Milton Wreaks Damage, Destruction on Florida
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All right, just before 6 a.m. here on the East Coast, a live look at Hillsborough County, Florida in the Tampa area. Police beginning search and rescue efforts ahead of daybreak. Officials in Tampa are expected to hold a news conference any moment now to give an update. We will, of course, bring that to you live as it happens.

Good morning everyone, I'm Casey Hunt. It's Thursday, October 10th. It's wonderful to have you with us, but we do continue to cover this difficult breaking news this morning. Hurricane Milton hammering Florida with life-threatening floods, extreme wind and deadly tornadoes. In St. Petersburg, a one in 1,000 year rainfall. The storm dumping at least 18 inches of rain on the area.

Stunning footage from the Tampa Bay Rays baseball field, the roof of the stadium ripped off by the storm. It had been housing thousands of first responders. And this. Holy s*** is in the building.

A crane collapsing into the side of a building, leaving debris in the road. Currently, more than 3 million people are without power across the state. The powerful storm slamming into Florida's Gulf Coast as a Category 3 hurricane before weakening to a Category 1 as it made its way east across the state. Dozens of tornadoes touching down across Florida, including in St. Lucie County, where the sheriff says multiple people were killed.

Our area is not used to seeing any kind of tornado activity. We had one tornado pop up. It actually struck our sheriff's office, taking out a 10,000 square foot red iron structure that was housing all of our emergency equipment in preparation for Hurricane Milton. Shortly after that, maybe 20 minutes later, all of our alarms have gone off. All the messages came out there. Our deputies reported at least visually seeing six tornadoes on the ground.

All right, until the sun comes up this morning on Florida, the full damage from Hurricane Milton is still unclear. Let's go first to Isabel Rosales. We find her in Plant City, Florida, where water rescues are going on right now. Isabel, what's the latest? Casey, I am in Plant City. This is the eastern portion of Hillsborough County. This is an area that...

is not used to seeing flash flooding like this. Not at all. This is inland. So what's happening is that people are waking up this morning blindsided, surprised to find themselves suddenly trapped, like we saw at a Holiday Inn not too far from here. I mean, look at this. Look at the

how high the flood waters are and how it's raging in some areas here by, I think this is a creek right here. So the Holiday Inn, we were just there where an amphibious vehicle from HCS, so the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office, just picked up

up two customers there who were trapped, had some mobility issues. They couldn't get out because the entire parking lot, the hotel was surrounded by these floodwaters. Cars were under the floodwaters. So they put them in that vehicle and got them out into dry land, into safety. HCSO is now going through so many of these calls, trying to see who is in need of help and ordering them by priority. We know that in the northern part,

of the county. There is an assisted living facility with 100 plus patients, people that are using wheelchairs, people who cannot, they're bedridden and need help. They're in complex medical situations. So we know that there's another vehicle out that way providing them help as we speak right now. So the sun, Casey, is not even up and we're starting to get our first understanding of the aftermath of Milton

And of course, the biggest priority is getting to these lives and rescuing people and getting them into safe situations. Casey. - Right, and as you note, of course, these were people who had done what they were asked to do because it was so far inland, as you just spoke a couple minutes ago with the sheriff there of Hillsborough County. Isabel Rosales on scene for us. Isabel, we'll be back with you throughout the hour. Thank you very much for that report.

Let's go down to Clearwater, Florida, which is dealing with a one-two punch. The city saw a record storm surge from Hurricane Helene. Now, of course, the fallout from high winds and flooding rain from Hurricane Milton. Joining us now is Clearwater Mayor Bruce Rector. Mr. Mayor, thank you very much for being with us this morning. What can you tell us about what your residents are facing at this hour?

I feel like we've received a direct hit from Hurricane and when you combine the two hurricanes that came through terrible storm surge, which we've talked about two weeks ago and then last night, Hurricane force winds and heavy rain which caused flooding in places which normally don't flood and clear water and throughout the county. And then you saw the wind damage is South of here in Saint Petersburg on the baseball stadium. And as I.

I drove my cars a short distance from my hotel to City Hall this morning. There were trees down everywhere. Many of the trees damaged by wind, as you might expect, but also we had trees collapse because the ground was so wet and saturated that the trees collapsed.

So, Mr. Mayor, what can you tell people who are just waking up this morning who may unexpectedly be needing help to do at this point? And what are your first responders doing at this hour?

We're reaching out and we're going to return any calls that we get, hopefully. And I haven't heard yet that we've had to rescue anyone from a dangerous situation yet. But we had a lot, a lot of elderly who were in shelters and I'm sure they are very uncomfortable. And I'm sure with their medical needs and being in a uncomfortable place that our families

Firefighters, our EMTs are working very hard this morning to assist them. All right, Mayor Bruce Rector of Clearwater, Florida. Mr. Mayor, thanks very much for your time this morning. We wish you and all of your residents our best. All right, let's go now live. Of course, officials in the city of Tampa are going to be holding a press conference very shortly to give an update on the damage. We're going to bring that to you soon. In the meantime, we're going to continue our breaking news coverage of Hurricane Milton next, where

where we're seeing scenes like this. Roads in Fort Myers Beach looking more like rivers overnight due to storm surge and flash flooding. And in just a few hours, Governor Ron DeSantis and FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell plan to hold a press conference to give an update on the damage.

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All right, welcome back. Officials in the city of Tampa now holding a press conference with an update on the damage from Hurricane Milton. Let's listen in live. Any trees or wires down, call and report those, and we will get them fixed as quickly as we can. We survived through Milton. We can't lose anybody in the aftermath, so please be careful out there. Next, I'm going to bring up Chief Barbara Tripp.

Thank you, Mayor. And once again, as Mayor stated, good morning. Just want to thank all the first responders who have started responding to calls. As the Mayor stated, because of the when we had to cease service,

for a couple of hours. It was very dangerous for first responders to get out there. But during that time, we did make a rescue of where a tree fell onto a home and did head injuries to individuals that were transported to the hospital. As the mayor stated, we had over 100 calls that came in. We are responding to those calls. And within that timeframe, we had a couple of fires that took place within the city of Tampa.

Our crews are out there assessing those fires and making sure that there is no other damage to any other structures nearby. Throughout the night, some of the calls that was coming in, like she said, was down power lines, minor medical calls, and a lot of fire alarms. Each one of those calls will be evaluated, and our crews will respond to those calls.

Now, we talk about damage assessment. It's that time to let the experts get out and do damage assessment to the areas before you go out. We don't want no one to create any more injuries to be able to pull the first responders into the area to respond. Some of the conditions we won't be able to get to. We still have flooding in certain areas, and once again, we will not be able to get the responders to those areas.

Power is out throughout the city of Tampa and many residents. We know a lot of residents have generators. We want you to follow the manufacturer's instructions when you start the generators. It must be in a well-ventilated area. Please do not put it in your garage or inside your home, and do not let the generator get wet.

Only plug in the important appliances that you need to plug in for safety and do not use candles, especially unattended candles. Candles does cause hazards, fires, and once again we don't want anyone to cause any additional disasters that's going to cause the first responder to respond and if they cannot get to your location.

We want you to be vigilant when it's time to turn your power back on when TECO give the word that your power because we do have certain surges that take place and can cause other fire hazards. We want everyone to be safe and as the mayor stated, let us get out, do the assessment before you go out and create more damage or injuries or situations where we won't be able to help you. Now I introduce Chief Burkhall.

Thank you, Chief Tripp. Our city has endured a lot and our city is a very resilient city. After preparing for Hurricane Helene and recovering from that, we were preparing for Hurricane Milton. And I want to commend everyone out there that heeded the emergency evacuation order. Definitely saved lives.

And as you know, over a dozen police officers had lost their homes, but still came to help the city during Hurricane Milton.

As Chief Tripp mentioned, she had a rescue of a house where a tree fell on it. We also had a rescue earlier in the evening last night. We were dispatched to a call where 15 people were in a house where the tree had fell on the house and water was coming in the house. There were children in the house and we were able to get officers out there safely and rescue 15, including young children, and take them to the Pizzo Elementary School.

shelter. We will provide video of that later for everybody to see. That's just one example of the hard work and the great first responder efforts that are out there saving lives. It is imperative that everybody stay inside and do not drive out on the roads. We have hundreds of calls of power lines down, we have trees down, and we are out there actively making the city and the streets safe. So please stay indoors until we give you the all clear.

And again, we are in this together. We will be safer together if you heed our warnings and stay in and stay off the road. And next I'll bring up Maribel for our Spanish translation. All right. We are continuing to listen in to this briefing from Tampa officials here on the latest on

on Hurricane Milton. But we want to go now to the National Hurricane Center, where we find Michael Brennan, who has been tracking the latest for the storm. Michael, good morning to you. You were with us, of course, yesterday morning as well. Help us understand what we saw from this, because it seems as though Tampa was spared the worst of the storm surge that was

predicted. But of course, they're now dealing with flash flooding further inland than expected, as well as this damage from wind, including ripping the roof off that baseball stadium.

Yeah, I mean, unfortunately, Casey, we've seen Milton play out pretty much as expected as we went from landfall through the substantial impacts we've seen all across much of central Florida overnight. Yeah, you're right with the center coming in south of Tampa that pushed the worst storm surge down into places like Venice and down into Sarasota County. But the flood, the flooding that you saw in the Tampa area with 18 inches of rain in St. Petersburg, greater than 15 inches in some locations.

really puts a lot of water everywhere anyway, regardless of whether it's coming from the bay or from the sky. And then they got into that northwestern eye wall where we saw some really intense winds and they were in that eye wall for quite some time. And you've seen the damage. You've seen the wind damage with gusts 90, 100 miles per hour across portions of central Florida, still substantial winds.

ongoing along the Florida East Coast this morning. It's still a very dangerous situation across much of Florida. It's important to remind people that we lose a lot of people after storms in these types of major hurricane landfalls. So we want people to be safe in that post storm environment. Don't go out and about. It's dark. There's damage. There's flooded water. There may be power lines down. Don't be going out until your local officials tell you it's safe to do so.

Yeah, a really critical reminder. What are you watching for, especially in terms of, I mean, we saw some significant tornado damage in Port St. Lucie, reports that people have lost their lives. What may we still be looking for there?

Well, the tornado threats largely passed, I think, at this point. But, you know, what we're looking for this morning is, you know, sustained hurricane force winds and the hurricane force gusts along much of the east coast of Florida. Still seeing storm surge this morning, heavy rainfall. There's ongoing flooding. So still multiple hazards playing out that are going to continue at least through the morning and into the early afternoon hours. All right. Michael Brennan at the National Hurricane Center. Sir, thank you very much for all you do every day and especially today. Thanks so much. Thanks.

We're going to continue our breaking news coverage as Hurricane Milton marches across Florida. Up next, the roof of Tropicana Field, home to the Tampa Bay Rays, blown off during the peak of the storm. The facility was housing thousands of first responders.

All right, welcome back to CNN's live breaking news coverage of Hurricane Milton, which has been churning across Florida overnight. Now more than 3 million customers reportedly without power at this time. We just heard a breaking news update from the mayor of Tampa, Jane Castor, as well as other officials there in the Tampa Bay area. Tampa was spared the worst of the storm surge,

But officials there did want to warn residents to stay inside as search and rescue operations continue. As the sun comes up here, they don't want people out in the streets putting themselves at risk as they try to repair power lines and deal with other hazards.

Let's go with this hour to our Victor Blackwell, who has been up through the night covering this storm from Orlando, Florida, where, of course, it turned through after making landfall just south of Tampa, really very close to Sarasota, Punta Gorda, Florida. Victor, tell us what you saw through the night and what we expect as the sun starts to rise.

Yeah, through the night we saw some pretty strong winds and we saw some heavy rain just like the rest of the state. Now the peak we saw from the winds was about 74 miles per hour. That registered at the Orlando International Airport and gusts were

I added the worst that consisted around 40 miles per hour. You can see now that the wind is almost stopped. It's just a soft breeze. It's not even really registering in these trees behind me and just a drizzle. But that could change at any time because two to three inches more of rain are expected for Orlando and central Florida over the rest of the day. So this event is.

as it relates to the flooding that's potential for this part of the state is not over. We just checked in. You talked about those more than 3 million customers across the state who are without power here in Orange County. That number here is getting closer to 100,000 at 93,000 right now. Just about 90 minutes ago, we were at

less than 50,000. So those numbers are piling up here in Osceola County, less than half that number at about 35 to 40,000 customers without power. I just spoke with a woman in the lobby here at the hotel who had just, you know,

Woken up and she had now just checked her socials, called her neighbors, and she's from the Sarasota area. And so good news for her that her power, although was out, that they didn't lose, the trees didn't damage anything. So she's got good news. And you see that the wind now picking up again.

and maybe the rain coming with it when these bans come in on the backside with the left of Milton. But so far for Orlando, we're waiting for an update. They're holding for a little later this morning in Orange County as well to give us a clearer, fuller picture of those calls for help after the flooding, the trees down, and some of the calls they're responding to.

Overnight, they took a few hours pause because the winds were just too strong to get the vehicles out. But they are out now and we'll get some some info from them about what the the legacy of this storm will be for central Florida.

Victor, I know that there was a lot of discussion ahead of this storm about how this might impact the theme parks. A lot of people know Orlando is the home of Walt Disney World, of Universal Studios. I know you had said earlier in our broadcast that you spoke with a couple from, or a family from the United Kingdom who was stranded here. Do we have any updates on the parks themselves in terms of damage, or what else have you heard on that here as this has unfolded?

Yeah, the parks, they shut down starting about 1 p.m. yesterday. The Disney parks started shutting down in phases and throughout the afternoon they shut down as well. And likely, they said at the start of this, that they'd be closed today. So Wednesday and Thursday a closure. We've not had any reports of any significant damage or flooding from the parks. We expect there will be an uptick.

date or an all clear from them on the backside of this weather event. But at this point, we've not heard from Disney, from Universal, from the others here, SeaWorld, any reports of any major damage.

Victor Blackwell for us this morning. I'm sure we'll be back with you shortly. Victor, thank you so much for being there. Let's turn now, though, to Hillsborough County, Florida, Sheriff Chad Chronister, who we, of course, spoke with yesterday as this was bearing down. Sheriff, thank you so much for being with us this morning. I know you had spoken to my colleague, Isabel Rosales, just a few minutes ago, really, about search and rescue operations that your team had underway at a hotel and also at an assisted living facility. Can you give us an update on how those missions are going?

Yeah, they're going well. I have to tell you what, there's so many trees and power lines down that we have to literally cut our ways into these neighborhoods to be able to assess just how damaged they are. We're on the east side of the county. It's high and dry. It's our agriculture part where we grow all our berries. They've never seen this type of flooding. Two to three feet. I don't know if you can see over my right shoulder, but there's so much damage.

rain now, so much flooding, so much water that's going in the drain now that there's actually a whirlpool that's being created. Up on the north end of the county, again, another dry portion of the county. It was so deep at a assisted living facility that we needed to do some rescues, that we needed our airboat.

Back out here to the east side of the county with our sheriff, if you can see my left shoulder, our amphibious vehicle. We did a rescue there. We're going back and forth to a hotel. Out here, they've lost power. They're standing in two to three feet of water. As you can imagine, they're quite traumatized. I'm sure. Sheriff, what is your message to those who seem to be safe, are okay right now at this hour, but waiting to get outside and assess the damage?

Please be patient with us. These roadways are too dangerous. Coming out here, we had to change our route three different times because of downed power lines. It's too dangerous. I know everybody wants to try to get out. Please, we will give you the all clear. I'm giving you a warning. I'm playing with you. Hang tight for just a little bit longer until we can assess what's safe and unsafe.

And Sheriff, how would you characterize this? I mean, you've seen storms before. You mentioned, obviously, that this is an area of your county that doesn't typically see flooding. But I also know that the worst of the storm surge did seem not to hit Tampa Bay, as many feared. How does this stack up to other disasters you've worked through?

Yeah, last storm two weeks ago, Hurricane Helene, we had seven feet of storm surge and there was a lot more damage. And there's a lot of flooding in South Tampa, around Dana Shores, around where our airport is in the south portion of our county. That's the usual suspects where they flood.

but we've never seen this kind of flooding. We were spared. Our prayers were answered. We didn't get this ungodly storm surge that's so deadly, but we have a lot of flooding and almost 600,000 people without power. All right. Well, Sheriff Chad Chronister doing the Lord's work. We'll let you get back to it. Thank you very much for your time this morning. I appreciate it.

Thank you. All right, let's go now to Sarasota, Florida, where the mayor of Sarasota, Liz Alpert, joins us. Madam Mayor, thank you very much for being with us this morning. I know Sarasota in many ways took the brunt of Hurricane Milton. What are you learning about those you represent, your residents at this hour?

Well, from our first in team, just, you know, our first cursory look, the biggest thing that we've seen so far is the westbound bridge going out to Lido Key. The small bridge, not we've got two different bridges. It's our small bridge is compromised. And so we have to keep that shut down until the FDOT comes.

can assess that. So we have not been able to get out on the island and from what we can see there's water out there. But the mainland is actually not bad. The coastal areas seem to be pretty dry. I'm in a building just across the street from the bay

And the water actually did not come over the seawall and onto the road and didn't come under our buildings. So that was good news. But they're telling me we've got water.

tons and tons of trees down everywhere, large trees, lots of lots of vegetative debris, but did not get any calls for rescue and don't see a lot of property damage. Now, again, it's dark, it's early, power is out. There's no street lights where I am. There's no stoplights where I am.

And, you know, a lot of that's why I'm kind of halfway in the dark here. Part of my some of my lights work, some of them don't.

And so overall, we're hoping it's much better than we thought, but again, we can't get to the barrier islands yet to see what's happened out there. - Well, that's certainly concerning, but I'm glad to hear that you've yet to have calls for rescue. That seems very promising.

Madam Mayor, very surprising. Yeah, for sure. Madam Mayor, I know you spoke with the president, Joe Biden, yesterday. Can you tell us a little bit about what you talked about there and how you expect federal officials to respond to what's happened?

Well, he he wanted to know, you know, how we were doing and, you know, wanted to know if there was anything we needed and to let him know if we did gave me his phone number. And, you know, so it was very gratifying to hear directly from the president. It was very surprising when I picked up the phone and said, this is President Biden.

So, you know, we've been getting the help we need from the federal government. A couple of days ago, I got a call from Secretary Buttigieg said, you know, you know, they're possibly transportation dollars if we need anything like that. And, you know, so I've been really, really happy with how they've been just very helpful.

Making certain that we have what we need here in Sarasota and moving forward with all of the disaster assistance that we'll need. And Secretary Scott also gave me a call. So we feel like they noticed us here and they know we need help.

Madam Mayor, as you try to assess the damage here as the sun comes up, one major issue is, of course, going to be restoring power. You talked about how yours is partially out. How big of a job do you expect that to be? And what can you tell your residents about how soon they may be able to expect that their lives will start to return to normal on that front?

- I don't know, but I know, you know, FPL is, you know, is out. They were some, you know, they're part of our first in team that goes out to look and assess the damage. Part of what will hinder them

to get the job done is because of the trees across the road and we're talking about really large trees so it's not like you know you can just clear a few branches and the roadways work so but that's what they're working on initially is just trying to get the major roadways where people can pass through and of course fpl trucks can pass through

All right, Sarasota Mayor Liz Alpert for us this morning. I know you've got a very long day ahead of you, so I really appreciate you taking some time to talk to us this morning. Thank you, Casey.

Thanks. OK. Joining us now with what all of this recovery is going to look like is Craig Fugate. He is the former administrator of FEMA. Sir, very grateful to have you here. I just want to start with your kind of observations, understanding of the task at hand here for first responders as we watch this storm move kind of off the coast. It's now sort of affecting northeast Florida.

uh florida we of course avoided the major storm surge that people feared the worst fears were not realized in tampa but the winds for this a storm were very very intense what's next well as you start to hear the search and rescue teams and the emergency responders are starting and they're working basically as soon as conditions permit so they started on the west coast they'll be working their way through central florida over to the east coast

And that's the first stage is getting there. Find where you got heavy damages. See if there's any search and rescue. You know, we're hearing that 911 is up in many places. So that should give us some indication that people are needing help being able to call in. But again,

The next stage, I think it's the hard one, and that's for everybody that's been in their homes while the storms passed over and people that evacuated. There's going to be this urge to get back quickly, and my my advice is don't. If you're home and you're safe, stay there. Stay off the roads. It's very dangerous if you've evacuated.

Stay where you're at because there's still a lot of hazards that got to clear, and it's going to take a little bit of time. While all this is going in place, FEMA is working with the state. They're looking at the types of damages and assistance that's going to be required. Again, as the governor makes these requests, FEMA is going to be positioning to be able to support those needs. And for a lot of this is going to come down to people who didn't have insurance.

And we start getting reports of damages. Yesterday, we were here and seeing the impacts of the tornadoes. And as the sun comes up, we'll see what kind of physical damages we're seeing from this storm as it's crossed the state. Craig, you mentioned people staying in their homes. I've heard others say that sometimes when we do lose people, it's in the aftermath of these storms. I mean, what are the most dangerous things that people should take extreme care to avoid at this point?

Well, you know, I was the director in Florida. We got hit by four hurricanes. We actually saw greater loss of life after the storms. And they really come down to falls, carbon dioxide poisoning from running generators too close around their homes.

Fatal car crashes when people are driving through areas where there's no traffic signals, there's debris. There's really, in many of these areas, just so many different hazards. Downed power lines, which people may not know if they're energized or not. And drownings. Surprisingly, you know, people in their homes are okay, but when they get out and they start driving or moving around, they fall into or drive into areas that are flooded, not realizing how deep it is.

So it's extremely dangerous. The emergency services folks are busy enough. So the thing we ask people is stay home.

If you need to get out and do some emergency work, fine, but be very careful. In fact, rather than getting so started today on starting to make repairs, just check in your neighbors and make sure everybody's okay. And if you've evacuated, stay where you're at because it is not safe yet to get back into those communities. As local officials say, okay, it's safe, go back, but don't go back immediately. Just give them some time to get things cleared up this morning.

Craig, we saw an incredible explosion of misinformation, conspiracy theories in the wake of Hurricane Helene to the point that one Republican congressman in North Carolina had to put out this press release debunking line after line after line of things that were not happening. How does that kind of thing impede first responders? And what would you say to people about where they should get their information in the wake of this?

Well, it just takes a lot of energy to try to correct that information. The best source of information in this type of response is always going to be your local officials, your local mayors and county commissions. They're going to have the most accurate information. And I wouldn't depend upon a lot of folks that are using social media and what they call influencers for your news. I'd get it from your local officials. As FEMA assistance is being turned on by President

FEMA will be clearly communicating that. And again, it's all kinds of rumors about FEMA assistance. The biggest thing is if you're an area of impact and you've been declared, you register with FEMA. First thing they're going to say, do you have insurance? And if you have insurance, file your claim and see what's left. We know that a lot of people have flood damage that don't have flood insurance. We know a lot of people are going to have immediate needs.

And FEMA will be there to support that. But the biggest thing I tell people is your best source of information on what's going on in your community is going to be your local officials. All right. Craig Fugate, former administrator of FEMA. Sir, very grateful for your time this morning. Thank you very much. Thank you.

All right, our breaking news coverage of Hurricane Milton continues next. As we go to break, I want to show you a moment just after landfall. It shows you how strong the winds were for our colleague Anderson Cooper, who was in Tampa when it hit. The water now is really starting to pour over. If you look at the ground, whoa, okay, that wasn't good. We'll probably go inside shortly.

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All right, welcome back to CNN's breaking news coverage of Hurricane Milton as it churned through Florida overnight. I'm joined now on the phone by Jonathan Petromala. He is a storm chaser who saw filmed the

the aftermath of Hurricane Milton in the Tampa Bay area, including the roof of Tropicana Field. It is the baseball stadium where the Tampa Bay Rays play. Jonathan, thank you for joining us here. Tell us a little bit about what you saw throughout the night, how you got the video that we are all looking at right now. Just a remarkable scene.

Surreal, really. Again, I live in St. Petersburg, so this is just a few minutes from my house, and everyone who sees it is just in awe because it shows really the force and the power of the winds from Hurricane Milton. And that was really the story in the Tampa Bay area. Most of the week, the big concern, of course, was the storm surge. But since the storm made landfall just to the south of the Tampa Bay area, that

that catastrophic historic storm surge didn't pan out. And that's great news for the Tampa Bay area. Not as good of news, though, for south of essentially Siesta Key, which is closest to Sarasota and south of there. And that's where we spent most of our night, where we documented storm surge in areas like Venice and Port Charlotte.

All the way down to Fort Myers, and there's a lot of damage most likely that's going to be caused by that storm surge in that area, similar to what we saw just a couple of weeks ago with Hurricane Helene here on Florida's west coast, which brought in, to this point, record storm surge. So it's going to be another cleanup. It's a one-two punch, and you just have to feel for everyone on the coast that's just dealing with one after another hurricane this summer.

Indeed, you really do. And of course, you a resident there. I hope your loved ones are safe and sound at this point. Can you take us to Siesta Key, what you saw in terms of some of the worst damage, the worst storm surge overnight? Again, we're still really waiting for the sun to come up in some of these areas.

Yeah, so there's a couple things we have to battle for once the sun comes up. Unfortunately, here in Florida, the state, the governor has requested a total flight restriction. So essentially, it makes it almost impossible to be able to show folks what has happened. And that's going to really hinder us as journalists to be able to show exactly the impacts. And I feel like it kind of is a control of the narrative. So it's an unfortunate situation. But

So while the overnight hours we saw the storm surge coming into those low lying areas in areas like Venice, that was on the southeast quadrant of the eye. So that's where the largest part of the storm surge came in. It didn't appear that the highest numbers that were issued by the National Hurricane Center, the 15 to 20 feet storm surge. I don't know if those numbers are going to verify just what we witnessed. We saw about seven feet or so of water in those low lying areas.

still enough to cause catastrophic damage, major damage to homes and structures and businesses. We saw water well over the hood of cars. But again, we can't quite get into those areas at that point, especially when the storm surge is coming in. It's too dangerous. And now with daylight, we aren't sure how far we're going to be able to get. Typically, we could use tools like drones, like we are able to show you with Tropicana Field and give you a perspective and an idea and

and show you the reality on the ground. But unfortunately now, starting at 7:00 a.m., because of Governor DeSantis' decree, we're not going to be able to do that, at least for 48 hours. And that's an unfortunate situation that we're going to have to deal with now with Hurricane Milton, especially with so many people that have evacuated. And they're just really at the edge of their seats, wanting to see what the hurricane has left behind. And just clarifying, this is the governor, Ron DeSantis, who issued this order?

This is an order from the state. So the order in a TFR essentially means that you can't fly. You can't fly a helicopter. You can't fly a drone. They're going to say that it interferes with rescue operations, which clearly there could be a conflict when you have helicopters coming in. But it also interferes with our ability to show folks back home. And it's going to be a difficult situation.

return for people as well. Gas has been a problem now for three days when the mass evacuation occurred. It hasn't gotten better. The gas hasn't returned. There's a lot of gas stations that if you go online and you look to see which gas stations have gas,

They don't. And so it's going to be a really complicated return for folks. And again, it's going to be a mad rush for people to get back. They're not going to be able to see ahead of time what has happened to their properties because it's going to be more difficult for us as journalists to be able to gather that information now. And it's going to be difficult for them to even be able to get back because of the gas situation. So while the hurricane is gone, the problems that it's created is far from over here in west central Florida.

All right, journalist Jonathan Petromala, based in St. Petersburg, Florida. Jonathan, thank you very much for that.

And of course, we have been continuing to cover Hurricane Milton throughout this morning. This historic storm carving its way through the heart of Florida overnight, spawning deadly tornadoes and catastrophic flooding. Millions are without power. We're only just beginning to grasp the scope of the devastation. Let's get to our Victor Blackwell, who has been in Orlando all night long. Victor, what did you see overnight? What are residents there grappling with now?

Well, we just heard from the mayor of Orlando, Buddy Dyer, who says that although the winds have calmed and the rain is taking a break, this is not over. He's asking everybody to shelter in place, continue to stay where they are. I mean, Buddy Dyer was here for Ian two years ago. He was here for Charlie 20 years ago. So he knows that.

hurricanes and how they can impact this community. We're expecting to hear from him and EOC officials with more detail later this morning. While we're waiting to get a clearer picture of what it looks like here in Orange County, I checked with officials right next door in Brevard County, straight east here from Orange County. They've got more than 70 miles of coastline in Brevard County. Cape Canaveral is there, Cocoa Beach.

87,000 or so customers without power and a report of a tornado touchdown there as well. No report of injuries according to county officials. We're still working to get some clarity from Cocoa Beach police about that tornado that touched down, some damage to infrastructure.

They did have to evacuate some people from an apartment building for some localized flooding there as well. A little more than 500 people who went to shelters in Brevard County, far fewer than the thousands who went to shelters here in Orange County, about 2,600 here.

about a thousand in shelters in Osceola County, which is straight south. So those people possibly will be able, once the sun comes up, once their communities are searched, will be able to go back to their homes. But as you talked about with Jonathan just a few moments ago, everybody's waiting for the sun to come up. We're getting just glimpses through these reports from local officials that

of what calls they got overnight. And we'll get you more from Cocoa Beach as soon as we can get details on that tornado that they say touched down there. All right. Our Victor Blackwell for us this morning. Victor, thank you very much for that. Let's go now to our meteorologist, Derek Van Dam, with the latest on where this storm is as it, of course, turned across Florida overnight. Derek, what are you seeing now? Yeah.

Yeah, it maintained its category one status even as it exited off the Cape Canaveral coastline. You can see the spin right there still gusting tropical storm force in Daytona Beach northward into other areas near the Georgia Florida border. But it dumped a lot of rain. This is a big story that we need to highlight here because that swath of pink that you see there is 10 inches plus.

In St. Petersburg alone, where they clocked in over 18 inches of rain, a foot and a half of rain in a three hour time span, they received over three times their monthly average rainfall totals. That is incredible. That's why we're seeing the unfolding flood that is taking place across the central parts of Florida. Now, there's still flash flood warnings for some of these locations as well. Daytona Beach, Deltona.

population there just over 750,000. And with that wind coming onshore on the backside of departing Hurricane Milton, it is still bringing the storm surge threat right here, three to five ft extending as far north as Georgia. This is incredible. As the storm sliced through the Florida Peninsula, it knocked down trees. We have multiple reports of

power outages because of those fallen trees, 3 million plus customers without power. And then you heard Victor talk about the tornado that we're trying to get some more details in southern Florida. This is in advance of Hurricane Milton's rival. The outer rain bands caused over 126 tornado warnings, which is the most tornado warnings ever

issued in one day across the state of Florida. And here is one of those just incredible video spottings of the tornado crossing a major road here in southern Florida.

Casey. Just remarkable video there. Derek Van Dam Forest. Derek, thank you very much. And we are going to continue our breaking news coverage tracking Hurricane Milton next. And as morning dawns in Florida, people begin surveying the damage in St. Petersburg, a mangled mess after a crane collapses into an apartment building. One witness said it sounded like a train crash.

All right, welcome back to CNN's coverage, breaking news coverage of Hurricane Milton. In just a few hours, Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida and FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell will hold a press conference to give an update on the damage from Hurricane Milton. And in Tampa, the worst not yet over, high tide in Tampa just minutes from now.

7 a.m. Officials there warning it could flood all over again. Let's go now to Tampa, Florida, where Pinellas County Commission Chair Kathleen Peters joins us now. Kathleen, what are you bracing for as the sun starts to come up?

Well, it's mostly assessing damage. We have 410,000 people without power here. Many, many power lines down, trees down as you expected. Of course, you've reported about Tropicana Field. Our biggest issue, I think, right now is in St. Petersburg. They've had a main water line burst, which is affecting five hospitals, 22 ALS, and nine dialysis centers.

So we're doing everything we can to bring resources in to move those patients if we have to move them and ensure that we have additional dialysis centers available for people that need those services. What have you been looking at in terms of needing to rescue people throughout the night as this has unfolded?

So I have not gotten that report at this time. I did get the report that they were not allowing emergency crews at some point when the winds were over 100 miles an hour to be going out for rescues. But I apologize, I don't have those numbers yet. I don't think the rescue numbers were as high as we expected.

But most of our rescues has been hospitals. Our Largo HCA hospital had flooding in the basement and they were having power issues so we had to move patients and get other resources there. So it really is those most critical that we focus on. - So at this point, the hospital rescue is really your preeminent focus here as you're waiting to assess more?

Yes, the lack of water supply is a big issue for those hospitals and the ALS in the nursing homes. So getting that water line fixed and ensuring that those patients have the resources they need to ensure that we meet their medical needs and the safety.

All right, Kathleen Peters of Pinellas County, very grateful for you to take us, for you, to you for taking some time with us this morning as I know you have so much ahead of you today. All right, thanks to all of you for joining us this morning. I'm Casey Hunt. Don't go anywhere. CNN special coverage of Hurricane Milton and the rescue efforts across Florida continues now.

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