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Hurricane Matthew's Eyewall Within Miles of FL Coast. Aired 5- 5:30a ET

Aired October 07, 2016 - 05:00   ET

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

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: All right. I'm Chris Cuomo in Jacksonville.

You have Alisyn Camerota in New York. This is your NEW DAY.

Hurricane Matthew is now a reality. It's just a few miles off the eastern coast off central Florida. That will be the western part of the eye. The heaviest winds are on the northern and central part of that eye, and then still have to deal with the calm and next phase of that hurricane.

Here's what we know. It is a category three. That means winds pack at 120 miles an hour, gusts much stronger than that.

They're already having gusts in central Florida over 75 miles an hour. So, you have your combination of wind, storm surge and then rain. Jacksonville, where we are, we came here to be relatively safe so that we could stay on air the entire time that Matthew comes. The advisory has been adjusted. They believe Jacksonville may be the most concentrated hit.

We're about 15 miles in from the shore behind us is the St. John River that feeds off of the intercoastal and the ocean.

The storm surge is expected to be anywhere from six to 12 feet. Right now, we're at dead low tide. There will be another four feet on top of that, that means that water, which is almost right up to the bank now, will be well into the flood area here. Plus, as much as a foot of rain and wind and why there could be so much disaster, so many here told to evacuated, upwards of 450,000 in the immediate danger zone.

However, what's going to happen in Jacksonville isn't going to happen for several hours to come. Right now, relatively light rain and some light gusting. But in Melbourne, in the central part of Florida, it's literally just miles away. This hurricane is moving at a quick enough pace where we're going to start feeling big effects very soon.

So, let's get to meteorologist, Jennifer Gray.

[05:00:00] Jennifer, you are where in Palm Bay, where you're going to start feeling those first bigger effects. What's it like and take us through how it's going to change. JENNIFER GRAY, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, Chris, actually, we're about

14 miles from that outer eye wall. You can really feel the difference. We are actually protected by the back wall of our hotel.

If we were standing out there, I don't think I would be able to stand up, the winds are that strong. In fact, we've had some hurricane force gusts just to our north reported. This eye is just offshore of where we were and that's what we've been talking about all week. It's going to depend so much on exactly how close that gets to shore.

We are extremely lucky that eye isn't closer to where we are than it is right now. In fact, it is just skirting that coastline just as the National Hurricane Center forecasted, flowing it to a T. Of course, we are in the thick of it right now. I think this is probably as bad as it's going to get for us, but it could be like this for quite some time.

And so, just a consistent wind, consistent heavy rain is going to be a problem for the next couple of hours. We are quite a ways inland compared to where we were last night. We had to move for our safety right along the coast.

There's one of the gusts. We're going to expect a lot of storm surge. We're going to expect flooding. Of course, this is far from over, Chris, as you know.

This storm is continuing to head in your direction where you are and look at those gusts behind me. You can see the trees blowing. Incredibly windy here across Melbourne and we are going to see the potential for storm flooding, especially to our north as this storm just parallels the coast, Chris.

CUOMO: All right. Jennifer, we'll check back with you. You know the first prerogative is let us stay safe, let us know what we need to know and we'll come back to you.

Let's head now to Boris Sanchez. He is just due north of where Jennifer is. He is in Daytona beach.

Boris, the situation there?

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Chris, the rain is getting stronger and stronger by the moment. Since we've been standing out here, the lights have been flickering on and off from the street lights. I want to paint a picture of what we're seeing. We're actually just a few hundred yards from the coast and we're seeing the waves get closer and closer to us.

There is a ton of debris already in the streets from palm trees that have broken off. You could see there in the distance, that fence is about to break off and wind up in the street at any moment. There's a ton of trash everywhere.

Fortunately, we have been able to keep the power on for the most part. I just heard from an official who says things are going well so far, but as we're looking at some of these palm trees the way they are bending, you know, we have felt gusts here of up to 60 miles an hour. But this is just the beginning.

So, a lot of this stuff is going to wind up in the street. We're likely to get some flooding here because we're so close to the coast, as that water surges in, especially paired with this rain, it is likely this area may flood.

We are also hearing, as of early this morning, that there are some people who have decided to stand by. We talked to a gentleman last night who said that he was afraid of looters so he was deciding to stay in his home despite these very nasty conditions.

There's a ton of danger out there. There are signs, again palm tree, all kinds of debris that could wind up not only on the street but in your home. That paired with flooding, paired with the power lines we've seen flailing in the wind could make for a very dangerous situation.

Again, so far so good here in Daytona, but the storm is only creeping closer and things will get drastically worse soon -- Chris.

CUOMO: All right. Boris, we'll be checking with you. There are already over 200,000 people without power in Florida. In a place like this, Jacksonville, that's supposed to now be the main target -- this is a bridge city. Those bridges closed down at 45 miles an hour, Alisyn, so if you decided to stay in a place like this, 45 miles an hour, now you can't leave. That's why it's so risky and they want people to get to safety now.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: All right. That's scary stuff. Chris, we'll get back to you in one second.

But we do want to get an update on the hour by hour forecast track. We want to bring in CNN meteorologist Chad Myers.

How is it looking, Chad?

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, best case scenario right now for wind damage because the eye, as Jennifer was saying, is still offshore, but that was always the forecast, at this point for it to be offshore. Does it move inland from here is the key?

Our Jennifer Gray right about there and there is the outer eyewall. I'm talking five miles away, winds would be double what Jennifer is feeling right now. The inner eyewall redeveloping at this hour, kind of fell apart in the overnight hours, this is where that 120-mile-per- hour wind is. So, that's still 25 miles offshore. That's great news.

But the forecast on all the short-range models have the storm moving this way, moving back still toward land. We'll get rid of that and bring it up here for you and we'll go hour by hour. Into motion, you can begin to see that the storm has paralleled the coast, pushed water into the coast.

[05:05:03] So, if this doesn't come onshore, we lose the good news here as we lose the wind damage, we still have the storm surge and flooding damage. In fact, probably more of a storm surge and flooding damage because the storm is going to stay in the gulfstream, it's going to stay in the warm water and not lose strength.

So, as the storm gets to Chris or as the storm gets to Tybee Island, we're going to pile that water up because that's how the water changes and that's how the turn of the Atlantic Coast is going to come into play.

Think about Georgia and South Carolina. The turn of the -- of Georgia goes like this. Well now all the water is piling in under my arm here and that's what we're going to see for the rest of the forecast.

There's the satellite. It's lost its eye but it's coming back at this hour. This isn't over. It's offshore, forecast is still for it to be very, very close all day. The flooding damage I think today is now the key.

We've lost $2 billion in wind damage because the storm is offshore. That's great news. I don't think -- we're not going on the ground EF- 2 tornado o the ground for 200 miles. That is eight miles offshore. That's fantastic. It's not on the shore right now.

Does it turn left, wobble, five miles? We'll have to see.

CAMEROTA: All right. So, there is some good news.

MYERS: Yes.

CAMEROTA: That's good to know, Chad, thank you for all that. But, of course, everyone is still in the danger zone there, including Jacksonville, where it's headed and that's where Chris Cuomo is.

Chris, tell us what you're seeing.

CUOMO: Yes. And the biggest cautionary word is that this is just starting and that's why you can't judge the current situation in terms of what might be the worst. Now, let's go to where the eye of this storm is really going to concentrate, down south from where we are in Cocoa Beach. We have the mayor, Tim Tumulty, on the phone there.

Mayor, now, where you are in Cocoa Beach actually jets out a little bit off the eastern coastline, exposing it even more. What's the situation right now, sir?

MAYOR TIM TUMULTY, COCOA BEACH, FL (via telephone): Well, I'm in the fire station here in Cocoa Beach. We are very comfortable. We built this building about a year and a half ago to withstand this type of event.

Currently, we have 60 to 70-mile-an-hour winds with gusts exceeding that, I'm not sure how fast those gusts are. Quite a bit of rain. I cannot see any water as far as canals or ditches. So, I cannot determine a storm surge. There's certainly no water flowing down the street other than basically from the rain.

And we do have power. I can see throughout the city, we do have power in most spots and I'm sure some areas have lost power. I have no indication of structural damages other than the buildings I see around the fire station are all stable.

From here, basically we were fortunate that eye did move out east just even a couple of miles, I'm sure, saved literally tens (INAUDIBLE) in damage up and down the coast or in this particular area, the state's coast, which is just south of Kennedy Space Center. It looks (INAUDIBLE) as far as getting a direct hit from the eye.

Go ahead, Chris.

CUOMO: So far, Mr. Mayor, do you have everything that you need? Were all the precautions that you took, was it enough? Is there anything in terms of what you're worried about in terms of vulnerability right now?

TUMULTY: Well, I'm still worried that we didn't get enough folks evacuated from here. There is still the -- you know, the issue of storm surge. We've got a lot of canals. We're not just an ocean front.

We also have the river behind us, the Banana River and Indian River Lagoon. And Cocoa Beach has 60 percent of single dwellings are on water, whether that be riverfront, canals or ocean front. And that's a lot of people.

You know, basically directly in (INAUDIBLE) storm surge, what they're predicting nine to 11 feet, that could be serious. From my, you know, basically hurricane, biggest loss of life isn't from the wind, it's from the storm surge and flooding.

CUOMO: Right. You have that combination effect of wind, you have the surge and then you have the rain. We're getting estimates of anywhere from six to a foot of rain depending on which band of the storm you get.

The authorities are saying the damage resulting from that could last days if not weeks. What can you do as the mayor there to help people with that transition period if the effects are bad to worse?

TUMULTY: That's a great question, Chris.

[05:10:00] We set up a command center here at the fire station. We have approximately 50 emergency personnel here, firefighters, police, EMTs and actually even IT to keep us up and running, so we can communicate with everyone in the mainland.

Basically, Chris, until the winds subside down below 39 miles per hour, at that point we can go out and assess the damage, structural damage, take care of folks that may or may -- may be injured and eventually allow folks to come back across the bridge to their homes. And that's -- that's why we set this up. We built this facilities, fire station, about a year and a half ago and -- for a command center and it's working out perfectly so far.

We're waiting for light which is about an hour and a half now where we can actually see more. We have a lot of windows in this building. I can see a block away but I -- it's eerie seeing here and watching winds go by at 70 miles an hour. And basically can do nothing but sit and watch.

CUOMO: All right. Mr. Mayor, you sit tight and be safe. Let us know what information needs to get out. That's why we're here. And we'll speak to you soon. Be well, sir.

TUMULTY: Thank you, Chris.

CUOMO: All right. Alisyn, while we were talking to the mayor we were showing the audience pictures of what's going on in Daytona Beach. You see, the increasing squalls and that's our affiliate, WKMG that's sending us that picture. CNN is very fortunate we have a lot of affiliates here in Florida.

But the concern is now that the eye is close, what rate will it move, how much closer will it come and what will be the toll of this combination effect of those winds, with the surge, and the rain? Alisyn?

CAMEROTA: Yes. Chris, I don't know if you can see the split screen but our correspondent at our affiliate had to take cover because the winds were battering her, I believe, so much. She could barely hang on to the pillar that was on part of the building there. So we can see how bad it is there in Daytona Beach, Florida.

And joining us now on the phone is George Diller. He is a NASA spokesperson. He joins us live from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral.

Good morning, George. Where do we find you hunkered down at the moment?

GEORGE DILLER, NASA SPOKESPERSON: I'm in the emergency ns center at Cape Canaveral and that's where we've been following this storm all night and it looks like it's just about here. It's maybe just offshore from Port Canaveral and Cocoa Beach. The forecast we've got shows that it's going to be within 26 miles offshore of Kennedy Space Center but that's better than the direct hit we were forecasting earlier.

But right now, think this the sustained winds for Kennedy Space Center are going to be about 104 with gusts to 130.

CAMEROTA: And what does that mean, George? If you -- if you have gusts of 130 at the Kennedy Space Center, what's in danger there?

DILLER: Well, the main thing is going to be our facilities and, of course, the ones closest to the ocean are most likely to take damage, but some of the major buildings like the vehicle assembly building he's had a tendency to take some damage in the past, but we think most of our flight hardware such as weather satellite, we've got way for launches in a secure building, as is the Orion spacecraft that we'll be launching into deep space next year, that's a very secure facility.

So, we think from the standpoint of really valuable flight hardware that we're probably safe. Right now, the main effect has been the loss of power around the space center, but we're just on the edge of this thing, so it's probably going to be a couple hours more before we know how much more significant damage we might sustain.

CAMEROTA: Absolutely. And, George, as you're talking we're looking at the satellite on the lower left side of our screen and we can see the yellow which is the outer eyewall and it is headed straight towards you. I know that you say that the forecast has changed so you don't think you're going to be getting a direct hit but it looks at least as though it's just about five ,miles off of Cape Canaveral.

So, you don't think -- you think that you have dodged or are dodging a direct bullet?

DILLER: Well, sort of. The eyewall, the edge of the eyewall is approaching Cape Canaveral, but the center of the eye, which is the most dangerous part, is going to skirt us a little bit to the east which is what we're grateful for. But the edge of the eyewall, that's exactly true, that is going to be skirting us here and our winds will escalate quickly up to hurricane force.

CAMEROTA: When you say that in the past your vehicle assembly building has taken some damage, give us some context, what have you seen there in terms of hurricanes and winds before?

[05:15:04] DILLER: Well, it's kind of varied depending on the storm, but, you know, we've had winds above 100 miles an hour before. I think the worst one we had was Hurricane Jeanne, Hurricane Francis right ahead of that. Obviously, that's probably the ones where we've had the two most significant storms that have given us damage, but I think, you know, in this case we're also watching the possibility of storm surge, which we haven't had before.

CAMEROTA: Yes. George, take care. We hope that you are safe during these next few hours and we will check back in with you. Thanks so much for taking the time to talk to us.

DILLER: Sure, you bet.

CAMEROTA: Appreciate it.

Back to Jacksonville and Chris.

CUOMO: All right, Alisyn.

Actually, let's go down to Alison Kosik. She is by the Disney theme parks there outside Orlando and Kissimmee.

They were all closed so we know you got a lot of families trapped in hotels trying to wait it out, Alison. What are the conditions like there?

ALISON KOSIK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The worst of the storm, Chris, has yet to hit Central Florida where I am. I am standing in Orlando right in front of one of the entrances to Disney and yes, we're finding out that a lot of the hotels are sold out.

It looks like that a lot of Florida residents living along the coast heeded the warnings and evacuated. So, they are hunkering down and just waiting this thing out. The winds are starting to pick up a little bit. The trees are swaying here. Nothing huge. But we're definitely starting to feel the effects of the storm.

There is a mandatory curfew in effect. It began last night, 10:00 p.m. It is going to be lifted 7:00 a.m. on Saturday. The big talk happening here in Orlando, besides the hurricane, is the fact that Disneyworld, for the fourth time in its history, since Disneyworld in Orlando began in 1971, has closed its doors for a full day.

So, Disneyworld is closed all day today. You know, we took a drive around some of the properties outside the properties last night. A very eerie ghost towny kind of feel. All the lights were on, but not a person or a motor vehicle in sight. It was quite eerie.

I mean, you can see around me here, usually around this time of the morning, remember, this is a holiday weekend. This is Columbus Day weekend. It's a huge family vacation weekend. And there's not a person in sight.

Usually at this time of the morning, on a Friday morning, you would see Disney employees going into this entrance, going to work, getting ready for the day. Not a car in sight.

So, we're all going to wait it out here and see how much Orlando gets hit -- Chris.

CUOMO: All right. Alison, the eye of hurricane Matthew is now just few miles off the coast of Central Florida. We're just starting to see the heavier impact and it's going to be lasting for hours and hours to come.

We're going to take a quick break and when we come back, we have people all along the target area. Stay with NEW DAY.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:22:28] CUOMO: Chris Cuomo here in Jacksonville. Look on your screen right now. Hurricane Matthew is making its effects felt. This is Daytona Beach that you're looking at there right now.

You see the wind, you see the combination effect of wind and rain and, of course, there's that tidal surge to deal with, storm surge as well. This is just the beginning. The outer wall of the eye of Hurricane Matthew is now just a few miles off the eastern coast of central Florida.

Throughout this day and into tonight we will see intensifying effects. The advisory has changed for what is now a category 3 storm. That means that you have winds that can pack 120 miles an hour, really turbo charging this combination effect of wind surge and rain.

The target now in terms of the biggest effects supposed to be where we are in Jacksonville, that's a change. We had set up here to hopefully be able to stay on air for the duration of Hurricane Matthew.

So, let's check in with another area in central Florida. We have Dave Waters on with Brevard County Emergency Management there.

What is the situation where you are, sir?

DAVID WATERS, BREVARD COUNTY EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT (via telephone): Well, we just got an update that 100,000 people are without power. That is 100,000 customers in this county, which is 160 miles south of you. One third of the county has lost $ power and that number continues to grow. That is the update as of a few moments ago.

We also have a couple of different house fires that have been burning. And in limited cases we have first responders going out to those scenes. The conditions here are too dangerous with the eye of the hurricane just east of Brevard County where we are.

I'm situated in the Rock Ledge Emergency Operations Center. That is the center for the whole county where the emergency run out of. More than 100 emergency personnel are in here with me. They're the heads of many different municipalities, agencies, fire agency, and the heads of shelters.

We also have more than 4,000 people in the evacuation shelters in the county that is scattered across the 15 shelters we have and that also includes some 400 pets, but certainly a very dangerous situation out right now and we do not have the eyes out there to let us know any reports of what's going on because the conditions are too dangerous for first responders to be out, so about 5 1/2 hours ago, most first responders came off the road.

CUOMO: And so, there's 100,000 plus without power, throughout Florida 300,000 plus without power.

[05:25:01] What are you expecting in terms of a window of urgency here before your first responders can get back out there and try to help people who are in need?

WATERS: Well, the limit that first responders have indicated is 50 miles an hour. When the winds are 50 miles an hour, it is too dangerous for any of them to move their emergency vehicles. There is a serious risk of fatalities there. So, nobody is moving from the county, fire department or from paramedics.

On a very limited basis, though, there are some individual cases on a case-by-case basis like the fires that we reported where there has been some response by crews that are the closest to it. Meanwhile, when there are people calling 911, many of them who now regret staying in the mandatory evacuation zone, in some cases we're having to take their names and numbers and addresses and then say we'll do a wellness check on them when the weather conditions improve enough to the point where they're not potentially fatal.

CUOMO: And we're still on the upside of the slope. Unfortunately, hopefully the number of people who decided to stay behind is small. But we're not going to know that until this is all over with.

What's your biggest concern right now, sir? WATERS: Well, our biggest concern right now is there are power lines

down in many places and we've had reports of live power lines but no crews can go out to get them because of the danger to the crews. In some cases, the power can be cut off to a very limited area, which will isolate those lines, but that unfortunately knocks other people out who may have had power.

That said, with more than one third of the county without power already, that might not necessarily be a bad thing because most people in the southern county, a lot of them at least have lost power. But the serious concern is that we don't want people going outside when there are live power lines because in many cases they're in the water, and that can electrocute those people who are in that area.

CUOMO: All right. Mr. Waters, we're here to get the information that's needed out, so if the situation changes and there are public alerts that need to be had, you know how to contact us and we will check back with you as well. Please stay safe, sir.

WATERS: You bet.

CUOMO: We're going to check in with Jennifer Gray. She's in a portion of central Florida that really is expected to take the early impact here of hurricane Matthew.

Palm Bay near Melbourne, Florida. Jennifer, how does it look now?

GRAY: Yes, Chris, we are in the gusty winds we have seen throughout the entire night. Last I checked we had sustained winds of about 55 miles an hour or 50 miles an hour and gusts around 65.

And so, luckily that eye is just enough offshore to where we are not feeling winds of 100 plus right here. Really, really lucky. It is just paralleling the coast, though. These big storms tend to wobble.

So, just as Chad has been reiterating as well one wobble to the west could mean all the difference when you're talking about the wind. I am concerned about the storm surge as we get to the north where you are, Chris. So, because careful there.

We are experiencing incredibly strong winds where we are in Brevard County just as the gentleman was saying, most people without power here. If something goes wrong, they're not be able to get emergency services to you and so that's why yesterday, when we were along the coast we were talking about how important it is for people to get out of that danger zone. We move quite a ways inland for our own safety protected by this hotel, but we are going to be in the thick of this, Chris, for several more hours before we finally get on the back end, but with that eye just offshore, we are definitely spared those 100- mile-an-hour winds.

With that said, though, winds are incredibly gusty, a lot of flying debris, even with gusts of 65, 70 miles an hour on the coast and even right along the beach, the gusts are going to be even stronger. The closer you get to that eye, the stronger those winds are going to be. And so, luckily we're able to broadcast. If that eye was a little closer to us, we would not be on television right now. So, it's actually positioned just perfectly where we can bring you the latest and still be out here, Chris.

CUOMO: All right. Jennifer, do me, if you can, stay with me for a second longer. We just got a new update from the National Weather Service getting gusts in Cape Canaveral of about 100, 115 miles an hour.

Take us through why the combination effect of the wind and the surge and the water and the rain really winds up upping the stakes for people as this continues.

GRAY: It's a horrible trifecta, to be honest. Winds in 100-mile-an- hour plus winds, that's telling me it's wobbled a little bit to the left or it's just continuing on the northwest track getting ever so close throw Cape Canaveral because Cape Canaveral kind of sticks out of the state. It's that notch that sticks out to the east.

So, if you have 100 plus mile an hour winds, you also have incredible amount of storm surge with winds wrapping around from the north and east heading into the west, heading onshore, that's what we were talking about, that incredible amount of storm surge, storm surge seven to nine feet, in some places, 11 feet.