hurricane hermine makes landfall. >>laura: it's back to a tropical storm now but we're still watching the wind and storm surge, potentially deadly flooding as the last feeder band rules through. we have crews stationed all over the tampa bay area to keep you up to the minute and good mornin lmood>>russell: and i'm rhodes. the center of the storm is far too our north but we are really feeling the effects of it from here and up north this morning. let's get to dave in center. he's been here since early this morning, watching the storm. but first, i'm sorry, we're going to get to vanessa. wow. you've been busy, too. >>vanessa: we have a lot of flooding, a lot of crashes this morning and a lot of debris signals out so we want to touch on the big crash of the morning so far southbound here, i can say i-275. this is in the area near bird street. we're seeing traffic moving a little better here. looks like they've opened up at least one lane, possibly two at

we actually had a tractor trailer crash. we're hearing from f.h.p., hit the guardrail, some fuel pillage in the area. extensive cleanup will be underway in the area. avoid, if you did. looks like you can take florida or nebraska instead. we'll talk about some flooding. if i'm not talking about your specific area, i will get to you. pinellas county, sre acr completely impassible workers and residents in the area and also retrstricted acce to stell isle. west of alternate 19, south of curlew road in the dunedin area and also flooding reported alternate 19 closer to tarpon springs. that's going to be closed completely with the work around being u.s. 19. flooding reported here along some of the beaches. gulf boulevard, 155th to john's

bayshore drive, 143th to 140th. work around here is 75. as i mentioned as we go throughout the morning, we'll check on other flooding spots and other flooding problems. >>dave: we've always known that the west coast of florida prone to storm surge and that is going to be a big issue this morning. it is up in citrus county, too, up around crystal river. we got reports, and i've even seen pictures. you've got stop sign. water up the pole to just below the sign. they just came off the high tide. secondary $ spekt of what's going on is all of the rainfall. a couple of spots i want to touch on is from dade city to zephyrhills on 301, extremely heavy rain and within the rain bands, we're getting winds that have been gusting to 35 to 40

less than that but think about this for a second. the ground is saturated. the ground is soaked. with wind gusts likethat, it wouldn't take a lot to bring some trees down, especially tree limbs. you have srm tt made landfall hours ago and is now in geor let's go to the land o lakes area. they're getting very heavy rain with that little band of thunderstorms moving through the area, down to lutz, citrus park you'll catch the tail end of do have a bit of a break over the gandy bridge, over south tampa, over pinellas, you look off to the west and from clearwater south, notice gettine onshore and now, we're also seeing that same feeder band produce the copious amounts of moisture and rain from bradenton down through sarasota. more scattered activity in manatee county and polk county

i-4. i do want to tell everybody, tweeting those pictures in really helps us out because it gives us an idea of a, where to send crews, where to tell people where to avoid. if you can safely get those in, we really encourage that. again, safely. i don't want you outside in the middle of this. in fact, hillsborough county put a tweet out earlier saying, stay off the roads. just stay off the roads until all of this water has gone down. i know y of reports of what's going on as well. so we'll get some pictures together and show this to you in a few minutes, okay? >>russell: see you in a bit. thank you. it's 6:04. you could hear it on the roof, maybe even kept you up overnight. inches of rain falling as part of tropical storm hermine. we are feeling it up and down the west coast. >>laura: and u.s. coast guard has stopped all maritime traffic along the coast in response to

this applies to everyone. reaction -- recreational, commercial. people are in the water that need help. swimmers should stay clear of any beaches if they need to be told that. that until local officials say the water is safe. >>russell: high tide this morning is making the impact more pronounced. >>laura: if you live in a coastal area, be safe. walter allen is live for us at ben t. davis beac it's been choppy, windy and rainy. we're not sure if the worst is yet to come or not. >>walter: the hope is the worst has already come and gone, at least that's what it seems like. let me show you the storm surge going on. we're not seeing as high of waves as we were earlier this morning. we are seeing anywhere from two to four feet waves over the seawall here and it looks like it's going down. another couple of observations we've made, a couple of

hit and the hit a half hour or hour ago, the water is not coming up as far as it was earlier this morning. earlier we actually -- ruelss you made a good pot. we needed toack the car because the water was getting so close to the vehicle. that's goo point. it looks like we're over high tide. the water is startin r a lile t rain is not coming down, if at all. th only moisture we're feeling is the wavesrash ihe that's good news for motorists heading along the courtney ca we're not seeing the 40-mile-per-hour gusts we were seeing earlier this morning, but the wind is whipping around. if you're in a high profile vehicle, make sure you have time to give yourself plenty of space between you and the vehicle to the front of you or side of you. russell? laura? >>russell: we'll see you in a few minutes. thank you. >>laura: we were also watching for evacuations right now. shayla reaves is live for us in

leave their homes. good morning. >>reporter: yeah. good morning to you. at last check, we found out that at least 20 people have been evacuated from their homes. according to pasco county emergency management. still, the work is not over for the first responders, the pasco county firefighters, pasco county sheriff's deputies out and about in the high water vehicles, trying to rescue people trapped inside of their homes. i want to take you right to this this is video captured overnight as firefighters assisted an elderly woman navigating through that water, trying to get to higher ground. this happened here in hudson beach overnight. fortunately, she was able to get out okay but stories like this one, they've been playing out not only here in hudson beach but also in green key beach. two areas where low lying conditions have found more people wanting to not stay in their homes now but get out of

pasco county emergency management throughout the morning, working to gather the latest information to pass along to you. i'll be back with another live report in the next half hour. back to you. >>laura: all right. thank you. and for the second day in a row, schools across the bay area are closed in all coastal counties except sarasota. districts will likely have to make up the days at the end of the school year and the schools in sumter county are closed. the interr counties including polk, hardee and highlands un today. >>russell: for the latest on the evacuations, cancellations and all things hermine, just go to fox13news.com. we've got it broken down by county on our home page. just click on the place where you live. and you can also get the latest on this storm from your smart phone. just download the skytower radar app. you can see live radar. it's free on the app store and google play store.

>>laura: just about 6:09 now and experts say hurricane hermine will make it harder for the state to fight zika. >>russell: it could serve as a breeding ground for mosquitos. >>laura: and making matters worse, the department of agriculture tested zika samples from miami beach. it's the first time the tests confirmed that zika is in florida mosquitos and this is a discovery that opens up the possibility that they are breeding in the wild. so in response department of health is planning to aggressively expand testing and outreach efforts in miami beach. mayor of miami says the news is disappointing but he's not surprised by the outcome of the tests. >> as soon as we found out there was a possibility of positives, we have a certain protocol that we follow in miami dade county mosquito control along with the department of health about those protocols. they are being followed as we

disrupting efforts to keep mosquito populations under control. the planes are grounded right now. the cdc has recommended spraying the helicopter instead. >>russell: and listen to this. head of the cdc is putting more pressure on congress to fight zika. the directo ss they're almost out of money. they've spent $194 million to combat the virus. congress has yet to act. they're still in recess. senate majority leader mitch mcconn when senators return to capitol hill next tuesday. for now, officials are asking everybody to do their part. that means draining water from open containers, be sure to scrub away mosquito eggs. they can sometimes form a ring and that's important because fresh rain allows any remaining eggs to hatch. >>laura: there is so much more to cover with what is now tropical storm hermine. >>russell: alcides segui is making his way to crystal river.

with the panhandle where hermine laid landfall. more on this incredible video and nasa's reaction to it. >>jim: heavy bands have been making their way onshore. hard hit this morning throughout pinellas, hillsborough, up to pasco county as well. you can see more rain is working its way onshore down towards manatee county, sarasota, you're starting to see

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>>russell: yeah. we've good all kinds of things coming out of the woodwork. this appears to be a python in a bucket. shane sent us this picture. he's in treasure island.

he said it scared the life out of him. >>laura: i'm sure it did. >>russell: among other things, i would imagine. wow. >>laura: these coastal areas, things have been tough this morning and last night. from st. petersburg, we had the mayor. please remain indoors. too many trees and power lines are down and there is severe flooding in many parts of the city. >>dave: you see me looking away because i'm looking at twitter. you were here in 2004. we were sitting here and we didn't have twitter. >>russell: you're right. >>dave: and it's been such a tool for us this morning to help out and for a lot of people out there that follow me on my facebook page or jim or whatever, since we're on the air, it's hard for us to update. we're relying on a lot of viewers to send pictures to us. >>jim: and get that instant feedback.

probably flooding in so and so neighborhood, but then when i get the picture in, it brings it all home. i want to talk about the radar first, jim. we still have a feeder band of moisture and it's just persistent. i can tell you that for citrus county along the coastline, your issues are the storm tides. that's your big problem. going down to sarasota now, you're getting heavy bands of rain coming in off the 15 to 20 inches of raie had in pinellas jim. >>jim: it's just absolutely amazing. you know, going into this event when we were talking and forecasting five to 10 inches of rain and we would see some areas 15, you know, and they just seem like astronomical numbers and you see, do you know what? it was maybe even a little underdone. >>dave: we had reports of 15 to 18 inches of rain. >>russell: that's unheard of.

today and then wednesday. remember, wednesday morning. that's what i'm saying. it's only a matter of time before the flooding. >>russell: 15. wow. >>jim: s wednesday we've had 15, 18 inches. that's a foot and a half of rain. >>dave: and we're zoomed in here on pasco county right now. we still have a flood warning out until 7:15. you're looking at dade city. dade city southward on 301 is that driving rain right now and the inches of rain they had overnight and going back to the southwest where every time it stops raining in pinellas county, it starts raining again in pinellas county. >>jim: it comes back worse. they get the small breaks in there, and the breaks are not long enough to help really alleviate the situation whatsoever. you can see down towards the sunshine skyway bridge, starting to see yet more heavy rain working its way right up the bay. but from indian rocks down

pete beach, you've got the rain heading right back over you. longboat key, anna maria into bradenton, heavy rain. we haven't seen as much rain to the south but now, you're starting to get more of this developing down to the south of us into manatee county, sarasota. you're starting to see -- you have to see as the loop goes on, they start out as little small showers and they just blossom right up. >>dave: you can only imagine as the sun comes going to get worse. we're going to get more showers until we push everything out of here and let's talk about these photos. here is one of david lee hopper. you can see a carport down in citrus county. they've seen gusty winds overnight. >>jim: and we're starting to get more damage photos in. you see carport down in citrus county. we were talking about this to the north, that's where you're going to see the winds a bit stronger. you're going to have the problem with the storm surge. this over in plant city so eastern hillsborough county, you

there. it looks like a metal roof there. obviously some wind damage and this one interesting. you can see the top panel. remember the barricades? you can only see the top of that panel there taking it from the front of his house. heavy, heavy rain. all across the area, we're seeing parking lots, roads, lawns, everything is just completely underwater and there, yet more damage over in plant city. see how the roof is right off? >>dave: and safely, if you have these pictures, safely send them to us so we can pass them to everybody. we want to show people, we can tell you all day long it's flooded here and stay out of the way and this is and that but we see pictures. maybe i should just stay back for awhile and let this situation right out. your enhanced satellite, where the storm itself is onshore, it's been moved to a tropical storm. it's a tropical storm with winds

to thk, it's like having a wet towel and it's just wringing out the moisture on top of us. that's the best way to describe it. you get all this rain coming down and there's nowhere for it to go because you're getting the intermittent high tides a couple of times a day and those high tides are pushing all the water in where typically the rain water would go out. tides are beginning to go out afternoon, we're going to go through the same process again. maybe not as bad as this morning, but we're still going to have those above normal high tides for later today. so 35 mile-per-hour wind gusts. these are current wind gusts. brooksville, leesburg 33, 29 in lakeland, 22 in brandon, 29 in st. petersburg, 30 in venice. get you an idea that especially when you get some of these heavier bands of rain, you're getting these gusty, gusty winds

about these wave heights? right along the coast, seven to eight feet. as the tide is going up and you're pushing some of that water, you have no doubt we're getting some coastal flooding, especially in areas to the north. i saw some higher storm surge earlier this morning. time is 6:21. are we going to take a quick break and then come back to vanessa? we're going to vanessa right now. >>vanessa: we're seeing a lot of incidents and as i've reminding folks, i'll try to get to as many different areas as possible. we want to show you the big crash at 275 at bird street. looks like lanes are finally clear, traffic back up to speed. that's excellent news for folks. we have reports of a tree down on the interstate. 275 northbound near the 75 junction pasco, looks like traffic will be passing northbound on the shoulder. use caution in that area. also use caution here.

bridge is open but we've gotten some reports of maybe some ponding or flooding on the roadway of some sort so use caution here, make sure you're slowing it down crossing the water here. you won't be crossing the water over the sunshine skyway bridge. that's closed due to high winds at this hour. we have some flooding reports here to get to out of hillsborough county. sligh avenue at river boulevard. looks like that is underwater at this point. avoid. alcides segui reported on his hillsborough at sheldon roads, got some flooding there. south tampa drivers, bayshore boulevard, that's closed from bay to bay to platt. channelside impassible from ashley. dale mabry at san miguel and manhattan, lots of flooding. northbound drivers on manhattan, watch out from inner bay to gandy. just the northbound lanes seem to be taken up with water. if you want a full list, check

at fox 13 traffic. >>laura: thank you. on to other news now at 6:22, incredible video of the space x rocket that exploded on the launch pad at cape canaveral. >>russell: the blast shook buildings more than four miles away. it happened during a routine test of a falcon nine rocket. it was carrying the $195 million satellite designed to provide the f program to africa. the launch was scheduled for tomorrow. the explosion won't impact plans to launch a spacecraft next week. we're going to go live to the florida panhandle. hurricane hermine made landfall, breaking an 11-year hurricane drought. >>laura: and we have more in just a minute. [ fly buzzing ] did you know people can save over $500 when they switch to progressive? i got your nose!

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>>laura: welcome back. 6:26 now. florida's 11-year hurricane drought is over. >>russell: hurricane hermine

big bend area. apalachicola got a direct hit, right? good morning. >>reporter: good morning. yeah, they got hit pretty good here. hermine was just off the coast here. it hit in saint mark's an hour and a half east of here but they got hammered pretty well. all things considered weathering the storm very well. i'm on a boat launch. you can see there's a little flooding but keep in mind the tide is coming in at this time, too. i talked to police here in apalachicola and they said aside from a few branches down and power lines down, they didn't get a ton of damage and they were able to stay on top of that overnight. let me show you some video we did capture last night. this was about 11:00 or so as hermine was coming onshore. lots of wind obviously, whipping through some boats that were

downtown appalapalachicola. the storm surge definitely a concern for the coastal town but aside from a little bit of high water here, not a lot of damage here in apalachicola and that's good news for those in franklin county. russell, laura, back to you. >>russell: it looks worse here than there. dave has a reason for that. we're talking about that. coming up at 6:30, fox 13's coverage of now tropical storm hermine continues. >>laura: and we have crews all over the area. shayla reaves is live in pasco county. we have alcides segui who is headed up to citrus county to take a look at damage there. we have crews all or the place. >>walter:walter. >>laura: walter allen is over at ben t. davis beach. >>russell: shore acres?

>>dave: it is 6:32. hermine is a tropical storm causing problems up and down the west coast of florida. lake tarpon canal, now, in the last 72 has received almost two feet of ihi i'm sighing because there's more rain coming down now but at the same time, this water has got to go somewhere and all those rivers, creeks, streams, eventually those are going to start to come out of their banks if they haven't done so already. largo 15.27 inches of rain.

now, it's still raining and the reason is, we have this feeder band. you've got a tropical storm in georgia, but a band of moisture is still pushing all of this water onshore and you're getting these intermittent thunderstorms and within some of these thunderstorms and let me start up around dade city because they're still dealing with very heavy rain. it's been about 30, 40 minutes of heavy rain in dade city. i'll bet they picked up at least an ih spots exacerbating the flooding issue in pasco county. we still have that flood warning for pasco county until 7:15. further south and west, here comes another thunderstorm complex. really, right into the oldsmar area which just picked up eight, nine inches of rain the past couple of days. that's moving eastward toward citrus park, lake fern, town 'n' country, carrollwood, all of these areas are about to get

rain and even southern pinellas, you're getting heavier showers. guess where that's moving? over the howard frankland, over shore acres into south tampa where we already have some issues with some flooding in south tampa this morning. now getting into the act, we have bradenton, down through sarasota, some of these heftier rains and they're moving from southwest to northeast as well. i mean, that's just the current radar picture and to the north, we're better. to the south, we're better. but it's just metro area, this is where we've had our problem. let me back out. you see the band of moisture, thunderstorms out in the gulf. let me see where it's all moving. yep, onshore. until we pull this fetch of moisture out of here, we'll be in and out of this all morning long which means more issues on some of the roadways. so that's a look at the radar check, some rainfall togethers we've seen and of course, you've got the gusty winds to go along with this. i know that causes problems on some bridges amongst the other

morning. right? >>vanessa: particularly the sunshine skyway bridge. that's the big one we see closed when we see strong gusts and that remains closed. we also have reports of just some general weather concerns along the howard frankland bridge. i'll show you a live picture of that in a sek. the bridge, the howard frankland, that is still open. ybor, we have reports of downed power lines at 18th street. you'll want to avoid this area and liveir and this is a good time to remind folks in general as you make your way out the door or on the roadways, should you have to, treat any wires you see down as if they were live. we want to make sure that everybody is safe and we don't get any injuries right now. here is a live -- or an updated live here from pasco county sheriff. they tweeted this picture out. this is 19 and ranch road. you can see lots of standing water there. it appears as though from what we can tell from this shot,

it looks like they're making waves as though they're moving. it looks like it might be passable but just a reminder as well, if you're unsure of whether you can make it through with your vehicle, do not chance it. we're getting some indications of roadway obstruction. it could be debris, flooding but we have some delays here u.s. 19 and i would use caution in this area. likely could be flooding because we typically get flooding reports around here in this general location so avoid if you i want to kind of catch up to speed with some crashes we've been dealing with. this comes from north port police. 75 southbound direction a couple of miles south of toledo blade, this is a fiery crash you can see involving a tractor trailer. we have a single lane apparently blocked off. you can see delays here and southbound 75, this crash in pass ing lanes.

reports out of the south tampa area, particularly around gandy, west shore, manhattan, sunset. we did send crews out to those locations which are apparently still reported by authorities as flooded but our crews are reporting that the water has gone down in those areas. we can't speak to bayshore. we have not checked that area out. bayshore is still reported closed from bay to bay to platt. >>russell: thanks. >>laura: inches and inches of rain. between that and the high tide disaster. it still is. streets are flooded, neighborhoods are underwater, schools are cancelled and if you don't have time to leave home, avoid driving. don't go out the door. we heard from st. petersburg mayor kriseman, stay in. too many trees and power lines down. hillsborough county sheriff's office -- >>russell: and csx saying don't drive usnles you have to. this storm surge is pushing flood waters into people's homes and forcing them to shelters.

county, that's where shayla reaves is this morning. good morning to you. >>reporter: good morning to you. we've been able to make our way to the beach here at hudson beach, florida and you can see the area where i'm standing just a few short hours ago, this is an area that was underwater. we continue to see the flood waters recede but in some of the neighborhoods nearby, that is where people are waking up, they'll likely see their streets turned into rivers in some as that water continues to flow down those neighborhood streets. in fact, we were here throughout the morning as some of the folks were trying to evacuate from their homes. you're seeing video captured during the overnight hours. many of them were just trying to get their belongings to higher ground. we watched as well as firefighters helped an elderly woman get to safety. she had been inside her home, was trying to get to higher ground as well. throughout the overnight hours,

management, they have been busy. there have been pasco county firefighters out, pasco county sheriff's deputies out and about in those high water vehicles working to rescue people who maybe didn't leave their homes initially but are now in a position where they're ready to evacuate. we've been in touch with them throughout the morning. at least 20 people have been evacuated. others they're maintaining contact with, calling every 15 minutes, a dispatch supervisor calling them every 15 minutes to check in, and once the conditions allow, they will get those first responders in to bring those folks out of their homes and to an area shelter or a safer place. so this is still active, still ongoing. the water fortunately is beginning to recede. some of the folks tell me they are worried. while it's receding now, they could see the water come back up again. they're concerned about high tide bringing some additional water in. i'll have another live report

shayla reaves, fox 13 news. >>laura: thank you. >>russell: it's almost 6:40 and we have several reporters checking out the damage throughout tampa bay this morning. citrus county. >>laura: a lot of homes and businesses are completely flooded this morning and the rain is still coming down. alcides segui is live for us in crystal river. he just arrived on scene a few moments ago. how are things looking now? we heard from josh who got back to the news room an half ago and he said things were really bad. have they improved at all? >>reporter: they have. most definitely has improved. the water is subsiding. of course, the high tide was at 5:30 this morning but thantarting to slowly come down and i'll tell you, we just arrived on scene maybe five minutes ago, if that. you can see where the water used to be and how it's starting to come down. i will tell you, we're on the

it's still flooded. it looks like a river. you really can't miss it. what you're looking at right now is, from what i understand, 44. actually, that's 98 and 44 is just behind you. that's about two feet of water on that roadway. like pickup trucks, you know, taller pickup trucks are making their way down. i saw a man that i don't recommend at those every once in awhile, a person on a bike who decided to go all the way down and he also made it, thankfully. but that truck you're seeing there with the flashing yellow lights is power light. they're trying to restore electricity in this area because as you can imagine with all of this water and the bad weather, it has caused power outages around this area and, you know, again, it's dark but i'm not too sure what you can see. towards your left of that truck

caution lights, there is an auto sales company back towards the back end, there are three cars, a silver one and two white ones and the one to the right of that, you can see how deep the water is. the water is almost to the headlights so in perspective, about two feet, possibly more than that and you can see now the truck coming through and you can see how deep it is. so residents have been dealing with a wristal river area, that storm sushlg causing between five to seven feet. that's according to the sheriff's office. when we pulled up a short time ago, there was a family that was evacuated from their homes. we hope to talk to them and hopefully you'll hear from them coming up in my next hit so hopefully in a couple of minutes. back to you. >>russell: wow. that's a lot of water. see you later on, man. >>laura: we are watching the

rolling in. >>russell: charley belcher is live for us in south tampa where streets are flooded. >>laura: and dave and jim will be back in a minute with more on

>>dave: jim weber and i have been here all morning and really a couple of things that are an issue this morning. number one, storm tides. they were so high last night. we're seeing residuals from that, county but it's still raining and we have thunderstorms and you've got heavy rain moving over spots that have seen 10 to 15 inches of rain since wednesday morning. so that's a problem. dade city under a flood warning. in fact, all of pasco county is under a flood warning. it continues to rain, albeit moderate now in the dade city area but you've had just wave after wave of rain this morning. you go back on 52 where it

raining since almost i walked in this morning and notice the heavier showers, too, around land o lakes and then going southward down to the lutz area. pinellas county, lake tarpon canal, i don't know exactly where that is. 22 inches of rain in the past 72 hours. 22 inches of rain. more rain in pinellas county. this is the courtney campbell, the howard frankland, both gusty winds going all the way down 19, 275, through pinellas county and it looks like i know we have flooding in shore acres this morning. you've got another round of heavy rain heading into that area. as you go eastward, you're all the way to plant city where we've been showing you pictures of some damage that they had overnight at plant city. southward on 39 it's been raining on and off all morning long. and about an hour or two ago, we

throw moisture onshore from bradenton to sarasota. i mean, look at this heavy rain and how about the lightning strikes as well? that will give you an idea of some strong thunderstorms with the persistent rain band just moving onshore and just this area alone, radar frame we're looking at, we've got about 100 lightning strikes this morning. copious amounts of moisture. this tropical, this feeder band is not moving much. see how it's going all the way to the southwest? the problem moves, we're going to be in and out of this mess all morning long. and i want to bring in jim now. i want to show you some -- we want to talk about some pictures, jim, we've been getting into our twitter page. >>jim: just amazing picture there. you look at the picture and you're seeing, i don't know if

ditch. and that's a big concern when you're driving with these flooded roads. you can't tell where the road stops and the ditch srt ortly w water. why do we you all the time? >>dave: brandon, if you're watching, can you tell us where this was you saw this? obviously an issue we want other people to avoid. i don't know where in the area that is. please send it to us. we just want to >>jim: and obviously, we'll see many areas where we see the same hazard. we had widespread flooding in with the copious amounts of water we've had, all of these little landmarks, those are gone. this along the river. notice how you did that 30 second exposure. it's still very dark outside but you can see heavy, heavy rain, lots of flooding.

strong wind gusts. the wind gusts inside of these cells moving i the morning hours alone, we're still seeing winds gusting over tropical storm force. you can see a rather large tree. it looks like it's been snapped there, basically right at the base. >>dave: we're seeing a lot of damage along the coast. this picture coming from north lakeland so a inland locations and going back to plant city, we've had issues, too. >>jim: and that's the thing. we focus so much along coastline and that's where the st have been. but again, as these cells, these very strong cells work their way inland, they don't really lose much energy and that's why you're seeing some damage carried further and further inland and you can see the high water really coming up. frank sending this picture in from 4:30 this morning so just another idea of exactly how much water we're dealing with as we go through the morning. again, this is over in plant

all the way into the interior, eastern hillsborough county, basically we've seen a number of pictures over in plant city of that roof peeled off some of these buildings. so we're going to continue to see more and more of these damage photos as we go through the morning. the sun is coming up. you'll bet more of an idea what is going on out there. >>ve: as busy as we arehi morning, busier. she's by herself over there. >>vanessa: i don't know about that. i know you guys are busy as well. you were focussing briefly on eastern hillsborough county and some damage and storm debris that you're seeing out there. we have some concerns here for the roadways because of storm debris eastern hillsborough county. we have several reports from viewers and doris, shawn clark, let me know on twitter what they were seeing. apparently railroad crossing is

area. so we have a lot of heavy eastbound-westbound delays in the area. cross arms are stuck because there's a tree across the train track blocking the train. avoid state road 60 in the area of valrico road. malfunctioning traffic signals, sligh avenue, flashing red signals, if you encounter those, flashing red, treat as a stop sign caution. dark signals treat as a four-way stop. citrus county drivers, we've been reminding you of flooding and road closures in the area all centered around u.s. 19. u.s. 19, flooding reported cardinal street to state road 488, crystal river and u.s. 19 closed port island trail to the crystal river mall. traffic west of u.s. 19 limited

as always, we have updated road closures, flooding concerns on my facebook page and twitter. let me know what you're seeing in the area as well. it's about to switch over to 6:53. i'm hillary clinton and i approve this message. he wears it like a crown. "make america great again". but trump made his shirts in bangladesh. his ties in china.

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>>russell: almost 6:56 and right now, duke energy is reporting more than 85,000 customers without power statewide due to the storm. crews are working to look for ways to safelyes power. >>laura: a lightning strike is believed to be the cause of an electrical fire at bayonet medical center. it caused a full scale ev more than 200 patients had to be transferred to other hospitals. >>russell: sea world's largest and best known orca is back at the park after beingataon respi. in march, sea world initially stated the infection was untreatable and said the whale was near death. now the animal is back on display in the public areas of the park. he's the whale that dragged a

during a show in 2010 and also featured in the documentary "black fish" which made a case against keeping whales in captivity. >>laura: stay with us here. our coverage of tropical storm hermine continues. >>russell: crews are keeping you up to the minute. >>laura: and dave and jim, they're watching the radar. >>dave: not only the radar but some wind gusts we're getting outside. just a few moments ago, we had a wind gust in sarasota of 46 miles per hour. continues even though the center of the storm is up in georgia. plus the heavy rain continues as well. you see it there on skytower radar. don't go away. we'll zoom in and out of radar

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((russell- while you were sleeping. hurricane >>russell: while we slept, hurricane hermine came ashore stronger than we thought. >>laura: and it is causing a lot of problems along the coast. we have team coverage. let's start with the roads and vanessa. it is a mess out there. >>vanessa: certainly is. lots of flooding we're dealing with, handful of crashes and lots of reports of debris in the roadway. live look here skyway bridge. we have high winds reported, gusting over the bridge there. alternate is going to be i-75. just a couple of trouble spots we'll touch on. tree down reported across the interstate, 275 northbound near pasco county. traffic is passing on the shoulder. some floodg reports out of south tampa, tampa area.