We begin with deadly Tropical Storm Debbie slamming the Southeast.
At this hour, states of emergency along the coast,
parts of Georgia and South Carolina are preparing for what
could be historic flooding.
Hundreds of thousands of customers in Florida now without power.
The storm made landfall as a category one hurricane near
Steinhatchee,
Florida, with winds of up to
80 mph. Debbie then slowing to a tropical storm as
it cuts a path along the state's West Coast,
pushing its way toward the Carolinas.
This is the first hurricane to hit Florida this season,
dumping more than a foot of rain in some parts.
At least four people killed,
including two children. The storm is also blamed for a
horrific accident in Tampa.
An 18 Wheeler losing control,
careening into a canal. Savannah,
GA, in the path of what could be a once
in 1000 year rainfall event.
The potential for as much as 30 inches of rain.
The storm causing thousands of flight cancellations and delays along
the East Coast.
The warning tonight that the worst is still to come.
Ginger Zee is standing by.
ABC CS Faith of Blue Bay leads us off from
Florida
tonight. Life threatening storm surge,
powerful winds and the potential for feet of rain.
Debbie leaving death and destruction in its way.
The system gaining strength before slamming ashore in Florida's Big
Bend around 7 AMA category one hurricane packing sustained winds
of 80 miles an hour.
We're about 20 miles from the coast and we are
now in the eye wall of Hurricane Debbie.
We're just now starting to see this finally come in
from the southeast with all these bands and stinging rain,
more than a foot of rain in spots already.
A flash flood emergency declared northwest of Gainesville.
And you can see members of the Florida National Guard
in high water rescue vehicles going into neighborhoods like this
that are flooded to rescue homeowners.
We met Kristen Mallett, she evacuated with her family as
their neighborhood started to flood.
Are you surprised by what you were seeing?
Yes, because I've never seen anything like this before.
Major flooding in Sarasota. As you can see right behind
me,
there's an active rescue happening as we speak.
This is one of many that we've seen since we
got here just about half an hour ago in Levy
County on Florida's Big Bend.
A 13 year old boy killed inside a mobile home
by a falling tree.
The young man was asleep in his bedroom and that's
where the major impact was near Tampa dive teams working
in dangerous conditions pulling a semi truck from a canal
after a slid off Interstate 74 five around 2:30 in
the morning.
Recovering the body of the
64 year old driver. More than
300,000 Florida customers losing power at one point and flight
cancellations piling up across the country are travel alt at
LaGuardia.
So this storm along with separate storms in the Midwest
and the Northeast have caused thousands of flight cancellations back-to-back
days during a really busy stretch of travel.
It's mainly impacting the East Coast but this has ripple
effects all over the country.
Debbie now crawling into Georgia and South North Carolina where
it'll sit and dump rain for days.
In Savannah. Residents racing to prepare,
authorities putting a curfew in effect starting tonight.
This type of rain hovering over us,
coming with the intensity that they tell us that it's
coming.
It's going to catch a whole lot of people by
surprise.
And Debbie has moved out,
but there are a number of communities just like this
one still dealing with significant flooding.
The power is out in this neighborhood and nearly the
entire county and 1st responders are going door to door
in some areas to check on residents.
Lindsay, hats off to those first responders.
Faith, thank you. Millions in the South are now facing
the potential for historic flooding.
Let's get right to AB CS chief meteorologist Ginger Zee
in Georgia for us.
And Ginger, it sounds like the slow down of this
storm is what's really going to be problematic
question. We saw it for days in advance on the
computer models.
Lindsay, we're just getting pounded here in Savannah.
So much is going on.
We've had several tornado warnings in Savannah proper already.
We could see more of those as we've got tornado
watches all the way up to Charleston.
We're also in a flash flood warning because we've already
seen two to five inches of rain here ahead of
the actual storm,
and we're going to end up with 12 hours ahead
of us with more 2 to 3 inch per hour
rainfall rates.
By the way, first, what happens in the timing and
why this is a problem?
Tomorrow morning, Savannah's just starting to release from the heaviest
rains,
but Charleston's getting that onshore flow,
meaning that you're going to plug up the rivers and
tributaries with that two to four feet of surge.
And then on top of it,
it won't allow the rain that falls to release into
the ocean.
So that combo, oh, look at that,
Myrtle Beach, Wilmington getting it Tuesday night through Wednesday.
Then on Thursday, it wraps back around now and hits
Savannah again.
It's going to hang out way too long here.
And that's why we have the potentially historic and,
yes, catastrophic flood problems, not just at the coast.
We keep saying these towns like Savannah or Hilton Head,
but a little bit inland as well.
Inland flooding, the problem, Lindsay,
just relentless Rainier. Ginger, thanks so much.