Florida officials brace for severe storms this weekend

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The director of Florida's Division of Emergency Management joined AccuWeather to discuss how they're preparing for potential flooding, tornadoes, power outages and more ahead of severe storms this weekend.
Transcript
00:00 Much of Florida is in the path of this incoming storm system.
00:02 And joining us with the steps already underway
00:06 in preparation and safety for residents of Florida
00:09 is Kevin Guthrie.
00:10 You may recognize Kevin.
00:11 He's the director of the Florida Division of Emergency
00:14 Management.
00:14 And it's good to have you back, Director Guthrie.
00:17 Hey, glad to be here, Jeff.
00:19 Thanks for having us on.
00:20 Well, thank you.
00:20 You have an important task.
00:22 And this weekend, you're back in the spotlight again.
00:26 So how are your teams preparing as this weekend storm
00:28 approaches?
00:31 So Jeff, the governor today activated the State Guard.
00:35 This is not the Florida National Guard,
00:36 but this is the Florida State Guard
00:38 to assist the division with any type of response and recovery
00:41 actions that we may end up having
00:42 to take throughout the weekend.
00:44 So we have the Florida State Guard at our disposal.
00:47 Of course, we have our regular public safety agencies
00:49 like Florida Highway Patrol, Florida Department
00:51 of Law Enforcement, Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission.
00:55 All of those traditional partners
00:57 will be working with us, Department of Transportation
00:59 is ready.
01:00 Specifically, the division has our personnel standing by.
01:03 We also have our flood response and control devices
01:06 that are staged in Orlando and ready to deploy
01:09 throughout the state.
01:10 We have pumps available.
01:11 We have hosing available.
01:13 So all of that is prepped and ready.
01:15 State Guard to help us with the manpower,
01:17 and our other state agencies to help us
01:20 with any of the other type of response actions
01:22 we may need to take.
01:24 And with this being a multi-pronged severe weather
01:27 threat, we're looking at the flooding rain
01:28 that you talked about.
01:29 Coastal flooding is also a concern
01:31 with that onshore wind shoving seawater into land.
01:34 And there is the risk of wind and tornado damage possibly,
01:37 too.
01:37 So what are you most concerned about?
01:39 I think what I'm most concerned about at this point in time
01:42 is our coastal erosion issues.
01:44 From Hurricanes Ian, Nicole, Adelia, more so Ian and Nicole,
01:48 we're still recovering from a lot of the beach erosion
01:51 that happened in those areas.
01:52 So coastal erosion is going to be one of our primary concerns.
01:56 I think a secondary concern is going to be electrical outages.
02:00 And I want to tell our viewers, we're
02:01 going to have electrical outages.
02:03 I've talked to FPL.
02:05 I've talked to Duke.
02:06 I've talked to some of our other electrical partners.
02:09 We don't have 40,000 electrical workers assembled and staged.
02:13 This is not a Cat 5 hurricane.
02:15 This is an El Nino weather pattern, if you will.
02:19 So we don't have all of those trucks amassed.
02:21 But Florida Power Light, Duke Energy,
02:24 our municipal electric associations,
02:25 our cooperative electric associations
02:27 are monitoring the weather very closely.
02:30 They will respond to these situations.
02:32 They will get the power restored as quickly as possible.
02:35 But I think the expectation of what we've had after hurricanes
02:38 is that's going to be in the next 24 to 48 hours.
02:40 It may take us a little bit longer
02:42 to get that done in this situation, Jeff.
02:44 And is there a geographical part of Florida
02:47 where you're most concerned about the greater risk?
02:51 This thing's been developing, it seems like now,
02:53 for two or three days.
02:54 I think what I would say at this point
02:56 is our Central Florida corridor right along the I-4 area.
03:00 If this thing does set up a little bit further
03:02 to the north, we're looking at the Big Bend or that area that
03:04 was impacted by Hurricane Adelia earlier this year.
03:07 So we're looking somewhere in that I-4 corridor
03:10 upwards of the Big Bend area is our primary watch area,
03:14 if you will.
03:15 And we'll respond accordingly to it.
03:18 All right, well, we appreciate your insight.
03:20 And all that you're doing to keep people in Florida safe.
03:24 That's Director Kevin Guthrie there
03:25 in Tallahassee, Florida, with Florida Emergency Management.
03:29 And Kevin mentioned this is an El Nino year.
03:31 And we do expect to see a more active than average winter
03:36 for severe weather in the south.
03:38 And something that he was keying in on.
03:41 And this may be the first in a series of active storms

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