[George Howell, Cnn Anchor:] It's 3:00 a.m. on the U.S. east coast. We're following the latest on Hurricane Nate. The third hurricane to hit the U.S. mainland in just six weeks and people are feeling the effects this hour. I'm George Howell.
[Natalie Allen, Cnn Anchor:] I'm Natalie Allen. We'll be with you for quite a while. Hurricane Nate made its second landfall of the night a short time ago near Biloxi, Mississippi. The Category 1 storm is drenching the region with heavy rains and damaging winds.
[Howell:] It's knocked out power to thousands of people in three different states, in Mississippi, in Alabama, and in Florida. One big problem, one big concern here is the storm surge. Officials are warning residents don't take any chances. Hurricane Nate is being blamed for at least 28 deaths before it was a hurricane. This in Central America. Hundreds of people were rescued from flood waters and mudslides there.
[Allen:] That was an impressive storm surge we were seeing a moment ago in Biloxi. Let's get the latest on the storm status. Meteorologist Ivan Cabrera tracking it for us. What have you got, Ivan?
[Ivan Cabrera, Ams Meteorologist:] We're looking at a storm that is now inland here, Natalie. George, good to see you. It will continue to weaken as far as the strength, as far as the core winds, right? So, I don't think we're at 85 miles an hour. We're getting a new update from the National Hurricane Center and those winds will like to come down. It's still officially a hurricane of course, as you mentioned making its second landfall in the United States, made the first landfall in Nicaragua. By the way, this was the first hurricane to hit and make landfall. First in Louisiana since 2012 with Isaac and then the secondary landfall near Biloxi in Mississippi. The strong west winds will be located around those rain bands. Wind gusts in excess of 50 miles an hour. I think we're certainly going to lose the wind gusts that we have seen between 70 and 90-mile- an-hour winds. Right now, we are looking at 30-mile-an-hour gusts in Biloxi that went from 75 to 5 with the eye going right on top of Biloxi and now we're on the back side of it here. We'll continue with 30-mile-an-hour winds. These are the kinds of winds that will continue through tonight and through the early part of tomorrow. And the wind field will continue to diminish and then we're just going to be talking about some big rains. Case in point, as far as the winds, 75-mile-an-hour winds in Mississippi. This is the highest wind gusts by the way that I've seen so far, this evening and so far from the storm in general as it made landfall, 89-mile-an-hour winds, 96 would be a Category 2. Of course, that was not sustained. That was a gust, but certainly more than enough to cause power outages and significant damage. There you see the storm surge warnings that are continuing in effect. This is from Southeast Louisiana although I think the worst of it here done for you and then further to the east from Biloxi heading into Mobile Bay. We'll continue to see some gusty winds and also a bit of storm surge. But by the next couple of hours I think that threat will continue to diminish as well. This is what you expect with a landfalling hurricane. Things will transition into a broader wind field. A lot of us will see more wind but less wind as far as the intensity. As it moved on shore it brought in the Gulf of Mexico, anywhere from 5.9 feet in Pascagoula, that was on the eastern flank of the storm, and then interestingly enough you don't need the water to come up from the gulf, right? We have lakes here. And specifically, Lake Borne with a northerly wind on the west side of the storm, that was enough to provide us with 4.6 feet of storm surge there at Shell Beach, St. Bernard Parish. As we see the storm pulling away the threat as well a little further to the east. This is going to be a tornado watch. It has now by the way been expanded by the national weather service. So that means the conditions will continue to be favorable. You see these bands here. Any of those bands embedded within them could be thunderstorms that could put down a brief tornado and we have seen that so far this evening. Numerous warnings in fact have been out for tornadoes. We'll continue to watch that threat developing as well through the overnight hours guys.
[Howell:] Ivan, that northeastern quadrant of the storm, the dirty side of the storm, right? That's what's pushing in right now and causing those tornado concerns.
[Cabrera:] That's where all the action is. The storm surge, the heaviest rain, the heaviest wind, and also where we're going to have the tornadic threat as well. You're right.
[Howell:] Ivan, thank you.
[Allen:] We're covering this storm from all along the gulf coast. Of course, we'll be watching as it moves inland as well and perhaps spawning a tornado. CNN's Ed Lavandera is in Mobile, Alabama. Martin Savidge is in Biloxi, Mississippi. Just due west. Martin, let's go to you first. What are conditions like there now? What have you been experiencing?
[Martin Savidge, Cnn Correspondent:] Well, you can definitely tell, Natalie, we're on the back side of this storm. The wind now hitting us from exactly the opposite direction than it was, say, about two hours ago. Much dryer on the back side at least as far as we can sense so far. Not getting the torrential kind of rain. You're getting some rain but not just the deluge that we had. And the good news is that the water that had been significant on top of U.S. Highway 90 here, that has all receded. In fact, I won't say it's completely gone but much of it is gone. It's down dramatically so, another good indicator. Probably one is the change of direction of wind. Also, two we're past high tide. So that is good news. The power has remained fairly consistent. There's been some periods where we had temporary blackouts, but otherwise seems to be holding OK. Right now, the biggest problem is the wind. But it's nowhere near as significant as what they did have. There is flooding in other areas as well because with this wind it gets pushed around and it's been driven in the various bays and that so really it won't be until daylight, you can get a full sense of how much flooding. But again, should not be catastrophic flooding. It should be just sort of the typical kind of flooding of wind-driven water. Daylight will tell us a lot more, but it seems that Nate's done OK here. They've made it through fairly well Natalie.
[Allen:] That's good news.
[Howell:] And Martin, it's George joining in here. Just to ask you, do you get a sense that people there throughout that region, that they did heed these warnings as they came in before the storm made impact?
[Savidge:] Well, you know, it was a little bit difficult because I think a lot of this is very much a tourist town. They had a lot of things planned this weekend. The casinos are always very busy. And they were waiting until they really got the last kind of update before they decided that they had to close down. It was a decision that was made by Harrison County here where they finally said we need to shut down those major waterfront hotels. Because if 90 did get covered as it did, they wouldn't be able to get the heavy first responder equipment in. It was probably a wise call. Even though this storm is hopefully going to push through quickly and maybe by midday tomorrow things will look a lot better. In fact, the sun is expected to be out George.
[Howell:] Marty, it's good to see, though, the conditions are improving where you are. Martin Savidge, thank you so much for your report. Let's now switch over to Ed Lavandera. Ed live for us in Mobile, Alabama. Ed, looking at the radar here, it looks like one of the stronger bands is about to push in or has pushed in there. What are you experiencing on the ground?
[Ed Lavandera, Cnn Correspondent:] Yes. We've been kind of keeping tabs on that as well, George. This is one of the stronger bands that we have seen throughout the evening and it is whipping the rain through here. You can hear it howling by at this point. I just saw off to our west over here a flash of blue light which I suspect is probably a transformer blowing out. There are some 17,000 people in the state of Alabama who have already lost power is the latest numbers we have been told. That looks like it will be a concern here as the worst of this storm and as the storm has passed through Biloxi, starts getting closer into the Mobile area and the Alabama state line. And that is what we're starting to experience here. We're on the edge of Mobile Bay. Just behind me is the water and it's moving very quickly from south to north and has been doing that for the last several hours. That kind of speaks to that storm surge we've been talking so much about. You can get a sense of how the storm even as minimal of a hurricane as Hurricane Nate, these storms' ability to push water from south to north. That pushes everything back inland. That's what creates that flash flooding. In fact, here along the harbor there's a step down here and some of the water's starting to come over the edge of the ridge here along the harbor where we're standing. Nothing major to worry about there by any means. And soon as the storm goes down that water will quickly recede, but it does give you a sense of it here slowly the water has been coming up. We're about high tide, which also influences the storm surges and the potential for flooding situation as the water comes up you add the storm surge on top of that. And in these bayous and tributaries and all around that water continues to rise. That's why emergency management officials have really been cautioning people to really pay attention to their specific areas and watch for where that water might come from George and Natalie.
[Allen:] All right. Ed Lavandera for us there in Mobile, Alabama. Ed, thank you for bringing us the latest. We want to talk now with Vincent Creel. He's the public affairs manager for Biloxi, Mississippi where we just saw our Martin Savidge. Mr. Creel, thanks so much for talking with us. We know this is a busy night. But what kind of reports have you been getting? What have you been hearing about what's going on in Biloxi?
[Vincent Creel, Public Affairs Manager, Biloxi, Mississippi:] We're starting to see the water recede, and we still have some wind gusts on the back end of the storm. And we're going to have a lot of cleanup to do on our front beach, and it's to be seen how much damage was done to the sand beach here in Biloxi and Harrison County, which we're proud to say is the world's longest manmade sand beach at 26 miles. But it looks like the beach took a pounding from the surge and we have not had any major reports of any major damage to homes. I'm unaware of any house flooding in the city. I do know we had some scattered power outages. One thing we're thankful for is, you know, the last several weeks we've been watching what happened to the small town in Rockport, Texas. You heard about all the flooding in Houston and what happened in Miami. So, we were well aware that this could have been a much more serious storm. There was talk of it being a Category 2 with an 11-foot tidal surge when it came ashore. It did not happily, it did not live up to that billing. From what we are understanding, it pretty much disintegrated, parts of it, whenever it made landfall. But nonetheless, it was much more than a nuisance for us. It's a storm that's going to require a lot of cleanup here in Biloxi. We're not aware of any injuries that are related to the storm. We're thankful for that. That's pretty much the story here in Biloxi. It's going to be a lot of cleanup tomorrow and we're going to be looking to get back in business just as soon as we can.
[Allen:] I can tell that you've got some relief there in your voice and there's reason for it, isn't it?
[Creel:] We sure do. We sure do because it was a lot of worried people. Our mayor was worried going into this, looking at the reports that he saw. But we're proud to say that all of our police officers were able to pretty much stay on the streets throughout the duration of the storm. There was one rescue that I'm aware of at a low-lying area on the northern side of the Biloxi peninsula called Pop Ferry where they had to rescue a family of four as I understand it, a man and a woman and a 14-year-old and a 4-year-old. They sent a swift water team out, was able to rescue them from a van that had started taking on water. That's the only incident I'm aware of. And from what we understand our friends in Mobile are having a tough time of it right now, and certainly, our thought and prayers would be with them as it begins to recede. The water begins to recede here in Biloxi.
[Allen:] And I want to ask you, too, Mr. Creel, what about flooding there? Earlier, we saw a casino being inundated.
[Creel:] There's been a lot of talk about that, and I was talking to one of the affiliates in New Orleans about it. What we did whenever we rebuilt after Hurricane Katrina was we made sure to build back in a manner that would diminish the risks from future storms. So, the casino resorts in pretty much all of the waterfront development in Biloxi on the Biloxi peninsula, it's elevated. It's anywhere from 10 to 12 to 15 feet above the ground, which puts it significantly above the tide line. Sea level's what I'm trying to say. So, what you saw there was there is a marina right next to that casino, Point Cadet Marina. What you're looking at is a bank of elevators that are at the bottom of the parking garage. We're happy to say that we're unaware of any of the casino resorts that actually had water on their gaming floor because they're all well elevated to where we learned a huge lesson from Katrina and we owe it to the rest of the country to make sure we build back in a more resilient fashion.
[Allen:] Right. That's the key.
[Creel:] There's been a lot of talk about that water.
[Allen:] Well, thanks for explaining it to us. It was just that lower- level
[Creel:] Like a bank of elevators at the bottom of a parking garage on the ground floor. But thank you all for the interest in Biloxi. We certainly appreciate all the thoughts across the country.
[Allen:] Absolutely. We know what Biloxi went through with Katrina so many years ago. We're so glad to see that this one has been a mild one. Vincent Creel, thanks so much for helping us out with that information. We thank you.
[Creel:] Thank you.
[Howell:] Pick up on that as well, Natalie. A little relief in his voice there. But certainly, the storm still making an impact and we'll continue to follow its trajectory. Still ahead here on NEWSROOM, reporters ask President Trump to clarify his mysterious tweets about North Korea.
[Allen:] His strange response leaves everyone guessing. We'll tell you what he said in a moment.