new york city is under a hurricane warning tonight, extremely rare. so are the fact that mandatory evacuations are underway. lester holt is inside the evacuation zone, in lower manhattan. lester, we have had minor flooding over the years where they have taken some folks out of nursing homes, perhaps a hospital or two, but this kind of thing has never happened in new york city. >> reporter: you know, brian, it's interesting you said seen at all. there are 8 million of us living in new york city, we do feel at times we have seen it all. heck we had an earthquake this week. but when the mayor announced mandatory evacuations in a lot of this city, it got a lot of folks' attention. tonight urgent reality is gripping the big apple. the naked city has never felt so exposed. residents in low lying neighborhoods are now being urged to get out. >> i feel nervous, like i don't really know what's going on, i don't know what's going to happen. that's always a scary feeling. zblsh the. >> reporter: the city has produced a map showing the relative flood risk, now zo

new york city. gusty winds and choppy seas already are being felt on the outer banks, and worse is on the way, much worse. president obama is watching irene from martha's vineyard, but not for long because he is heading back to washington, d.c. a day ahead of schedule. earlier he called irene a historic storm. >> i cannot stress this highly enough. if you are in the projected path of the hurricane, you have to take precautions now. don't wait. don't delay. we all hope for the best but have to be prepared for the worst. >> irene is on track to follow the northeast corridor right up to new england and beyond. cnn is there. reynold wolf is in new jersey, and athena jones is in annapolis, maryland. we will start here in the weather center with cnn meteorologist, chad meyers. chad, give us an idea of where irene is now. >> not too much changed overnight. the storm did get a little stronger, and as it got stronger, you could see the eye. at 2:00 in the morning, you could truly see the eye. now we don't se

public transportation in new york city including the metro and buses have come to a halt as new york city prepares for this dangerous and possibly destructive hurricane parts of the city was was filled with crowds of people as you saw of fishel zx evacuating new yorkers from parts of areas that were deemed extremely dangerous for the first time in history the new york city mayor ordered mandatory evacuation of what he called low rise areas these are areas all throughout new york that are very close to the water and it is estimated that more than two hundred thousand new yorkers will have to evacuate their homes and go to shelters close to seventy shelters have been set up in new york city in preparation for this hurricane hurricane irene it's also been recommended to anyone that lives above the tenth floor to a vacuum wait from their building this storm is expected to hit the city by nine pm with winds gusting anywhere between forty and eighty miles per hour u.s. president barack obama has issued a state of emergency for new york meaning that new york will receive federal funding oba

york city has also been shut down that includes the trains the process is a new york city officials are on a week and see approach they're trying to monitor everything everything warn everybody but at this point the trouble quins are moving and everyone is just bracing themselves for the storm. artie's marina reporting for us there from new york now you are with r.t. and coming up a new president but old problems. as the people of the caucuses make their choice at the ballot box we look at what lies ahead for the new leader as his republican struggles to rebuild after winning independence from georgia. and our close up team takes you to a russian city that knows how to party find out more about the spectacular festival held in kid off every year. the richest sector of french society is pledging another three percent of its annual income this week to help the country battle its descent into debt as growth slumps france has also announced some twelve billion euro worth of cuts but as daniel bushell explains the move could be too little too late with fears social unrest could fall. fro

second hit will be around new york city. and a scientist will be here to give us an explanation for what that means. and word out of new england. boston's public transit city will be shut down. and all day tonight and tomorrow and monday through the evening rush. historic emily and that is emily. it is irene. why i want it to be emily is beyond me. times square. no body. beautiful thing. love it. [ whistle blows ] oh! [ baby cryg ] ben harper: ♪ what started as a whisper every day, millions of people choose to do the right thing ♪ slowly turned into a scream ♪ there's an insurance company that ds that, too. liberty mutual insurance. responsibility. what's your policy? look at all this stuff for coffee. oh there's tons. french presses, espresso tampers, filters. it can get really complicated. not nearly as complicated as shipping it, ough. i mean shping is a hassle. not wh priority mail flat rate boxes from the postal service. if it fits it ships anywhere in the country for a low flat rate. that is easy. best news i've

east coast closing in on new york city. the russian government has ordered a major shake up of the country's space agency after the loss of yet another unmanned mission a progress resupply craft failed to reach the international space station in the earth's atmosphere so its crew members aboard the i s us will now have to ration out the food or water they have left or does jacob greaves has more. moments it's who came crashing down. launched on wednesday from the baikonur cosmodrome three hundred twenty five seconds later the progress craft atop a soyuz rocket plummeted back to earth i thought it was a plane a first then i realized going never flying there or quietly and then it turned into some bright object and then suddenly you were sparkling and i heard a loud noise it was like three bangs one really loud and he quieter it was due to dock with the international space station on friday delivering essential supplies to the six crew members on board rocket malfunction has been blamed for the unsuccessful launch as a craft

new york, the city that never sleeps, very much asleep. most people not adventuring out into the rains, a few brave cab drivers, that's about it. good morning, everyone, i'm alex witt at msnbc world headquarters. we have hurricane irene making landfall along the jersey shore where it crashed ashore near the little egg inlet. at least ten deaths are blamed on irene, four million remain without power this morning. let's look at new video we're getting in from wnbc, there have been a partial roof collapse at an apartment complex in long branch, new jersey. the only good news, no reported injuries thus far. though fire crews in the area have responded to a few fires in the area overnight. fortunately they were able to put them out. let's update the latest watches and warnings from nbc meteorologist jeff ranieri. what do you think people should be on the lookout for as the storm moves north? is it winds, is it rains, is it flooding or all three? a trifecta? >> it is all three, but it depends where you are. if you're in new england, massachusett

up five am sunday morning in new york city michael bloomberg did have a press conference stating and urging all new yorkers to stay away from their windows move away from their glass windows because he says the winds are going to speed con ed be forced to shut down power in certain parts of new york city between now and sunday evening if those areas get to flooded friday new york city michael bloomberg the first time in history issued a mandatory evacuation of certain parts of new york city to three hundred seventy thousand people live there all these evacuation zones a lot of people chose to not move chose to stay in their homes but overall there is a feeling of anxiety taking over not just new york but all the surrounding states and we did get to speak with some people down were heading to the stores to buy up supplies hot saturday here's a little bit of what they have said. my whole grandma this is the only real one it really had a married you're about to leave for so here's to a big nose of the no we don't know the whole thing around here out of like going out right in the i'm li

and that's what new york city did. they first went to the hudson highlands, but 150 years later, it went to the delaware highlands. and really diverted the water that normally went to philadelphia to new york city. i don't think they anticipated that. narrator: the majority of new york city's drinking water comes from watersheds in upstate new york. a watershed is the area of land where water from rain or snow melt drains downhill into a body of water. mountains act as a funnel to feed rivers and lakes. and in this case, reservoirs. in the new york city system, water is collected and stored in 19 reservoirs, which can hold more than a year's supply -- over 580 billion gallons of water. almost all of the system is fed by gravity, without the use of energy-consuming pumps. valves open to regulate the flow into the 85-mile-long delaware aqueduct -- the longest tunnel in the world. at hillview reservoir... the water is partitioned into another giant tunnel system. where it travels deep below manhattan. the pressure built u

way, close to new york city. >> thank you, julie. glad people are listening to those warnings. a lot of new yorkers are like, hey, we dealt with 9/11, we can deal with this. but this is serious. another advisory at the top of the hour. stay with us for the late test as irene gets ready to slam into new york city. we will go to the fox extreme weather center for the latest on the storm. f!

york city, new york city needs to take seriously and indeed it does and it's my impression. this is a storm that will carry water up against the coastline. we'll have those winds. i think it will be tropical storm if not category 1 storm surge, if it weakens it will be less. if it strengthens, it will be more. the big point of this and what i want to say is based on the track, track is responsible for the prep regulates. the track is responsible for the evacuations and the track is responsible for the coverage. our job is to make people aware of what the outside possibility is with a storm like this and get them ready to survive it. if this storm were to turn or dissipate or fall apart, fine everybody is okay. that's what matters. it's getting their attention and getting them ready for this storm. i think this storm will hold together in a very powerful form for this area. not something they see and deal with and roll and flood and take a lot of power with it. it will be a real problem over the weekend. >> the key question i guess, lots of people on twitter very worried, unn

it puts it 115 miles from new york city. we've been focusing on new york. there is a reason to are that. new york is say place that has 8 million, 9 million people in op population. you're talking about a lot of people being affected in a place that's not known for its hurricane preparedness. new york is ready for a lot of stuff. it ain't quite ready for this. you have the airports closed, the public transit closed down. they're telling us, can you imagine this, tomorrow morning, rush hour, the commute, no public transit tomorrow in new york. >> a lot of people don't have cars. they rely on the subway system and the buss to get where they have to go. people are basically stuck at their homes. it's unclear -- maybe that's what they need, people to stay home for a while and maybe that's what's going to happen here. >> the mayor is telling them to do that, asking everybody to evacuate. that was yesterday, the day before. that's over. don't even try to go anywhere now. you need to stay in your homes. jacqui jeras, do i have you over there? >> i think you got me

disastrous hurricane on its way to new york city this hurricane is expected to hit new york by nine p. am saturday evening parts of the city was was filled with crowds of people as you saw officials evacuating new yorkers from parts of areas that were deemed extremely dangerous for the first time in history the new york city mayor ordered mandatory evacuation of what he called low rise areas these are areas all throughout new york there are very close to the water as of twelve pm all public transportation will come to a halt it's also been recommended to anyone that lives above the tenth floor to evacuate from their building now up until this point new yorkers were really taking these warnings and these forecasts seriously because the last time this city experienced our hurricane very heavy and dangerous hurricane was in one thousand nine hundred thirty eight but as we saw saturday we saw the winds picking up we saw many people rushing to the supermarkets rushing to the stores to stock up on good stock up on food stock up on water some engineers believe that the infrastructure of new

that is the zone of new york city. we're talking lower manhattan, places like staten island, coney island, where there could be flooding. and so they evacuated those hospitals. wolf they got the e-mail from mayor bloomberg's office yesterday morning and were told by 8:00 friday night, in other words about 12 hours, you need to have your patients out of there. and i must say, i watched the evacuation from from one of them, and it was quite orderly. they were bringing people out in stretchers. they were bringing people out from the intensive care unit. they were bringing premature babies out in those little isolettes and bringing them to other hospitals. as you can imagine, this is difficult for the hospital. also traumatizing for the patients. you know, obviously they're already sick, and now they having to to see another hospital. and we caught up with one woman whose brother has a brain tumor. and he was about to start a brand new therapy to get rid of the cancer when he was told that he would have to leave the hospit

will it head into new york city? will it just go into the west in new jersey in just to the east on long island? it will matter to millions of people and our weather center is getting a good handle out. fox news channel, america's choice for news. premiering the revolution by lg. the newest release with verizon 4g lte. the first phone pre-loaded with access to netflix's massive movie library. powered by verizon 4g lte for an unparalleled streaming experience. see how mobile entertainment was meant to be seen. only with verizon 4g lte. now get the revolution by lg for $199.99 and receive 3 months of netflix free. ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] with the most advanced engine in its class, 50 horsepower, dual overhead cams and fierce acceleration, the gator xuv 825i will shatter your expectations. discover the fastest most powerful gator yet, at johndeere.com/gator. >> shep: storm is still going up the eastern seaboard, i would about to say barreling but i believe it's slowed down. it's taking a jog to the north and east. we

still ahead, bracing in new york city. the hurricane is already a historic event, the first ever mandatory evacuation order in effect for parts of all five burrows of new york city. we're going to take a look at the rare times the northeast has take an direct hit from a hurricane and what kind of impact that has had coming up. >>> hurricane irene is expected to make its first landfall along the east coast of the united states in north carolina. our state spokesman says he is concerned about the eastern half of state that it could affect 20 counties, 3 1/2 million people in north carolina alone john zarrella is with us from atlantic beach. >> reporter: 7:00 a.m. tomorrow morning, if the eye crosses us here that's the time the center of the storm is expected to get here. so just after first light. prpgss they're taken, not a lot of people have put up shutters or boarded up. we did see some. most of the people here at least a good percentage of them did decide to leave. others said they were going to go ahead and stay. mandat

and hours ago, new york city mayor michael bloomberg addressed the people of new york city. >> the edge of the hurricane is finally come upon us and conditions are expected to deteriorate rapidly. according to the national weather service, tropical winds can be expected from this point forward. a tornado watch, just to make life more complex, is in effect until 5:00 a.m. in the five boroughs and in nassau, suffolk, westchester and rockland counties. hopefully, that won't happen. but there is the potential. combined, i think it's fair to say that these conditions make it unsafe to stay outside. let me repeat that. the time for evacuation is over. everyone should now go inside and be prepared to stay inside until weather conditions improve, which won't likely be until sunday afternoon. but we will get through this next 24 hours, i assure you. the city has taken exhaustive steps to prepare for whatever comes our way and the very best first responders are going to work nonstop through the night to make sure we get through this night as safely as possible. i am joined by our fire commissione

also bracing for the storm new york city still in the path of irene. thousands ordered to leave now fearing potential historic flooding in parts. the storm still moving on its expected path along the east coast. there are key developments to tell you about this morning. a good morning to all of you. welcome to msnbc live coverage of hurricane irene. i'm alex witt here at msnbc world headquarters. we're going to get the latest forecast for you on irene's path. it is now hitting north carolina head on. mark potter is live for us in nags head. a good morning to you, what's it like? >> reporter: hi, alex. we're getting some very strong east windows now. it's been blowing all night and it's kicking up at this hour. we're expecting it to get considerably worse as the eye of the storm approaches us. the tide as you can see behind me is coming up. we're just finishing a high tide. that's a factor in this. the good news is i'm not seeing any areas where the tide has breached the sand dunes. they're holding and that's good news. more good news is at least in thi

still ahead, bracing in new york city. the hurricane is already a historic event, the first ever mandatory evacuation order in effect for parts of all five burrows of new york city. we're going to take a look at the rare times the northeast has take an direct hit from a hurricane and what kind of impact that has had coming up. you okay?[] try this. bayer aspirin? it's not a heart attack. new bayer advanced aspirin's for pain. it has microparticles and enters the bloodstream faster. works twice as fast as before. did you invent this or something? dr. eric first, from bayer. wow. [ male announcer ] new bayer advanced aspirin. wow. distracted driving. it accounts for 25% of car crashes. - ♪ [ dance ] - music, cell phones, food-- the list goes on. this is why safe driving is so important. - correct. - and it's why the best agents... help safe drivers get a lower rate. - oh! - exactly. ♪ another dream but always you ♪ whoa! ♪ it's like a vision-- [ tires squeal ] ♪ [ resumes ] [ man announcing ] we are insurance. ♪

she's between new york city and north of that is albany, new york, a two and a half hour drive. it's the catskill mountains. a lot of mountains enhancing the amount of rain already coming down. good luck to her. >> we are trying to get authorities on the telephone to speak to them and see how to resolve the situation for you in the home. are you all in one room or how are you situated to keep track and take care of one another? >> we're trying one fireplace because there is no heat, no nothing. all the families are in one room next to the fireplace. that deeps us warm, all the kids and infants and toddlers. that's the worst thing. everybody is in one room. not much space in this room. >> you ended up in this home how? why didn't you evacuate with the c on coming storm. >> nobody predicted it to be here. everybody was concerned about new york city, brooklyn, but nobody mentioned anything about catskill mountains. it's not like we came on a weekend. we were already there from last monday. it was unpredictable basically. >> do you have flashlights? food? do you have the -- do you h

the rain has let up in new york city. wins are beginning to die down but the storm surge will continue for at least another 12 hours. they will see how that plays out. we just got an update. as you can see, the track hasn't changed any. the storm has followed pretty closely to the forecast track for the last several days. it's been forecast very accurately. again, it looks for the most part that millions of people got out of the way. >> we will check in with our local weather forecast which looks pretty warm for you but if you are planning on flying anywhere today or tomorrow, your flight may be canceled or delayed because of irene. right now 10 major airports in the northeast are closed. ffo more than 40 flights to the region were canceled yesterday, at least to flight team minutes. again, you want to check your flight because there can be a rebel effect when so many flights are canceled. even if you are going to a destination not on the east coast. a special report in a half hour at 8:00. face the nation is going to air

still ahead bracing new york city. the hurricane is already a historic event first-ever mandatory evacuation order for all five boroughs. the northeast has taken a direct hit from a hurricane, what kind of an impact that has had coming up. 's for pain. it has microparticles and enters the bloodstream faster. works twice as fast as before. did you invent this or something? dr. eric first, from bayer. wow. [ male announcer ] new bayer advanced aspirin. but not in my neighborhood. ♪ [ female announcer ] we're throwing away misperceptions about natural gas vehicles. more of the vehicles that fuel our lives use clean american natural gas today. it costs about 40 percent less than gasoline, so why aren't we using it even more? start a conversation about using more natural gas vehicles in your community. start a conversation about using more natural gas vehicles any questions? no. you know... ♪ we're not magicians ♪ we can't read your mind ♪ ♪ read your mind ♪ we need your questions ♪ each and every kind ♪ eve

statement from the mayor of new york city michael bloomberg. we know that, pete to, your point, a lot of the information getting out at this point is about the inconveniences and the issues of checking out the soundness of the bridges, tunnels and making sure that the airports and buildings and structures are okay, but so far, we are not hearing of the major reports of damages and debris here and there, but thankfully, nothing more than that, pete. >> well, i think, tamron, the business of checking out the monumental buildings in washington, and i mean two ways, literally monuments like the lincoln memorial, and like the jefferson memorial and instructive thing happened here a couple of years ago when a little piece about the size of a -- what -- a can of coffee and not during an earthquake, but it crashed down to the marble steps below and that caused a lot o

if it stays west of new york city some of that could go in the new york harbor. this is a big concern for battery city and manhattan, not the ideal situation but if we get landfall in long island, we are looking at greater storm surge in long island. hars -- you have every governor in all 12 states reporting some sort of it looks like a twister or could be a twister and we will not know until daybreak. thank you. >> harris, mayor bloomburg spoke a minute and updating residents on the city's hurricane response. residents, if you want to leave, guess what, too late. time for evacuation is over. everyone should go inside and be prepared to stay inside until weather conditions improve which will not leakly be until sunday afternoon. we'll get through the next 24 hours, i assure you. the new york mass transit system subways and buses and trains are all shut down at noon eastern time. many bridges could also close soon as the wind speeds began to pick up. >> hurricane irene's whipping winds spawning a twister in maryland. that is the secondary part of the story all of

york city but most of the damage we are talking about has been outside of new york city. it is long island, it it is upstate new york, the mid hudson. that is where we clearly the preponder arancance of the dame clearly is. >> you have a place in west chest evewestchester county. >> and obviously i stay in albany. both places. i have seen days -- >> shepard: well, the governor you's phone is breaking up. you were getting local stuff. that is the triburrough bridge, i believe. all the bridges seem to be open in and around new york city. that stat fox news corner of the world on the left-hand side of the screen there, 6th avenue right at 48th street in the heart of midtown at rockefeller center. for most of the morning and that is a look at the overview of times square. folks starting to come back in there. the road that runs to the left there is now a pedestrian mall if you haven't been in new york city a couple of years you would be astounded what mark bloomberg has done to it. you can't drive-thru there any more. the taxis are running and livery cab drivers running but a

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york city mayor michael bloomberg that border a mandatory evacuation of certain parts of new york city those are wrangled lying areas proximately three hundred seventy thousand people who live in all those different areas a lot of equal evacuated and a lot of new yorkers chose to stay and our way out of the storm as it made its way through your according to what we are all just are saying on this storm has now passed new york city is heading towards rhode island newport rhode island and new england and he could even become a little bit greater as the plains laments and heading that way detroit out to be a lot less than what was anticipated and what was hyped up and at this point it's just about cleanup here in new york. of course we're closely following the developments on raveling on the east coast of america which has been hit by a wave of extreme weather a lot more you to. also watch the most recent as well as the most impressive videos from hurricane site. by europe spread exact quotes this is threatening to grow enough for us as a government announce a new one started measures ear

i have not ever seen these models go over new york city like this. but if you get street level, down toward the big empire state building here, you can look above the sky and some of these forecast models would take the center irene directly over new york city. >> i'm always worored about storms. this going to go through one of the most populated areas on the east coast. we're very concerned. >> reporter: concerned about the very big cities. 4.5 million in boston. 6 million in philadelphia. and 19 million in the new york metro area. >> what we have to do is assume the worst, prepare for that and hope for the best. >> reporter: but if the storm continues on its current path, some 2727000 new yorkers will be required to evacuate storm night. the elderly and those living in the most prone areas to flooding. the city has boats and helicopters ready to rescue the stranded and is preparing to shut down the city's subway system, the large nest the world, if need be. >> new york city is surrounded by water. boston is on a shoreline. incredible waves, 20, 25,

number of people in new york city ordered to evacuate their homes. number of times that any mayor of new york has previously ordered such an evacuation -- >> please, nature is a force more powerful than any of us and it really is better to be safe than sorry. >> reporter: that would be zero. it is a first. number of new york city subway stations ordered closed with the system shutdown bloomberg has ordered? 468. date of the last time new york subway system shut down completely? september 11th, 2001. number of amtrak trains that will be running in the northeast on sunday? zero. number of upcoming commercial flights pre-emptively canceled while it was still dry and sunny on most of the east coast today, around 6,000. which was just for starters. the likelihood that it will be sunny and dry tomorrow on the major north-south interstate highways? about zero. which is why it's good that our van full ofpe

do you think new york city is ready for this? >> well, new york obviously doesn't get hit by hurricanes very frequently. so it's hard to imagine that people are mentally prepared for the type of catastrophe that this is likely to be. we hope people will listen to warnings, and evacuate if necessary. but there are always the cases where people don't heed the warnings. but hopefully there's been enough publicity about how this storm could impact the area, so hopefully people will -- if they're not prepared, start getting prepared right now. >> sam, let me come back to you. in terms of the categorization of this hurricane, am i right in thinking if it hits land somewhere on the way, in the carolinas, somewhere in virginia, before it gets to new york city, the power of the hurricane would start to diminish? is that what happens? >> absolutely, piers. you've got one of the best on your team, chad myers, by the way, who's really good at this. i will tell you that if this storm hits as a category 2 or 3 in the carolinas, and the eye is

irene is now closing in on new york city. mass transit has been shut down, and if the flooding gets bad, power will be cut off to thousands of customers in lower manhattan. >> the grate dane jerry -- danger to us here is from the storm surge and there's no evidence that the forecast for that is changing. it is going to be a very serious thing. now, they said they're going to -- the water is coming up here. so looks like it's going to be bad. >> alan: the hurricane force is expected to hit new york city in just a few hours. a possible tornado spawned by irene ripped through delware tonight. as many as 40 homes were damaged, five severely. there were no injuries out there. >> meteorologist leigh glaser is tracking irene's path. >> leigh: you can definitely see those rain bands just lashing parts of the new england area, from virginia beach up to new york city. the storm system right now, 80 miles-per-hour winds. it's moving to the north northeast, 16 miles-per-hour. very slow limit still category 1, and considered 250 miles sou

that was 300 miles from new york city. the storm was on shore for 300 miles and windows were knocked out well north of there. it was always possible for the same type of damage to happen in new york city. it was just a sheer stroke of luck that it didn't do that. >> well, chad, again, thank you for your sterling work on this. i'm sure that contributed to many people getting to safety when they needed to. i appreciate that. i'm sure many people do. >>> new york city's mass transit system shut down completely the day before irene hit. was that politics ahead of safety? joining me is a woman who may be the next mayor of new york. city council speaker christine quinn. you have heard the debate today. i have to say from where i sit, in the end, people are complaining about having their lives markedly disrupted -- >> from an officially point of view we had to make decisions based on what we were hearing from the national weather service and other hurricane and governmental experts. remember, we're talking about new york city her

and a new york city michael bloomberg for the first time in history issued a mandatory evacuation of certain parts of new york city three hundred seventy thousand people live there all these evacuation zones and that those evacuations began on friday evening and continued on through saturday into sunday up until this point and those evacuation zones include five hospitals nursing homes so people literally had to go to shelters a lot of people chose to not move chose to stay in their homes but overall there is a feeling of anxiety taking over not just new york but all the surrounding states as as this hurricane hurricane irene is moving in we did get to speak with some people that work heading to the stores to buy up some flies on saturday little bit of what they have. everything out there possibly pushed everything up in the garage . got plenty of food they were prepared. my whole life and this is the only real one they really had a major evacuation for so. you know something that we don't know the whole thing i'm scared out of like going outside in. tons of water like hurricane katr

we think the storm will be east of new york city. that's going to put us on what we call the good side of the storm. means much of our winds will be offshore and that our impact is going to be a little bit less. we're expecting the winds to be near that 60-mile-an-hour threshold. i'm thinking somewhere between 50 and 65-mile-per-hour with possible some gusts greater than that. timing wise, you can already see we have the showers and the thundershowers. this is just the start. and the tropical storm force winds, they think, are going to be ri reifing by this evening with the peak of this storm early tomorrow morning, probably starting before dawn and continuing into the early afternoon before things start subsiding by storm. in the latest statistics, in case you're just checking in, this is a category 1 storm now. winds at 85 miles per hour. for this to be a hurricane, it has to have 74-mile-per-hour maximum sustained winds. we're in the middle of that category. there's been weakening for a couple of different reasons. dry air has bee

new york city is not typical. only 3% of the students in the new york city attend charters. most of them have large outside funding, some of them get great results, not a lot of them do. we have national. one is the study from stanford the rest are no worse or indifferent. the studies in eight states said no difference. the studies came out in the state of florida are charters schools. the district news reported that one out of four charter high schools out performance in the woeful city of detroit. i'm looking at the studies, state to state where the charter movement into over selling itself. you can see hip is great. >> guest: let's look at what i say in the book, okay. in the book i say a quarter, maybe half of the charter schools could be deemed as succeeding. okay. so i'm not saying it's called -- >> host: it's not a quarter. >> host: you are just lungeing for the results. i'm not lungeing for anything. >> guest: the importance of the charter schools that work, 10%, 30%, the importance of the charter schools

here's what's important about new york city. in addition to the fact that they're waiting for irene to come ashore later tonight, five minutes from now, mass transportation throughout new york will be shut down. that includes long island railroad, metro north railroad, all subways, all bus service. anything that has public transportation to it will be shut down. if you need to use public transportation to evacuate, you better already have done it or get in your cars and get out. thanks for joining us, everyone. uh, forgot jack's cereal. [ jack ] what's for breakfast? um... try the number one! [ jack ] yeah, this is pretty good. [ male announcer ] half a day's worth of fiber. fiber one. [ jack ] yeah, this is pretty good. or creates another laptop bag or hires another employee, it's not just good for business -- it's good for the entire community. at bank of america, we know the impact that local businesses have on communities, so we're helping them with advice from local business experts and extending $18 billion in credit last

if it's 85 miles an hour up to the new york city area. there are a lot of boats out in the hudson river. a lot of rain in this hurricane and a lot of wind crossing along the streets. >> bill: homeowners they are like homeowners, they decided to leave it there and that time they lost. we heard the storm surge in places like new york city. it happens when a hurricane hits the coastline. the storm's rotation causes low pressure and that creates a sucks. did suction. but it forces the water and it floods it will take some of that water and move it around with it. what is happening with irene right now just in the last 60 minutes it has made a right turn and obvious on the radar. our chief meteorologist is tracking it live. it's tracking to the northeast it appears, rick? will it stay on that path or why would it do that now? >> storms take a little jogs, but it did take a little bit of a jog and kind of corrected and went back to the northeast. overall no change to the direction that the storm is going. you have to look at the storm. it's ver

york city between now and sunday evening if those areas get to light it friday new york city michael bloomberg the first time in history issued a mandatory evacuation of certain parts of new york city three hundred seventy thousand people live there all these evacuation zones a lot of people chose to not move chose to stay in their homes but overall there is a feeling of anxiety taking over not just new york but all the surrounding states we did get to speak with some people down who were heading to the stores to buy up supplies saturday here's a little bit of what they have to say i love. my whole life this is the only real one they really had a major evacuation for so here's the nose of the no we don't. the one thing i'm scared about is like going outside and being like tons of water like hurricane katrina that to me the public transportation system in new york city has also been shut down and that includes the trains the process is this point the truck went are moving and everyone is just bracing themselves for the storm. reporting for us there now you are with our team and coming

in new york city are closed. washington, philadelphia, and boston are handling some flights but airports are expected to see cancellations tomorrow during the brunt of the storm. a big effect at sfo appears to be on international travelers who have to fly threw east coast hub. this couple has to be in barcelona on monday to get back to work on tuesday. >> we came here to the airport to change our flight, maybe flying to barcelona through another airport. >> jeanie of san jose and her daughters were going to spend a few days in new york after their european vacation but got a seat to the bay area in the nick of time. >> called her name. almost like winning the lottery ticket. >> joined greats are parked around the airport. it will be at least another day before their airborne. >> tomorrow we may see some depart tours, although we have seen 30 caps laces -- cancellations for tomorrow. >> oakland international cancelled two jet bliew flights -- jetblue flights, and an incoming flight from jfk has been cancelled, and

we go to nbc's steve handelsman in new york city. >> reporter: starting the cleanup. this was central park. new york is draining tonight. rhode island is taking stock. >> it's not as bad as we expected. it's much better. >> reporter: irene was a full fledged cat 1 hurricane. this was long island this morning. >> pandemonium pretty much. kind of crazy. >> reporter: at least 15 people were reported killed from florida to new england, many by falling trees last night and today. flooding extended far inland. this was near philadelphia and some rivers are still reported rising. now, many of the millions who evacuated want to see if there's damage. asa lowe in new york city. >> they said there was limited damage and power outages. i don't know what to believe. >> reporter: charlie jones in north carolina. >> they won't let us back in. you have to have a reentry pass. >> reporter: with power out to 800,000 homes in maryland and more than half a million in north carolina and pennsylvania, many people are not being allowed home. the feds expect second-guessing. >> a lot of peo

martha: new york city is getting ready. mayor bloomberg says he expects to decide on mandatory evacuations later today. mayor bloomberg has asked anybody in those areas to voluntarily evacuate before they wait to get a mandatory order which he will wait to see if that is necessary. gregg: on five hurricanes have even come close to new york city since 1851. there was the great storm of 1938 known as the long island express. the most powerful hurricane known to make landfall near new york as a category 3 hurricane. hundreds were killed. $300 million in damage, and that was a chunk of change in 1938. then the 1985 hurricane gloria, that's the most recent to make landfall on the east coast. the category 3 was called the storm of the century. $1 billion in damage and the u.s. army corp of engineers say it could have been catastrophic if it had arrived at high tide and a little bit closer to the city. it appears irene is making the exact same loop. martha: you look at that path. it looks familiar to what we are seeing now. all th

new york is bracing itself for what could be the worst storm to hit the city in a generation hurricane irene has a way to cause severe damage in north carolina and virginia and spawned the natives in the area moving up to two million people without an interesting right now it can cross lights in reno nine a new york. marina hello there so what's the scene like they new york how would you describe the atmosphere in the big apple right now well right now the big apple looks extremely eerie the streets are empty businesses are are either have boarded up their windows or put along their windows the tropical winds are beginning to move into new york city at this moment and you could feel the wind increasing you feel are being increasing the rain is coming down like sheets of water and new york city has also been put under a tornado watch told up five am sunday morning in new york city michael bloomberg did have a press conference stating and urging all new yorkers to stay away from their windows move away from their glass windows because he says the winds are going to speed between now and

on up into philadelphia and new york city. the winds are going to be strong, the rain's going to be heavy, and we're going to see a whole lot of flooding with that 6 to 12 inches of rain. >> jacqui jeras, thank you once again. >>> at 12 minutes past the hour now, i want to turn to coast guard rear admiral william lee. he's a commander for the fifth district of the coast guard. that's, essentially, he handles the mid-atlantic. his responsibility runs from north carolina through new jersey, so this is the guy to talk to who's right now handling things over there where, exactly where this storm is and is headed. sir, we appreciate your time with us this morning. tell me, have you jumped into action just yet? you were prepared, but have you had to react to anything in north carolina just yet, and what do you anticipate? >> yes, good morning. we have repositioned all of our forces that were in the path of the storm, and we are postured to respond as the storm passes and we're going to swing around behind it. what the general public