Frances Slowly Moves to Strike the Florida Coastline
STOUFFER: Florida Governor Jeb Bush is warning residents there they are really going to need patience to deal with this storm, because the hurricane is moving so slowly, it could hang around for not one, but two high tides. That means the state could see two rounds of storms surge and dangerous flooding. Florida's governor has already declared a state emergency for the entire state, and he's preparing residents for the days ahead.</s>GOV. JEB BUSH (R), FLORIDA: It will take a long time for it. We're already seeing the beginning effects of the storm. The eye of the storm won't hit for -- until later on tonight, and then we'll have tomorrow, as well. So people need to be very cautious and very patient with this storm. In addition, if they're in a shelter, they need to talk to the American Red Cross volunteers before they go home. As we all know, some of the loss of life occurs after the storm. And there will be a lot of rain, a lot of utility poles down, a lot of wires in that water. Make sure that your children and you, yourself, do not go back to your homes or don't leave your homes until it is the proper time to do so.</s>FRAZIER: Florida Governor Jeb Bush there with some timely warnings. And you heard him talk about wires in the water. That's the kind of thing that became a factor in the Bahamas, where at least one death is being linked to the storm. It was an electrocution, in fact. Our Karl Penhaul is in Freeport with the latest.</s>KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: For several hours, the town of Freeport, on the island of Grand Bahama, was in the eye of the hurricane. That led to a decrease in the wind speed. But now, as the tail of the hurricane passes across this Bahamian island, the wind speeds are picking up again back into hurricane force. We tried to talk to the weather experts to find out precisely what's going on. We caught up with them, though, in a Freeport hotel. They had to evacuate the weather center at the airport overnight. Six feet of water, waves driven by those high winds, came through the airport and started to crush the side walls of the airport, leading to their evacuation. They say that the last wind speed they registered was 86 miles an hour. After that, the wind pulled all the equipment off the roof of the airport. No more reading. Since that, this morning, in the early hours, we were told by the authorities that islanders in many in the low-lying areas of Grand Bahama had to be evacuated, areas that were not foreseen as flood risk areas. But more than 200 people in the early hours of this morning took to their rooftops because of the rising flood waters. They were brought from their homes to safe areas by fire trucks, by fire trucks and other four-wheel drive vehicles. They are now in safety. But, yes, widespread flooding. The area of Grand Bahama is without power, and some of the telephone lines are also down. Karl Penhaul, CNN, Freeport, Grand Bahama.</s>FRAZIER: Karl's report is the kind of thing that they're watching with some trepidation in St. Augustine, Florida, where CNN's Kathleen Koch is on hurricane watch. And it's good to see those images, Kathleen, because where you are right now, weather so nice, you could be lulled into a false sense of security there.</s>KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Indeed, Stephen. And we really haven't had many storm bands here yet. But, still, if you look at this historic square, they have already boarded up. They were boarding up back on Thursday when we first got here to town. So they are really taking this storm very seriously. And one of the reasons is that when you look over here, you'll see that this city, the historic part of the town, is surrounded on three sides by water, two rivers and a bay. And so it really does not take much for it to flood. This morning, one of our crews went about town and they were able to find business owners still filling up sandbags, still propping them up against the doors of their businesses, still hoping to save any property inside. Because, we're told, again, in just a severe rain storm that you can have flooding, eight, 10, maybe even 12 inches. Now right here, in this historic plaza, in the center of town, again, this is the oldest city in the country, founded back in 1565 by Spain. They planned a birthday party here today. And unfortunately, because of all the threats from Hurricane Frances, they canceled it. However, there was one group that still did have a celebration right here in this pavilion behind me. They're gone now. But it was a local couple renewing their wedding vows. Ryan Cooper (ph) and his wife, Kristen (ph), they had eloped a year ago. He is with the Marines. He served with the 1st Marine Expeditionary unit, the first group into Baghdad. And as soon as he got back from Iraq, they ran off and eloped. But they have been wanting for quite some time to get together with their entire family, renew their vows. And they said they were going to do it hurricane or not. Now, they only had 20 people, versus the original 60 who had intended to come. But they say that they were very happy, and the rest of it went off without a hitch -- Stephen.</s>FRAZIER: That is a great story, Kathleen. We're delighted you brought it to us. And let's hope their marriage can weather many, many more storms over the years.</s>KOCH: Quite so.</s>FRAZIER: Kathleen Koch in St. Augustine. Thanks.</s>STOUFFER: Not even a Cat 2 could get in their way. Well, there is never a good time for a hurricane, but a holiday weekend, well, it's one of the worst times for Florida. Take, for example, St. Augustine. It is a ghost town, after tourists and residents packed up and left. CNN's David Mattingly reports.</s>DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The slow approach of Hurricane Frances gave beach-goers in St. Augustine one more day in the sun. But the choppy surf was a constant reminder the fun was not going to last.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And this is the first time we ever boarded up our home. We never did that before. Just because of the wind of the storm, we're afraid it might not hit -- not hit us, but the wind itself might cause a lot of damage.</s>MATTINGLY: Thousands made their hurricane decisions early. Labor Day Weekend crowds who were supposed to come to celebrate the city's 439th anniversary stayed away. Celebrations were canceled, and empty sight-seeing trolleys were a sign of a big money holiday lost.</s>JOHN YEARY, TOUR GUIDE: I'm seeing no one. I'm seeing people boarding up stores and maybe a few people walking around, but not much.</s>MATTINGLY: Below sea level in some areas, St. Augustine is always prone to flooding. But long-time residents say it's unusual to see so many boarded windows and sandbags. Frances is one storm everyone is taking seriously.</s>PAUL WILLIAMSON, CITY SPOKESMAN: So everybody is just kind of -- I use the word a lot, we're poised. We're just kind of waiting to see what happens right now.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Emergency Operation Center. May I help you?</s>MATTINGLY: Shelters opened Friday night for people living in probable flooding areas. They were encouraged not to wait until the last minute to leave home. (on camera): And while it's still too early to tell how strong Frances will be when it reaches north Florida, the 10 to 20 inches of rainfall predicted could easily take streets normally clogged with tourists and fill them with flood waters. David Mattingly, CNN, St. Augustine, Florida.</s>FRAZIER: And, of course, any other Labor Day Weekend, Walt Disney World in Florida would be packed. But not this holiday weekend. Mickey and Minnie Mouse and Donald Duck and the rest of the gang aren't taking any chances on the storm. Even Donald with his webbed feet isn't hanging around. Walt Disney World closed all of its theme parks today amid concern about possible winds and rains from the hurricane. Its hotels are still opened to accommodate about 75,000 holiday guests. Disney officials say they are monitoring the storm and will reopen the parks as soon as any storm-related dangers have passed.</s>STOUFFER: And we want to get more now on the blow to Florida tourism. We're joined by travel industry analyst Tom Nulty. Thanks so much for being with us today.</s>THOMAS NULTY, TRAVEL INDUSTRY ANALYST: Good to be back.</s>STOUFFER: First of all, flights, anybody flying in or out of Florida today?</s>NULTY: You know, there are some people. When you take a look at the Flight Explorer software program, you can actually see that there are still some flights going in and out, but they're primarily on the west coast, in the Tampa and Ft. Myers area. But Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Orlando, West Palm Beach, no flights at all.</s>STOUFFER: Forget it. All right. And this thing is so slow as it's heading across Florida. When might things get back to normal?</s>NULTY: Well, American Airlines, which is one of the large carriers in Florida, is projecting -- they were earlier projecting they would be back to business this evening in Miami. But they're now saying tomorrow morning from Miami. Then they'll slowly start opening the airports throughout the day. They'll open up the Fort Lauderdale, then West Palm Beach. They won't open up Orlando until Monday afternoon.</s>STOUFFER: And because you have so much warning on a hurricane, I know cruise lines are able to change their itineraries. But this is a pretty big storm to try to steer around.</s>NULTY: It's a big storm, but I think there was some good news and bad news for people. The good news is that some people got on extended cruises. In fact, I was talking to the president of Royal Caribbean Cruise Line yesterday and he told me that one of their ships came in early in order to let people off so they could go home. But they were going to take the ship back out to see, and they decided -- they actually offered the passengers, if you'd like to stay, we will take you back out to sea again. So 800 people got off and they all got back on again, and they went back out. So they had been -- been touring the seas on a cruise to no where, but enjoying themselves.</s>STOUFFER: Following the sun with a drink in hand, I guess.</s>NULTY: Exactly. Right. Other cruise passengers weren't so lucky. Their seven-day cruises are becoming six and five-day cruises. But the cruise companies are taking good care of them with extra perks and other things to make it worth their while.</s>STOUFFER: If you had Labor Day plans for this weekend, and you were hoping you could still pull it off, and now it's obvious you're not going to be able to, what do you do? How do you go about canceling?</s>NULTY: Yes, well, it's difficult. You're going to have a hard time getting through to airlines. So if you booked through a travel agency, I suggest you call them. Most of them have 800 numbers. Some of the online travel agencies, like Orbitz and others, also answer telephones. In addition to that, they have been proactively sending messages to people that purchased from them, telling them what to do. Now, if you actually end up going to the airport, then you want to be prepared for it. Because it's going to a mess when things start up. Go comfortably, bring some extra food, snacks, other things, especially if you have kids with you...</s>STOUFFER: Right.</s>NULTY: ... because it's going to be a mess. And you could find yourself sitting on airplanes for a long time. So be prepared for it.</s>STOUFFER: And no one likes to do that.</s>NULTY: No.</s>STOUFFER: Well, let's take you to from the East Coast airports to the West Coast, because we have this situation at LAX today.</s>NULTY: Right.</s>STOUFFER: Shut down. There were two separate incidents, one involving a suspicious person, and one, mixed reports about some sort of corroded batteries in a flashlight that either set off some minor explosion or perhaps set off some kind of detection machine. You know that airport so well. How could this be affecting things?</s>NULTY: Well, it's going to basically clog things up. I know where one of the incidents took place in terminal six, which is towards the end of the terminal link. And it really shut down three terminals because they're linked together. And because of the way that airport is designed, when those three terminals are closed, they really have no choice but to close everything else, just the way the traffic flow goes there. The other thing that happens is that the Bradley International Terminal is right at the end of the horseshoe. And if there's an incident there, they have to close it down as well. So they have had a double whammy. It's going to be very, very difficult for them to get things going again. A there are going to be lot of flights delayed all over the country as a result of this, because those departing airplanes were headed to other destinations. And from those destinations, they were supposed to depart. So people are going to be delayed around the country as a result of this country around</s>LA. STOUFFER: And the longer it's closed the worse it's going to get around the country.</s>NULTY: It will be a mess. It's going to be a mess.</s>STOUFFER: Tom, thanks.</s>NULTY: My pleasure.</s>STOUFFER: We've had a lot to cover on both sides of the country.</s>NULTY: My pleasure.</s>STOUFFER: Tom Nulty, thank you.</s>FRAZIER: And you can follow Frances' projected path by logging on to cnn.com/hurricanes. Some very powerful tools there to show you the storm, and you'll also find links to emergency information and resources, as well as tips on what you should do during a hurricane. Bill Clinton is preparing to undergo heart surgery. The former president talked exclusively with Larry King last night. We'll find out what warning he now has for Americans who may think they have a healthy heart.