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Sunday Morning News

Florida's Gulf Coast Prepares For Hurricane Gordon

Aired September 17, 2000 - 9:30 a.m. ET

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

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Now back to the hurricane. We turn back again to Jill Brown in the weather center -- Jill.

JILL BROWN, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Miles, this is a radar satellite. You can really see how the rain is just sweeping in across the state of Florida. A hurricane is still over 100 miles off the coast, but heading up toward the Big Bend area, expected to get up here and make landfall sometime this evening.

Exact time kind of hard to pinpoint, probably around sunset, possibly a little after, maybe a little sooner. It's picked up some speed today, so that will make a bit of a difference. But anywhere from Tampa to Orlando, you're not going to see this come rolling over, but you are getting the very heavy rain, and anywhere from where it makes landfall east is where we're going to see the biggest storm surge, all that water being pushed toward the coast and also, of course, the strongest winds.

So let's take a look at the latest stats. This is the 8:00 update, next one comes at 11:00 Eastern. Winds are still 75 miles per hour. That may change. They may come up a little bit, but it is not expected to increase in strength a lot. Again, the speed is up to 16, it was 13 miles per hour with the last update, so that's changed somewhat.

Hundred and fifty-five mile south-southwest of Cedar Key in Florida, that's where the center of circulation is. The hurricane force winds extend out mainly on the northeast side of the hurricane by about 45 miles.

And there's your track of where it is expected to head, and again, it looks like this evening. And then it'll continue to head into the southeast, will of course diminish in strength, but we could see this also produce some heavy rain, some strong winds all the way up into Georgia. This may be a story that lasts for a couple more days if we hear more about heavy rain and flooding.

Today, heavy rain, severe weather, by this evening landfall, next couple of days, more heavy rain.

We'll keep you up to date on Hurricane Gordon in the Gulf of Mexico. Now back to Miles.

O'BRIEN: All right, thank you very much, Jill. We have reporters up and down the coast keeping an eye out for you on the situation right there at ground level.

CNN's John Zarrella is in the Tampa Bay area -- John.

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Morning, Miles.

Well, we had a police officer drive by here a little while ago and say, "Welcome to sunny Florida." And it -- with a laugh, of course. And they can laugh a little bit here in the Tampa Bay area because it appears they will escape the worst of Hurricane Gordon, which is expected to track to the north of this particular area.

Yet there are still about a dozen shelters that are open here for anyone who has concerns and is in low-lying areas. There is the potential for flooding and for some water to move in as the storm moves closer to us, the storm surge.

And you can see behind me just how low-lying it is here in the Tampa Bay area. You've got hotels and you've got condominiums and office buildings right along the water here, that's Tampa Bay there behind me.

And so there are some genuine concerns of low-lying flooding in the low-lying areas. Little further to the north they do have mandatory evacuations in areas like Cedar Key, which is expected to be one of the primary areas that might well get struck by the storm, and certainly by the storm surge as it moves in.

Rain's been steady here all morning, coming down a little bit harder again now, the winds gusty, but nothing yet to tropical storm force -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: All right, thank you very much, CNN's John Zarrella in the Tampa Bay area.

Floridians, of course, no strangers to hurricanes and tropical storms, that's why many of those in Gordon's vicinity are not taking any chances.

Donald Forbes of our Orlando affiliate WKMG has this report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've done what I'm going to do on this. If I were to do anything else, I'd leave the dock.

DONALD FORBES, WKMG REPORTER (voice-over): The captain of the boat "Outrageous" has battened down the hatches as well as he can. Now it's just a matter of waiting out the threat of Hurricane Gordon.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (on radio): The National Weather Service has issued the flood watch for the following counties...

FORBES: The same is true of the other boats in the Tarpin (ph) Springs Yacht Club. Owners have tied up tight their investments and stowed away anything that might get blown away.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I pulled my enclosure. These are my side curtains. And just stowed those aboard the boat. Brought my tender aboard. And then also brought my deck chairs aboard.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (on radio): In the meantime, of course, we do have tropical storm warnings out...

FORBES: As Gordon threatens the entire west coast of Florida, many have come here in curiosity to watch, to play. But others aren't taking any chances.

NANCY KAMMIS (ph): Yes, everything's off the -- you know, off the bottom shelves, moved up. Anything I cared about.

FORBES: About 15 miles north of Tarpin Springs in the low-lying area of Hudson Beach, the Kammis family is hoping for the best but preparing for the worst.

KAMMIS: You know, birth certificates and marriage licenses, all that happy stuff.

FORBES: Nancy Kammis has picked up all the stuff that could get damaged if her house gets flooded, and is packing up the stuff she and her family will need if they're told to get out.

KAMMIS: Soon as they say to evacuate, we will evacuate.

FORBES (on camera): Where will you go?

KAMMIS: We were discussing that. I don't know, inland, you know. There were a lot of friends who said, Come stay with us, but I don't see that they're in any better situation, really.

FORBES (voice-over): The Kammis family says it will be tough to leave, if that means shutting the door and leaving their worldly possessions behind.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'BRIEN: Again, that report from Donald Forbes of our affiliate WKMG in Orlando.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com

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