West Palm Beach Officials Warn Residents to Keep Up Their Guard
CABRERA: It's our breaking news right now. Hurricane Dorian, a category 4 storm with sustained winds up to 150 miles per hour. It's bearing down on the Bahamas now. And will head toward Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas next. CNN's Chad Myers is live in the Severe Weather Center. Chad, what kind of timeline are we talking about at this point?</s>CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Still probably 30 hours from the Bahamas. But the problem is it may stop and sit over the Bahamas for 36 additional hours as either a 150- or 140-miles-per-hour storm. You can see the eye on the visible satellite now, very distinct, very clear. Even at times, you can see the ocean through it. Hurricane hunters were in it earlier, and they took this picture. You can see the round part of the eye itself. And every time they get into the eye, and the eye is calm, but it's a raucous flight trying to get there, they drop one of these little guys. They drop it all the way down to the ocean. And what they do, when it hits the ocean, they will get the pressure of the storm. And they will send it out, too, in thunderstorms to see what the wind might be in the eye. It's an interesting thing that they can get those things all the way down to the ocean surface, see what the pressure is doing with the storm, and see if it is getting stronger or weaker. And so far it's gotten stronger. There's not a plane out there right now. There will be. There's a plane flying over the top of it, dropping those off from space, 45,000 feet, almost like an inverse weather balloon. Instead of going up like a weather balloon, it goes down. We get the same kind of data and the data goes into the models. We've seen this all day long where it looks like a nice smooth path all the way through Bahamas. That's not the case. It actually gets the Bahamas, and then it stops. Here we are right now. Still about from here. If I drew a line -- and I will draw it now -- all the way from here to West Palm, it's about 380 miles. But it's not going there. It's actually going to stop for a very long time, like 36 hours, and then go to the north like this. At least that's what the models think right now. Both models that we have out there, the American and European model, are saying a similar thing. We will not get a new track at 5:00 that says it's back on land again. That's not going to happen. We won't have new models until the 11:00 or even as late as tomorrow's 5:00 a.m. Maybe a breath of relief for people across the U.S. Certainly not for the Bahamas. A rough couple of days to come -- Ana?</s>CABRERA: Chad Myers, thank you for the latest.</s>MYERS: You bet.</s>CABRERA: There's still plenty of anxiety as residents along the southeast coast watch and wait for Dorian to pick a spot to strike. At one point, West Palm Beach Florida looked to be directly in Dorian's sights. Now that the latest models have the storm drifting east, officials in West Palm are warning, this is no time to drop your guard. CNN's Randi Kaye joins us from a restaurant in West Palm. Randi, what are you hearing? Are people keeping up their guard?</s>RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR & CORRESPONDENT: Some of them are, Ana, and a lot of them aren't. It seems as though the day has made a difference from where I was yesterday. We were at Home Depot yesterday, and people were in a panic. They were buying plywood, looking to board up their homes. Today, they are out bar hopping, having cocktails on a sunny, Saturday afternoon in Florida. You can see where we are not far from the beach. Just over the trees is the public beach in West Palm Beach. This restaurant, Two Drunken Goats, is the name, is usually packed on a Saturday. Some people obviously staying home. They usually have some live music. That's not happening today. We have been talking to folks here this afternoon, and some of them, really, most of them are just having a good time. Like these two here we were talking to earlier, Ashley Harris and Brie McLeod. And so now you have decided that it's safe to come out and play, I guess.</s>ASHLEY HARRIS, WEST PALM BEACH RESIDENT: Absolutely. We're all set up. We're ready to go. We have our water. My car is filled up. I'm about to go board up my grandma's House, and it's not like we're going to sit and dwell.</s>KAYE: You think it's taken a turn. You have been watching the weather and you feel pretty safe.</s>HARRIS: Yes. Even if it doesn't, Florida is pretty built up to sustain a hurricane.</s>KAYE: You told me earlier you have a cement house, so you're feeling pretty good about it.</s>HARRIS: Exactly. Even if we were to go to a shelter, they're all made of cement as well so I might as well stay at my house. It's a new house.</s>KAYE: Let me ask your friend, Brie, here because you booked a ticket to visit. You knew the hurricane was coming and you decided to come anyway.</s>BRIE MCLEOD, TOURIST: I'm here on vacation and I'm going to try to enjoy as much as I can before the hurricane hits.</s>KAYE: Are you happy to see it take its turn up north?</s>MCLEOD: I feel relieved it's going to go the other way.</s>KAYE: So you guys today are out watching college football and cocktailing and --</s>HARRIS: Swimming, enjoying ourselves, just enjoying the weather. It's nice out for sure. Going to enjoy it while it lasts.</s>KAYE: Stay safe. Enjoy yourselves. And that's the general attitude around here. People are feeling like they dodged a bullet for sure. This is Ryan Brady, the general manager of this restaurant. So obviously, the crowd may be a little smaller than it is on a typical Saturday.</s>RYAN BRADY, GENERAL MANAGER, TWO DRUNKEN GOATS RESTAURANT: Yes, definitely, a little bit smaller. I think people are being, you know, cautious and doing their preparations last minute.</s>KAYE: And you guys were probably ready to close up shop but now you think you might be able to stay open?</s>BRADY: Well, the latest reports are looking a little more optimistic for us, so we're praying that we're going to be OK. We're still planning on closing tomorrow, Monday and Tuesday. Hopefully, you know, we'll be open Wednesday, fingers crossed.</s>KAYE: I hope so, too. I hope so, too. This is a very popular spot along the beach. Part of the prep will be pulling chairs and tables, and closing these doors, and making sure that the restaurant holds up. Ryan, thank you so much and best of luck to you here.</s>BRADY: You're welcome.</s>KAYE: Ana, back to you. That's the scene of West Palm Beach.</s>CABRERA: OK, Randi Kaye, thanks for giving us a sense of how people are feeling right now. I sure hope that their hopes come true. What would you like to see done about the climate crisis? 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