for several months now after Jeanne. And of course, there are still other storms brewing in the tropics. But once again, you can see just what the wind is doing here and we're only getting gusts to about 25 miles per hour and already, you're seeing this. Just imagine when the worst of it starts to heading our way. We're live in Daytona Beach, I'm Adam Landau for CNN -- Carol.

LIN: All right, thanks very much, Adam.

In fact, parts of Hurricane Ivan just rewrote the coast of Alabama. So it's not surprising what's happening already on the coast of Florida. We've got much more ahead on the coverage of Jeanne. Stay right there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: Well, Hurricane Jeanne was a mere tropical storm when it slammed into Haiti just last week. And considering that it's going to be a hurricane when it arrives here in the United States, take a look at what's going on in that country: massive flooding and chaos. The situation is really bad in Gonaives. You can see the storm victims are so desperate for food and clean water that they're rioting and looting now. And there are plane loads of relief supplies heading to Port-au-Prince, but those supplies cannot get to places like Gonaives because the roads are so damaged and there's still so much flooding. Gang members are also trying to steal some of that aid. I have got a Haitian journalist on the telephone right now. Nancy Roc is in Port- au-Prince.

Nancy, the -- when we look at these pictures and it's hard to believe that there is that kind of desperation. Give me an idea of what you have seen today.

NANCY ROC, HAITIAN JOURNALIST: Well, I haven't seen this today. I was in Gonaives this week, but what you're seeing right now is indeed what is happening right now in the Gonaives. I'm going back on Monday and fortunately, because I have to follow what's going on and young -- the calls that we've been giving of Haitians in the press and everything, unfortunately, this is what's going on every day in the city of independence because I remind you this is the city of independence of Haiti.

And unfortunately, people are not only starving, they cannot get water. They cannot get any food right now. The international aid is really, really thin even though we've had help from all over the world. And I'm sure the country is extremely grateful about all the help that we absolutely need for the people in Haiti. But unfortunately, to get there, it's extremely difficult, not only that people are very thirsty, very hungry and when they distribute -- when the distribution goes on, it's very, very hard...

LIN: Nancy, let me ask you this...

ROC: ...for people to get it. But also...

LIN: ...the United States...

ROC: ...there have been some humanitarian convoys that have been attacked by looters, which is extremely difficult.

LIN: The United States has pledged $1.8 million. Does that sound like a lot of money in a situation like this?

ROC: Unfortunately, that's not, ma'am, because Canada, for example, immediately gave $2 million. The Red Cross gave $3.3 million. You have to understand that, of course, that helps and it's extremely important. But when you have more than a quarter of a million people, this is a city of more than 230,000 people, that's become homeless in one night, overnight. It's extremely, extremely difficult. Plus, we have very -- we are fearing epidemic right now because corpses have been in the water for the past week, human corpses, corpses that are bodies of animals. So we -- this is an extremely difficult situation right now.

LIN: Right.

ROC: And the whole town is underwater and under mud. So we're going to probably have to face an emergency situation and humanitarian situation for...

LIN: You're in it right now.

ROC: ...for the next month.

LIN: You're right. You're in right now. Nancy Roc, thank you very much. She was just saying a quarter of a...

ROC: Thank you very much.

LIN: ... million people homeless. That is like the size of Greenville, North Carolina, here in the United States.

CNN's Karl Penhaul is going to have a live report from Haiti later tonight. He has been at those food depots in Gonaives. He has seen the violence himself. Be sure to tune in our primetime show at 10:00 Eastern.

In the meantime, Jeanne is showing no mercy. It's heading for Florida right now and who knows better than the Bahamas how powerful that storm really is. Jeanne hit Abaco Island pretty hard and some neighborhoods are under five feet of water right now. Power and phone outages are reported throughout the island. But the eye of the storm is not exactly what you might expect. Matt Lorch of affiliate station, WPLG, reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MATT LORCH, WPLG REPORTER: We have all heard about the eye of a hurricane. This is what it looks like. Take a look, dead calm, and go ahead -- and as we pan skyward, blue sky. This is the middle of the hurricane, the eye of the hurricane. What a change from just an hour and a half ago when we saw the worst of what Hurricane Jeanne, a category 2 hurricane, has to offer. Sustained winds of roughly 100 miles per hour. We saw hard, driving rain. As we pan across the beach front here at the resort where we are staying on Marsh Harbor, you can see that there are a few trees down. There is mostly cosmetic damage, we are told, to the resort.

The main concern here on Abaco Island with this storm was the storm surge. The winds were coming out of the northwest. And the northwest portion of Marsh Harbor, the town where we are staying, is vulnerable to storm surge. Earlier reports said three to four feet as far as the storm surge, sea water right up to the peoples' doorsteps who live on the west side of the island.

We can tell you that at about 6:30 this morning, the phone lines went down. We lost power here on the island much sooner than that, but once again we are in the eye of the storm. We've all heard about it. This is what it feels like. We are now being told that the backside of this storm is heading our way. We expect to see those fierce winds and driving rain once again and we hope to bring it to you.

On Abaco Island, I'm Matt Lorch, now back to you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: Pretty interesting perspective there. All right, Hurricane Jeanne heading for the Florida coast. We are tracking it. It's expected to make landfall in about six hours but our Jacqui Jeras is going to tell you wherever you are, during that storm track, we're going to -- she's going to show you what's going to happen. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: This morning's storm update reminds us once again that every storm is different. And I sincerely hope that Floridians on our east coast will take this to heart. Where Frances was a slow storm, Jeanne has sped up and is moving quickly to our coast. And it's getting bigger and stronger.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: Bigger and stronger, and yet, as you look at that view of the Indian River off of Melbourne, Florida, Anderson Cooper was just telling us that people were driving over that bridge to get to the other side, perhaps even to try to protect their homes. Winds are kicking there at least 40 miles per hour. But Hurricane Jeanne, when it makes landfall, it could have winds in excess of 115 miles per hour. It is too late to evacuate, too late to save your home. You've got to take cover.

In the meantime, we can help you, somewhat, in the meantime. Jacqui Jeras in the CNN weather center tracking Hurricane Jeanne's path -- Jacqui.

JERAS: Well, Carol, we're actually starting to get wind gusts now around 53 miles per hour, very close to that location. So the winds are picking up. You don't want to be driving out there. You want to be hunkered down at this time.

We also have a brand new tornado warning for northern Brevard and east central Orange County in East Central Florida until 7:15. That does include Kennedy Space Center, also Titusville airport, and also Canaveral Groves around 6:55. That storm is moving to the southwest very quickly at 50 miles per hour.

The 7:00 advisory is in a little bit early. Just some minor changes -- the wind speed staying the same at 115 miles per hour. The pressure has actually inched up a little bit. It's gone up a millibar. That's some good news but it doesn't mean that it's not going to strengthen further and that we're not going to see a pressure drop yet before it makes landfall. The speed on this remaining the same, so landfall still expected to be around midnight somewhere between West Palm Beach and Melbourne.

Our primary impacts here, flooding is going to be extreme. Five to 10 inches near the path of this storm. Winds extreme to high impact with hurricane winds extending out about 70 to 100 miles from the center of the storm. Good news on storm surge, even though this is going to be a problem at four to eight feet above normal tide, it looks like it's going to be coming in around low tide. Tornado threat is going to be moderate. There's a tornado watch in effect across the entire area. Power outages are going to be very high in the bright orange area and moderate extending across central Florida and into northern Florida -- Carol.

LIN: Wow! All right, thanks very much, Jacqui.

And that's all the time we have for this hour. But coming up next, it's "THE CAPITAL GANG." And then at 8:00 Eastern, we're going to begin our special coverage of Hurricane Jeanne as it inches closer to the Florida coast. We're going to have live coverage throughout the night. And we are going to be with you when Jeanne makes landfall.

But right now, Mark Shields is here to tell us what the gang has -- Mark.

MARK SHIELDS, CO-HOST, "THE CAPITAL GANG": Carol, Senate Democratic Whip Harry Reid joins the gang to look at the Bush/Kerry confrontation over Iraq and the upcoming presidential debates. We'll also look at Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle's tough re-election fight in South Dakota. All that and the latest updates on Hurricane Jeanne right here next on CNN.

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Aired September 25, 2004 - 18:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Carol Lin at the CNN Center. Welcome to CNN SATURDAY. Here's what's happening right now in the news. Hurricane Jeanne is moving closer to Florida's Atlantic Coast and expected to make landfall tonight. Right now, it's a category 3 major hurricane with sustained winds of 116 miles per hour.
And seven people are dead after an U.S. air strike in Fallujah. Multinational forces say the strike targeted a meeting of terrorists. Supporters of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi were said to be in the building that were hit. However, doctors say some of civilians killed included women and children.

A U.S. commander in Afghanistan expects insurgents to step up the violence there as elections get closer. Lieutenant General David Barnow (ph) says terrorists can't be allowed to destroy the hard work of millions of registered Afghan voters. Elections are just two weeks away.

Keeping you informed, CNN, the most trusted network in the world.

I'm sure you've been watching this throughout the afternoon. This hour, we're going to begin with yet another weekend of preparations and evacuations in Florida. Hurricane Jeanne is closing in and once again, residents are boarding up and packing up. The storm is expected to come ashore in about six hours somewhere between West Palm Beach and Melbourne. Florida governor Jeb Bush is urging residents to seek shelter.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. JEB BUSH (R), FLORIDA: Soon, at some point, the highway patrol will be leaving to go to safety and maybe in the next few hours depending on how the winds pick up. This is not the time to be traveling. The evacuations should have occurred already and now is the time to find a safe place and stay there.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: Well, earlier today, Jeanne battered the Bahamas with ferocious winds and rain. You know that island chain is still recovering from Hurricane Frances, which just passed over three weeks ago. And Jeanne has caused a lot of chaos in Haiti. Take a look at this damage. It struck as a tropical storm a week ago causing massive flooding. The death toll has now passed 1,300 and those who escaped harm are being more -- are becoming more desperate for food and clean water. We're going to get a firsthand account from Haiti, from a Haitian journalist later in this program.

But in the meantime, we have reporters stationed all along Hurricane Jeanne's projected path. We're going to start with our own Anderson Cooper live in Melbourne.

Anderson, you're becoming our hurricane guy.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: It's like deja vu all over again. Carol. Yes, Melbourne, Florida yet again hit. I mean it was hit by Frances on September 5. Now, just a few weeks later, it is going to be hit again. This place is right in the path of this storm. And as you said, Carol, we're about six hours away from when the height of the storm is supposed to be right around here.

Already, the winds are picked up. I mean the winds were starting to the 30 miles per hour range. It's really nothing. But if you look behind me, that's the Indian River, which is sort of like the Intercoastal Waterway between Melbourne and Melbourne Beach. It looks like the Atlantic Ocean already. I mean there are white caps out there. That bridge over will be closed down after winds exceed about 45 miles an hour or so. But that's a barrier island out there, Melbourne Beach and Indian Beach. There are already people who are not evacuating. I mean, this whole area is under mandatory evacuation and there's going to be a curfew in effect.

But there -- I got to tell you there are a lot of people who have decided, you know what, it's just too much hassle. I'm just not going to do it. I've done it before. And I've actually I've never seen it. I mean with the last three hurricanes, that we have been down here covering; the towns have been ghost towns. I mean boarded up, no one around. I got to tell you, there are people walking around the streets here in Melbourne. Domino's Pizza was open until like an hour ago. A few places are boarded up. But I'm very concerned. I got to be honest with you about how ready this town really is for this storm. There are several thousand people, we're told, in the county already in shelters. That number is far lower than it was for Hurricane Frances. A lot of people, Carol, are just sick of these storms and just don't want to move out.

LIN: Yes, but they know from Charley and Frances what can actually happen during a hurricane. So what are they doing? Are they just hanging out in the living rooms tonight or are they actually trying to take some precautions around their homes?

COOPER: Well, you know, that's the problem. I mean with Frances there was such concern about it. It was a category 4 storm. It slowed down a little bit, 105 miles an hour winds it actually hit Melbourne. And there was, I mean honestly, not a lot of damage. I mean it wasn't like Punta Gorda with Charley. So I think a lot of people, they heard those warnings, they evacuated. They came back. They saw their house. You know it was more or less OK, a few shingles maybe missing. And they decided, you know what, it's not so bad. These warnings maybe are a little bit overstated. We're just going to ride this one out. That is a big concern because this storm -- I mean, Frances was 105 and weakening when it hit land. This is 115 right now and may be getting stronger as it hits landfall. So, there is real concern. I mean, there are people boarded up. A lot of homes are boarded. But I'm really surprised and I've literally seen -- I saw some people out jogging about an hour ago. And, you know, you want to roll over and go up to them and say, you know, get off the street, you know, find some place because this storm is coming in less than six hours.

LIN: Right, right. And for all the hurricane -- just in the last six weeks, you know 70 people have been killed in the state of Florida, so something definitely to be taken very seriously. Anderson Cooper, once again, you're going to be very close to this eye of this latest hurricane.

Right now, we're going to move on to CNN's Gary Tuchman in Fort Pierce.

Gary, are you finding the situation there the same? Are people feeling complacent about this?

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Carol, we're in the exact same spot that we stood in three and a half weeks ago for Hurricane Frances. This is the Fort Pierce City Marina. When we were here last time three weeks ago, there were about 75 to 80 boats in the water. They were all destroyed except for one boat during Hurricane Frances for this part of the marina. You can see behind me the wreckage of one of the boats.

The day after the last hurricane, 30 or 40 were piled into this pier right here. Other sunk. They cleaned up much of it, but still, there's so much to clean up and they now have another hurricane coming. Right now, torrential rain in Fort Pierce. The winds have picked up now to about 35 miles per hour.

And here in Saint Lucie County, they're expecting the eye to come close again. It was about 25 miles to the south during the last hurricane. There's a chance it could get even more damage this time. That's what officials are telling the people who live here because obviously, this is a stronger storm. Hurricane Frances was 105 miles per hour winds. This is now 115 and possibly will go higher.

Power is already out in much of St. Lucie County. It was out for the last two hours in many homes. There's a curfew in effect tonight at 8:00 Eastern Time. No one will be allowed outside. They are being warned they're going to be serious police -- they are going to arrest people and take them to jail if they spot them outside. They don't want a possibility of looting or people getting hurt because of the weather.

What's very unusual about this hurricane being back at the same place in three weeks, there's still a lot of damage from the last one. Trees down, light poles down. This marina, you can see fences down, trees down. And now, they know that one of the big issues they're going to face is the damage from the last hurricane blowing around during this hurricane.

Carol, back to you. LIN: Gary, I know it's hard to hear me because the winds are starting to pick up there. I asked you earlier, as Anderson has been seeing people out on the streets in Melbourne even just hours away from when this hurricane is supposed to make landfall. Are people where you are, are they feeling complacent about this?

TUCHMAN: Well, Carol, I do hear you now and I hear your question perfectly. And I can tell you here in the Fort Pierce marina area, which is in the downtown section of the city of 40,000 people; we have seen no civilians walking around. And we saw the same thing last time, no one walking around. People in this area near the water and the Intercoastal Waterway and we're a half a mile from the ocean right now, they have evacuated the area. I can tell you, although, shelters in this area, in Saint Lucie County, last time, they reported 5,000 residents in the shelters. Right now, they're only up to about 2,000, so fewer people have gone to the shelters.

LIN: All right. Thanks very much. Gary Tuchman reporting live there.

Well, our coverage does continue right now with CNN's John Zarrella. He is standing by in West Palm Beach -- John.

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN MIAMI BUREAU CHIEF: Hi, Carol. And just like Gary Tuchman, I'm standing virtually in the exact same spot I was three weeks ago today during Hurricane Frances here in West Palm Beach. Behind me over here, the Intercoastal Waterway, Lake Worth. Across the water there is, of course, Palm Beach. And we have been getting hit now. The weather, of course, beginning to go downhill. Winds gusting here into the mid-30s now.

And one of the things, of course, of big concern is, for example, these palm trees back here that you can see, that's still damage from Hurricane Frances three weeks ago. And, root systems have been weakened on a lot of trees. There's likely to be damage to these kinds of trees that they didn't fall during Frances. Perhaps, with this hurricane, it's certainly stronger. They might do that. And wherever you look, we took a tour out into the Palm Beach, West Palm Beach area a couple of hours before this all kicked up and you could see the debris that still lines the streets along in the West Palm Beach area, not only the debris in the West Palm Beach area, but the blue tarps on a lot of the roofs that are out there. And of course, with this kind of wind picking up, chances certainly are that a lot of people that the blue tarps protecting the holes in the roofs that were caused by Hurricane Frances are going to lose those tarps. And with the steady rain and heavy winds that we're likely to experience here later, they might again be faced with a situation where they have even more damage than they had before.

The streets, of course, deserted for the most part here although just like Gary Tuchman, we've seen joggers out there. We've seen cars on the road. And we're seeing the same thing in the shelters today. It started off pretty slow. There were only a few thousand people in the shelters earlier today. They can hold up to 27,000 people here in Palm Beach County in the shelters but what they had were about 11,000 as of about 2:00 this afternoon. The emergency operation center told us a little while ago that they're already beginning to get phone calls from elderly people who decided to stay and now, they want to get out and they're asking for help to get out. And, of course, with the weather deteriorating as rapidly as it is now, it's not likely that anybody's going to be able to get anywhere to help them in the not too distant -- well, certainly, for the foreseeable future until this thing blows through. A lot of accidents reported on streets. Too many cars, the EOC is telling us. Too many people on the streets, Carol, who don't need to be on the streets but unfortunately, are out there -- Carol.

LIN: All right. Thanks very much, John. John Zarrella reporting live in West Palm Beach.

Our meteorologist, Jacqui Jeras, is tracking the storm from the CNN Weather Center.

Jacqui, we've now seen our reporters from north to south, right about where you've been warning us that Hurricane Jeanne is going to hit sometime in the next six hours.

JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: That's right and I can't emphasize enough, Carol, this is a dangerous storm. This is a major hurricane, a category 3, winds of 115 miles per hour. And the pressure has been dropping consistently over the last six hours. Now, we haven't seen that translate yet in terms of seeing our winds increase but we are likely going to see the winds increase once the hurricane hunters fly back into the storm and take some more measurements. So be aware that this could possibly be a weak category 4 before it makes landfall. And people need to be inside at this time. We're already getting wind reports around 45 miles per hour around Fort Pierce and stemming down towards West Palm Beach. And we are expecting those winds to continue to increase.

These outer bands are now making their way on shore at this time and some of them are also showing signs of rotation. You can see especially within this area, those little swirlies you see are sheer markers, indicating rotation. And now tornado warnings have been issued for Western Indian River County and Okeechobee County until 6:20 for tonight. A tornado watch is in effect for the entire area until midnight. We'll likely see that extended well into tomorrow.

Now, we are concerned about this eye wall and the timing on that. When can you expect it to make landfall? That's what's going to be the worst part of this storm, on the leading edge here. There, you can see Port Saint Lucie right where Gary Tuchman is, coming in at -- just after the 9:00 hour. Down towards Fort Pierce, near 10:00 and then Vero Beach just before 11:00 for tonight. And you could expect those winds to be around 100 miles per hour if not stronger at that time. We're going to see the squalls that are moving on shore right now. Those winds will be increasing as they move through, probably on the order of 40 to 60 miles per hour.

So the forecast track of Jeanne has changed a little bit. It has moved a little bit farther and off to the west. The location that we're expecting it to make landfall is about the same, south of Vero Beach and likely north of West Palm Beach. But it does get much closer towards the Tampa Bay area and almost making a little hook here into the Gulf of Mexico before it continues to push on up to the north and to the east, riding around that area of high pressure.

Here are those winds I was talking about. These are sustained winds, not to mention the gusts. Thirty-one miles per hour in Melbourne, 17 in Fort Pierce, 28 in West Palm Beach. And you can see 25 miles per hour in Orlando.

The forecast winds, you can see them increasing for tonight. The hurricane force winds extend out about 70 miles from the center of this storm and that could expand a little bit as this storm is expected to continue to strengthen and grow just a little bit. And you can see those strong hurricane force winds possibly making their way towards Tampa and to Gainesville and then weakening as a tropical depression as it moves up to the north and to the east -- Carol.

LIN: Boy, it looks like from your map, Jacqui, that just about everybody in Florida is going to be affected somehow by this hurricane.

JERAS: It's a big storm again just like Frances, just like Ivan, about 400, 500 miles across.

LIN: Remarkable. All right, thanks very much, Jacqui, and thanks for being with us tonight and tracking this storm.

We want to go to the area where Anderson Cooper was just reporting from in Melbourne. Brevard County, sheriff's department, public officer Yvonne Martinez is on the telephone with us.

Yvonne, just taking -- just hearing from our correspondents out there covering people who are saying they're not going to leave. They're walking around the streets. The winds are picking up and they just don't care. Do you have a big problem here?

YVONNE MARTINEZ, EOC BREVARD COUNTY, FLORIDA: Well, it's a concern. I can tell you that our shelter population is a lot lower than what we saw during Hurricane Frances. The numbers just for comparison, we have today 3,857 in our shelters now, 3,857. During Frances, we had more than 8,000.

LIN: These people who are walking around, driving around right now, we're six hours away from this hurricane making landfall, can't your officers go and just pick them up?

MARTINEZ: Well, all we can do is advise these people, and we have, that as of right now, we're passed that time where they need to be in their homes, in shelters, and in their safe spot where they need to ride out this storm. We're passed that spot. We are beginning to feel tropical storm forces winds that will be intensifying throughout the evening. Hurricane force winds as early as 2:00 Sunday morning.

So we have a concern because there were a lot of people who didn't evacuate. We feel that they have gotten into this false sense of security because they evacuated during Hurricane Frances, came home, saw that their homes were not damaged so they figured, well, we can ride this one out, too.

LIN: Right, right.

MARTINEZ: But you just can't take chances like that because you're really taking chances with your life.

LIN: Right. You're saying and in fact, just a couple of hours ago, Governor Bush was saying you are at the point of no return, that people who haven't evacuated now have to stay put. But you -- so you are actually saying no matter what the circumstances, an elderly person having a heart attack, a young couple maybe with a baby who decided not to leave and suddenly are panicked, you can't do anything for them right now?

MARTINEZ: At this point, it's on a case by case. Our emergency personnel will not respond once the winds reach 55 miles an hour or above. We're still, you know, marginal. We're having some gusts at that point. But it's unsafe for emergency personnel to respond to those situations. So, you know, when you decide to stay and you panic at the last minute, you're at your own risk.

LIN: Right. We're adults. Yvonne Martinez -- and certainly people have had enough experience in Florida to know what is ahead of...

MARTINEZ: They should know better, yes.

LIN: You bet. All right, Yvonne Martinez, we will hope for the best...

MARTINEZ: OK.

LIN: ...Brevard County, sheriff's department.

Stay with CNN for the latest details on Hurricane Jeanne. In fact, I'm going to have live continuous coverage starting at 8:00 p.m. Eastern and throughout the night. So look for live reports from Florida and our weather center as it tracks Jeanne, as the storm stalks the Sunshine State throughout this night. Six hours, this hurricane is going to make landfall.

Jeanne, in the meantime -- you want to see what Florida is in for? The crisis in Jeanne's wake in Haiti. There are hungry. There are homeless people and they are taking the law into their own hands.

And up next, the violence in Iraq is so routine but not for the soldiers walking the beat. We're going to show you our view from the front lines.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: We're waiting in the next few hours for Jeanne to make landfall on the east coast of the state of Florida, but already, the Bahamas took another blow from Jeanne. It swept through there and the city of Freeport was hit pretty hard. Alexander Williams, Freeport's emergency administrator is on the telephone with me right now.

Alexander, give me an idea of what the status is because you're still feeling a lot of the wind and the rain from Jeanne?

ALEXANDER WILLIAMS, FREEPORT GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATOR: Oh, yes. We have been bombarded by high winds and torrential rain now for the last four hours. We have had reports that came in. Tidal surges have flooded some of our communities. The Grand Bahama International Airport is under water. And we had to evacuate persons from all of the coastal areas into shelters.

We are presently operating some 12 shelters and we have more than a thousand persons in those shelters. Reports -- we are being bombarded now by reports as this onslaught continues of roofs being blown off and collapsing and houses being flooded. And we have to activate our emergency search and rescue teams, which have been at it for the last two hours.

LIN: And added to the last two hours, have they found anybody dead or alive?

WILLIAMS: No, no. We have not. We have not. There has not been any report of anyone -- any loss of life. But, of course, we have to rescue persons with medical troubles that were stuck in houses with roofs torn off. But so far, all has gone very well.

LIN: Anybody missing?

WILLIAMS: No one missing so far.

LIN: So far, you've been pretty lucky then.

WILLIAMS: We have been pretty lucky. We have taken the necessary precautions. We have learned our lesson well over the years and most recently from Hurricane Frances. We were just out of Frances before this one came.

LIN: Right, right. Well, what's going on in the Bahamas is just a preview for us here on the continental U.S. Alexander Williams, thank you very much.

WILLIAMS: You're welcome.

LIN: A very different situation and certainly a very different story when we talk about Iraq. The tick tock of killings and the attacks in Iraq, it takes on new meaning while we wait for news about the hostages and wonder whether even January elections in that country are actually possible.

Now, American commanders tell CNN they are striking hard to stop militants, in particular in Fallujah and Samara. Well, today, 14 Iraqis were killed in separate military operations and 10 others were wounded. And an air strike targeted what the coalition called a known terrorist meeting site connected to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Now, at least seven new recruits for Iraq's national guard were killed and several others were injured in Baghdad. They were being driven through the city in an Iraqi national guard van when it was attacked. They were identifiable.

Moving on north of Baghdad, an Iraqi police captive was killed in a drive-by shooting near Baquba. This happened as hundreds of Iraqis held a Day of Unity convention. The group debated ways to end the violence. What an irony there.

Now, the fate of a British man held hostage in Iraq still remains uncertain today. An Islamic Web site claimed Kenneth Bigley had been killed. But British authorities say that claim could not be verified. A Muslim delegation from Britain is in Baghdad hoping to appeal directly to the militants holding Bigley for his release.

Jack Hensley's family had a memorial for him today here in the United States. Now, he and American Eugene Armstrong were both beheaded by those militants. All three were being held hostage together.

"It was better than it was a year ago." That is a quote. Despite the ongoing violence, that's how some U.S. soldiers see the situation on the front lines in Iraq. Our Jane Arraf is traveling with U.S. troops in Tikrit and brings us a progress report but from a soldier's perspective.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JANE ARRAF, CNN BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): It's a different view at ground level. American soldiers actually fighting the war in Iraq aren't paying much attention to the debate raging over it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Friendly. We came here -- we came here to do a job and like I said the job we're doing is pretty much good.

ARRAF: Sergeant Parker's job is a lot more than getting shot at or shooting people.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I got to take a picture of the store and the...

ARRAF: Most aren't paying attention to politics, either.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a good neighborhood?

ARRAF: Specialist Jamie Rice (ph) from Ohio is turning 21 this week. It's the first time he'll be able to vote, but he doesn't plan to.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's a tough choice right there. I really haven't been able to follow the news at all, so I don't know which way to go.

ARRAF: Soldiers say the streets they're patrolling are safer and more prosperous than they've been. Here in Saddam Hussein's hometown, the 1st Infantry Division spent a lot of time getting to know the people whose city they're living in. First Battalion 18th Infantry Company commander Aaron Coombs stops to talk to a carpet dealer to get his view on life here. He tells the captain that what they need are jobs.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have money. People can work and get money. Life can be better.

ARRAF: It's still dangerous.

CAPT. AARON COOMBS, U.S. ARMY: It's not a daily gun fight here in Tikrit anyway but it does happen. It's still a very lethal place.

ARRAF: Two weeks ago, the company medic was killed near here. But with so much else going on, the steady drip of deaths doesn't seem to overshadow the progress they believe they've helped make.

COOMBS: I think if you talk to a lot of people, even here in Tikrit, somebody who's honest with himself will tell you that things are better although there are problems than there were a year ago.

ARRAF: Most of these soldiers say that makes it worth it.

Jane Arraf, CNN, Tikrit.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: We have also much more on Hurricane Jeanne tonight, which is heading to the United States. We're going to take you to the most deceptive part of this storm, the calm within. We're going to show you actually what's like to be inside the eye of the hurricane as Jeanne makes landfall.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: We're following Jeanne but we also have some other stories across America. For example, the deadly fire in Chicago last night where four kids were killed. And fire officials say there weren't any parents at the scene. A fire department spokesman describes the blaze as suspicious and says an arson investigation; maybe even a murder investigation is under way.

And CBS, the network, is canceling a 60-minute story on the rational for war in Iraq. The network says it would be inappropriate to broadcast that report so close to the presidential election. This on the heels of their embarrassment about possibly using fake documents that were indicting to President Bush's war record.

Also, Oprah's free cars turned out to be pretty expensive. A lot of people who got those free cars during the show's season premier are complaining that the cars are actually going to cost them several thousand dollars in higher income taxes. Since each car was worth about $28,000, that means $7,000 is going to be taxable.

All right, getting back to Hurricane Jeanne, it is on a steady march for the east coast of Florida. Let's check in at the hurricane center where our veteran, Max Mayfield, director of The National Hurricane Center, is standing by in Miami.

Max, what is -- when do you expect Jeanne to make landfill?

MAX MAYFIELD, DIRECTOR, THE NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER: Well, Carol, the center will probably arrive on the coast sometime around midnight. On the forecast track, if it's a little bit of south of that, somewhat earlier. But if it's a little bit to the right, it's a little bit later. But main thing, we're already getting gusts to 47 miles per hour in Palm Beach. The conditions will really continue to go downhill between now and the time that the core crosses the coast.

LIN: Well, give us a perspective on how dangerous this hurricane can actually be given that it's the fourth. I mean that's really what's kind of interesting about it.

MAYFIELD: Well...

LIN: It's not as slow as Frances. It's not as big as Charley. So is it as deadly or more deadly?

MAYFIELD: I think it could be more deadly. Frances that hit, basically this same area a month or so ago, was a category 2 hurricane. This is a category 3 hurricane. The No. 1 hazard will be the storm surge; will likely be four to seven feet near and to the north of where the center is crossing the coast. So we're probably talking the northern part of Palm Beach County all the way up to the Cape. And then on top of that, these very large and dangerous, breaking waves. They have a buoy offshore of the Cape there that had a report to 29 feet here about an hour ago. So when those large waves get up to the coast and break, that's what's going to cause all the damage. Then you have to worry about the winds spreading inland along with the rain fall and some tornadoes.

LIN: All right. So what are looking for? What's interesting to you in the next six hours before it makes landfall?

MAYFIELD: Well, you know, we're certainly hoping we don't see any additional intensification. The main concern here is that the folks particularly on those barrier islands, we hope that they have either been advised of those local thresholds in the mandatory evacuation areas and hopefully, those people have indeed gotten out.

LIN: All right, thanks very much, Max. Max Mayfield, we'll be talking to you throughout the evening, as well as Hurricane Jeanne makes its move. Thanks very much. Max Mayfield with The National Hurricane Center.

All right, we've got much more ahead on the hurricane. We've got reporters positioned all up and down the state of Florida and the best experts on hand to tell you what's going to happen next. Stay right there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: Welcome back. I'm Carol Lin and here's a quick look at what's happening right now in the news. Hurricane Jeanne, that's what we're covering this hour, battered parts of the Bahamas today and is now barreling towards Florida's Atlantic Coast. It's a category three major hurricane and the sustained winds right now are pretty close to 115 miles per hour. And already when you take at these pictures in the Bahamas, it ripped off roofs, it toppled trees, and knocked out power. It's a pretty bad situation.

Now, forecasters are predicting that Jeanne's going to make landfall probably about midnight. I was just talking with Max Mayfield from The National Hurricane Center. It's going to be somewhere between West Palm Beach and Melbourne. But already the winds are picking up. The outer edges, the outer bands of the hurricane are already along the Florida coast and millions of people have had to leave their homes under a mandatory evacuation.

And a week after Jeanne slammed Haiti, the situation there is really deteriorating. So far, more than 1,300 people have died mostly due to the flooding and rioting and looting is also on the rise as people grow more desperate for food and clean water.

There's nothing like a hurricane barreling towards the continental United States that gets CNN's Anderson Cooper out in the field so fast. He is in Melbourne, Florida, where Hurricane Jeanne is expected to pretty close make landfall there -- Anderson.

COOPER: Yes, Carol, conditions are deteriorating actually pretty rapidly. It's funny, about a minute ago, you said the outer bands of the storm are starting to hit the coast. And then when you said that, I heard it in my ear and I thought, what is she talking about. I'm not seeing that. Literally, a few seconds later, boom, we just got this big sort of squall coming in, really the first of the heavy rain just starting to come in. Visibility, I mean, you -- I don't know if you remember, at 6:00, about a half hour ago, you could see the barrier island. You could see Melbourne Beach. You can no longer -- you can just faintly make it out on the horizon. The winds, the visibility is dropping rapidly.

I'm here -- Chad Myers, CNN meteorologist with me.

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: We're doing this again?

COOPER: I know, God, yikes. What are the winds right now?

MYERS: We had 44 just now. We're a little protected right here by this little bit of palm tree here we have. But I'll you what, 44, 45, that's just now getting to tropical storm strength. When you talk about hurricane strength winds, tropical storm strength winds, 39 or better is now a TS. So now we have Tropical Storm Jeanne and soon we're going to get Hurricane Jeanne, then Cat 1, Cat 2, Cat 3.

COOPER: It's interesting because when you and I were out here for Frances, you know -- it seems like just yesterday -- it was September 5, there really wasn't much rain. Do you anticipate a lot of water this time?

MYERS: Yes. There's a lot of water on radar and its' blowing sideways obviously. You can see it on the water just like last time. You could see the island and then all of a sudden you couldn't the island because it was in fog. It probably wasn't fog obviously. It was the rain headed our way. But I noticed -- and I heard you talk about this earlier -- the people here are not taking this seriously. People are still driving to the island to the barrier island over that very large bridge there and I see their lights headed out. It's too late to do stuff now. You can't put up a sheet of plywood at 44 miles an hour. You can't protect your property.

COOPER: And that barrier island, I want to explain to people because the water -- I mean, we were out there in good conditions. The water was 20, 30 feet off from some of these houses. I imagine that beach has already washed away in some places.

MYERS: Well, 6:00 was high tide officially and 1:00 a.m. is low tide or somewhere around 1:00 a.m. So that's going to help as the real eye or the biggest winds get in here. The water's actually going to be trying to recede on its own because of the sun, the moon and the real tides. But obviously the storm surge is going to push that water back up onto the beach.

COOPER: How bad do you think the winds are going to get here tonight, for you and I?

MYERS: I don't think that -- we just talked about a little bit of a right turn possibly with this storm and if that turn right is right here where we're standing will be 130. No question.

COOPER: One hundred thirty mile an hour winds right here?

MYERS: Yes, absolutely. Yes, and it's not going to be pretty. And even though it's 115 right now, it's in that Gulf Stream and that Gulf Stream is so warm. There is no sheer at all out there. No wind blowing the tops off the storm. And when that sheer doesn't exist and that water is warm, the thing gets bigger and bigger. And I think easily 115 and 130. And a couple of gusts even hurricane center forecast saying gusts to 160. Not out of the question right in the north side of the eye wall, so that's dangerous.

COOPER: Right, and people aren't taking this seriously. That's definitely true. I mean still we see people out. I mean literally there are people in sort of flimsy built houses about 20 feet away from where we are right now, you know. And they're kind of just boarding up now. It's, frankly, a little bit too late for that, Carol.

LIN: Yes, a lot of optimism out there in the face of a potential disaster. We'll see what happens. Thanks, Anderson, Chad.

OK, we're going to check in with CNN's Florida affiliate, WJXT, Adam Landau is keeping an eye on Jeanne's approach in Daytona Beach.

Adam, a little geography lesson. We were just talking with Anderson and Chad up in Melbourne. Where are you in relation them?

ADAM LANDAU, WJXT REPORTER: Well, we're up further to the north, about 100 miles, I'd say. And if you want to see something, we can show you behind us just how the wind is really whipping up the surf here. And you can see literally the beach is falling to the ocean. It's amazing to see up and down the coast here as the beach is literally washing away. This, of course, all started with Charley. Then there was Frances and now, of course, everyone here is worried about Jeanne.

There are 120,000 people in the Volusia County around Daytona Beach that are supposed to evacuate their homes. The concern is though that people aren't. And shelters, we're told, a lot fewer people are now there for this storm than there were for Frances. In fact, we talked to people who said, look, we made it through Charley, we made it through Frances, we just can't do it again. We're going to bunker down at home and we're going to do the best we can.

We're expecting winds to maybe reach about 70 miles an hour here. If that happens, you're looking at a lot of the area that would be damaged right along the beach. These hotels have been hit extremely hard. Many of them shut down because of Charley and they don't expect to reopen for several months now after Jeanne. And of course, there are still other storms brewing in the tropics. But once again, you can see just what the wind is doing here and we're only getting gusts to about 25 miles per hour and already, you're seeing this. Just imagine when the worst of it starts to heading our way. We're live in Daytona Beach, I'm Adam Landau for CNN -- Carol.

LIN: All right, thanks very much, Adam.

In fact, parts of Hurricane Ivan just rewrote the coast of Alabama. So it's not surprising what's happening already on the coast of Florida. We've got much more ahead on the coverage of Jeanne. Stay right there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: Well, Hurricane Jeanne was a mere tropical storm when it slammed into Haiti just last week. And considering that it's going to be a hurricane when it arrives here in the United States, take a look at what's going on in that country: massive flooding and chaos. The situation is really bad in Gonaives. You can see the storm victims are so desperate for food and clean water that they're rioting and looting now. And there are plane loads of relief supplies heading to Port-au-Prince, but those supplies cannot get to places like Gonaives because the roads are so damaged and there's still so much flooding. Gang members are also trying to steal some of that aid. I have got a Haitian journalist on the telephone right now. Nancy Roc is in Port- au-Prince.

Nancy, the -- when we look at these pictures and it's hard to believe that there is that kind of desperation. Give me an idea of what you have seen today.

NANCY ROC, HAITIAN JOURNALIST: Well, I haven't seen this today. I was in Gonaives this week, but what you're seeing right now is indeed what is happening right now in the Gonaives. I'm going back on Monday and fortunately, because I have to follow what's going on and young -- the calls that we've been giving of Haitians in the press and everything, unfortunately, this is what's going on every day in the city of independence because I remind you this is the city of independence of Haiti.

And unfortunately, people are not only starving, they cannot get water. They cannot get any food right now. The international aid is really, really thin even though we've had help from all over the world. And I'm sure the country is extremely grateful about all the help that we absolutely need for the people in Haiti. But unfortunately, to get there, it's extremely difficult, not only that people are very thirsty, very hungry and when they distribute -- when the distribution goes on, it's very, very hard...

LIN: Nancy, let me ask you this...

ROC: ...for people to get it. But also...

LIN: ...the United States...

ROC: ...there have been some humanitarian convoys that have been attacked by looters, which is extremely difficult.

LIN: The United States has pledged $1.8 million. Does that sound like a lot of money in a situation like this?

ROC: Unfortunately, that's not, ma'am, because Canada, for example, immediately gave $2 million. The Red Cross gave $3.3 million. You have to understand that, of course, that helps and it's extremely important. But when you have more than a quarter of a million people, this is a city of more than 230,000 people, that's become homeless in one night, overnight. It's extremely, extremely difficult. Plus, we have very -- we are fearing epidemic right now because corpses have been in the water for the past week, human corpses, corpses that are bodies of animals. So we -- this is an extremely difficult situation right now.

LIN: Right.

ROC: And the whole town is underwater and under mud. So we're going to probably have to face an emergency situation and humanitarian situation for...

LIN: You're in it right now.

ROC: ...for the next month.

LIN: You're right. You're in right now. Nancy Roc, thank you very much. She was just saying a quarter of a...

ROC: Thank you very much.

LIN: ... million people homeless. That is like the size of Greenville, North Carolina, here in the United States.

CNN's Karl Penhaul is going to have a live report from Haiti later tonight. He has been at those food depots in Gonaives. He has seen the violence himself. Be sure to tune in our primetime show at 10:00 Eastern.

In the meantime, Jeanne is showing no mercy. It's heading for Florida right now and who knows better than the Bahamas how powerful that storm really is. Jeanne hit Abaco Island pretty hard and some neighborhoods are under five feet of water right now. Power and phone outages are reported throughout the island. But the eye of the storm is not exactly what you might expect. Matt Lorch of affiliate station, WPLG, reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MATT LORCH, WPLG REPORTER: We have all heard about the eye of a hurricane. This is what it looks like. Take a look, dead calm, and go ahead -- and as we pan skyward, blue sky. This is the middle of the hurricane, the eye of the hurricane. What a change from just an hour and a half ago when we saw the worst of what Hurricane Jeanne, a category 2 hurricane, has to offer. Sustained winds of roughly 100 miles per hour. We saw hard, driving rain. As we pan across the beach front here at the resort where we are staying on Marsh Harbor, you can see that there are a few trees down. There is mostly cosmetic damage, we are told, to the resort.

The main concern here on Abaco Island with this storm was the storm surge. The winds were coming out of the northwest. And the northwest portion of Marsh Harbor, the town where we are staying, is vulnerable to storm surge. Earlier reports said three to four feet as far as the storm surge, sea water right up to the peoples' doorsteps who live on the west side of the island.

We can tell you that at about 6:30 this morning, the phone lines went down. We lost power here on the island much sooner than that, but once again we are in the eye of the storm. We've all heard about it. This is what it feels like. We are now being told that the backside of this storm is heading our way. We expect to see those fierce winds and driving rain once again and we hope to bring it to you.

On Abaco Island, I'm Matt Lorch, now back to you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: Pretty interesting perspective there. All right, Hurricane Jeanne heading for the Florida coast. We are tracking it. It's expected to make landfall in about six hours but our Jacqui Jeras is going to tell you wherever you are, during that storm track, we're going to -- she's going to show you what's going to happen. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: This morning's storm update reminds us once again that every storm is different. And I sincerely hope that Floridians on our east coast will take this to heart. Where Frances was a slow storm, Jeanne has sped up and is moving quickly to our coast. And it's getting bigger and stronger.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: Bigger and stronger, and yet, as you look at that view of the Indian River off of Melbourne, Florida, Anderson Cooper was just telling us that people were driving over that bridge to get to the other side, perhaps even to try to protect their homes. Winds are kicking there at least 40 miles per hour. But Hurricane Jeanne, when it makes landfall, it could have winds in excess of 115 miles per hour. It is too late to evacuate, too late to save your home. You've got to take cover.

In the meantime, we can help you, somewhat, in the meantime. Jacqui Jeras in the CNN weather center tracking Hurricane Jeanne's path -- Jacqui.

JERAS: Well, Carol, we're actually starting to get wind gusts now around 53 miles per hour, very close to that location. So the winds are picking up. You don't want to be driving out there. You want to be hunkered down at this time.

We also have a brand new tornado warning for northern Brevard and east central Orange County in East Central Florida until 7:15. That does include Kennedy Space Center, also Titusville airport, and also Canaveral Groves around 6:55. That storm is moving to the southwest very quickly at 50 miles per hour.

The 7:00 advisory is in a little bit early. Just some minor changes -- the wind speed staying the same at 115 miles per hour. The pressure has actually inched up a little bit. It's gone up a millibar. That's some good news but it doesn't mean that it's not going to strengthen further and that we're not going to see a pressure drop yet before it makes landfall. The speed on this remaining the same, so landfall still expected to be around midnight somewhere between West Palm Beach and Melbourne.

Our primary impacts here, flooding is going to be extreme. Five to 10 inches near the path of this storm. Winds extreme to high impact with hurricane winds extending out about 70 to 100 miles from the center of the storm. Good news on storm surge, even though this is going to be a problem at four to eight feet above normal tide, it looks like it's going to be coming in around low tide. Tornado threat is going to be moderate. There's a tornado watch in effect across the entire area. Power outages are going to be very high in the bright orange area and moderate extending across central Florida and into northern Florida -- Carol.

LIN: Wow! All right, thanks very much, Jacqui.

And that's all the time we have for this hour. But coming up next, it's "THE CAPITAL GANG." And then at 8:00 Eastern, we're going to begin our special coverage of Hurricane Jeanne as it inches closer to the Florida coast. We're going to have live coverage throughout the night. And we are going to be with you when Jeanne makes landfall.

But right now, Mark Shields is here to tell us what the gang has -- Mark.

MARK SHIELDS, CO-HOST, "THE CAPITAL GANG": Carol, Senate Democratic Whip Harry Reid joins the gang to look at the Bush/Kerry confrontation over Iraq and the upcoming presidential debates. We'll also look at Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle's tough re-election fight in South Dakota. All that and the latest updates on Hurricane Jeanne right here next on CNN.

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