Speaker 1: Bill Cunningham, the Great America, and welcome this war. It's
Speaker 1: Friday afternoon of the tri State. The Bengals tee it
Speaker 1: up about nine am on Sunday morning, kick off about
Speaker 1: eight fifteen eight twenty pm, big game against the New
Speaker 1: York Football Giants. To say, it's a crisis if they lose.
Speaker 1: It would be a crisis if they lose, because this
Speaker 1: is a team picked by Mowager to win the Super
Speaker 1: Bowl and beyond. But instead of that, they're one in
Speaker 1: four And there's no team in the NFL that is
Speaker 1: a worse record than the Bengals. There's a few one
Speaker 1: in four teams and the Bengals are one of them.
Speaker 1: So this could begin the renaissances. Rocky boyhim and said
Speaker 1: the other day that when he was with the Colts,
Speaker 1: they opened up one in four won the next ten
Speaker 1: in a row. Certainly the Bengals have the capability of
Speaker 1: doing that and more. But until then the last few
Speaker 1: days have been somewhat remarkable when it comes to weather
Speaker 1: and when it comes to hurricanes, when it comes to
Speaker 1: Ian or Helene, or when it comes to Milton, and
Speaker 1: there's been lots of coverage even this morning watching news
Speaker 1: Nation and watching many other channels, it's the dominant story
Speaker 1: in the country and that as far as what's happening
Speaker 1: and how it happened, how to stop it from happening again,
Speaker 1: what are the impacts? And one thing I found very
Speaker 1: informative is I watched the Mayor of Sarasota this morning
Speaker 1: on News Nation and he talked about the fact that
Speaker 1: there's not been a hurricane to hit Sarasota since nineteen sixty,
Speaker 1: which was during the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower. So
Speaker 1: this isn't exactly a regular event in Sarasota. Joining you
Speaker 1: and I now is Brian Innton. Brian Anton has a correspondent,
Speaker 1: has been on the scene with News Nation the last
Speaker 1: several days. And Brian Anton, welcome again to the Bill
Speaker 1: Cunningham Show. And Brian this afternoon, can you tell us
Speaker 1: what's happening now? I know you're in Tampa, Sarasota. How's
Speaker 1: the recovery going?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I appreciate you having me, Bill. It's moving along.
Speaker 2: You know, Florida.
Speaker 3: I'm from Florida. I'm a Floridian. We're really good at
Speaker 3: responding to hurricanes. And I was just on the highway
Speaker 3: between Tampa and Sarasota. I mean, it's like the cavalry
Speaker 3: is coming in, all the linemen and the search and
Speaker 3: rescue teams and the construction crews.
Speaker 2: So it's well underway.
Speaker 3: There's still, you know, a lot of people without power,
Speaker 3: but that's improving greatly. The power restoration cruis are out,
Speaker 3: you know. I was in North Tampa near the University
Speaker 3: of South Florida yesterday where I mean there's just the
Speaker 3: whole neighborhood there is underwater and it's slowly starting to recede.
Speaker 3: They were doing rescues out there yesterday. Shout out to
Speaker 3: the Hillsboro County Sheriff's office. They did an amazing job.
Speaker 3: They saved like one hundred seniors from this senior living home.
Speaker 3: There were no deaths.
Speaker 2: But it's gonna be a clean up.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, when you get four or five
Speaker 3: feet of water in your house, you think about it.
Speaker 3: You got to throw everything away, all the dry wall
Speaker 3: has to go.
Speaker 2: So it's gonna be quite a clean up process for
Speaker 2: all these folks in this part of the state.
Speaker 1: And some of the best video you have is I've
Speaker 1: seen dumpsters on top of roofs. I've seen large alligators
Speaker 1: chewing on the tires of cars. I've seen little boys
Speaker 1: plucked out of deep water by rescue workers. It's at
Speaker 1: all hands on deck. Has been one or two two
Speaker 1: incidents that you've seen that you're gonna remember for a
Speaker 1: long time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, you mentioned I was in the neighborhood
Speaker 3: where they got the fourteen year old.
Speaker 2: He was like hanging on to a.
Speaker 3: Piece of wood that was again the Hillsborough County Sheriff's office.
Speaker 3: They rescued him yesterday. I won't forget that.
Speaker 2: It's interesting, you know.
Speaker 3: The only time I've covered a lot of these storms
Speaker 3: and you get in storm mode.
Speaker 2: The only time I felt a little like that.
Speaker 3: Little ping of emotion, like I was almost gonna get
Speaker 3: a little tiary again, was just seeing all the search
Speaker 3: and rescue crews driving in right after the storm ended.
Speaker 3: You know, they stage all over the state, and you got,
Speaker 3: you know, people that they want to do this, They
Speaker 3: want to do this work. They come from all over.
Speaker 3: It's just so amazing what they do. People don't realize it,
Speaker 3: you know, because there's no power, it's hot, it's a
Speaker 3: terrible condition to work in, but they come from all
Speaker 3: over to help and I think I'll always I'll always
Speaker 3: remember that.
Speaker 1: And the other the other issue which you don't think
Speaker 1: about are the critters. I see people walking and maybe
Speaker 1: an ankle deep water or mud or maybe a waiste deep.
Speaker 1: Talk about the critters that you might encounter in Florida
Speaker 1: that you don't have like in North Carolina.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, look, we got the gators everywhere here.
Speaker 3: Bill Florida is just one big swamp.
Speaker 2: They say.
Speaker 3: Everybody of water already has a gator in it. And
Speaker 3: when the water comes up like this, this neighborhood that
Speaker 3: I was just in where it's now just all underwater,
Speaker 3: the gators are there. There was video of a gator
Speaker 3: in someone's house. The house was flooded. They left the
Speaker 3: door open and there were the gator inside. All the
Speaker 3: snakes come out. Everything is disturbed, you know, all the
Speaker 3: things that live underground here, the snakes and crabs and
Speaker 3: the holes, they all come out.
Speaker 2: Because it gets flooded. So you really do have to
Speaker 2: be careful of that.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, I had these stick boots on
Speaker 3: when I was walking in the floodwater. But even then
Speaker 3: you have to look where you walk. And that's a
Speaker 3: whole nother sort of.
Speaker 2: Part of it.
Speaker 3: You try not to think about it too much, but
Speaker 3: the gators are definitely amongst us.
Speaker 1: You know, when you live in Cincinnati or Northern can
Speaker 1: tell you live in Boone County, you live in Dayton, Ohio,
Speaker 1: you don't think much about gators. And I've often told
Speaker 1: some that that's the up in the up and the down.
Speaker 1: The mountains and the valleys of life are available in
Speaker 1: Florida that unavailable other parts of the country. Kentucky had
Speaker 1: terrible incidents with tornadoes and flooding. It's awful, and the
Speaker 1: tornado is unpredictable, and maybe flooding is not really predictable,
Speaker 1: but hurricanes are. And when you think about the fatigue factor,
Speaker 1: I've seen many talk in Florida about the fatigue factor
Speaker 1: that is. This is I had on several times the
Speaker 1: mayor of Fort Myers Beach, a good man, and I'm
Speaker 1: thinking about what he's gone through the last three or
Speaker 1: four years, and it's truly unbelievable, the fatigue factor of
Speaker 1: what one goes through. And in Florida that you don't
Speaker 1: have the fatigue factor. And since you're a Floridian, can
Speaker 1: you address the issue of why would I don't know,
Speaker 1: twenty five million people live in Florida. When it seems
Speaker 1: this is a regular event, Why did that happen?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's such a good question.
Speaker 3: You know, Fort Myers Beach by the Way has been slammed,
Speaker 3: and you're right. The mayor is a great guy, and
Speaker 3: it's a beautiful area there, but they've been hit hard
Speaker 3: the last couple of years.
Speaker 2: I was thinking about that today.
Speaker 3: It's interesting you asked me that, Bill, because people have
Speaker 3: asked me that too. Gosh, you have to worry the
Speaker 3: whole chunk of the year about these storms coming. Who
Speaker 3: would we even want to live there anymore? And then
Speaker 3: they come and they have the station.
Speaker 2: I just love it here. I mean, you know, you've
Speaker 2: got eight months of the year that's beautiful. Everybody's jealous
Speaker 2: of you.
Speaker 3: It's cold and snowing everywhere else in the country and
Speaker 3: we're here and it's seventy five degrees every day in
Speaker 3: blue sky.
Speaker 2: Is a big chunk of the year.
Speaker 3: So this is the payoff, and you know, there's a
Speaker 3: bonding that happens with these storms.
Speaker 2: You know, even in the last couple of days, I
Speaker 2: realized it again. People are just so nice here.
Speaker 3: After a hurricane everybody comes together as a Floridian.
Speaker 2: Nobody, you know, you watch the national news, everybody's talking
Speaker 2: about politics.
Speaker 3: Right now and global warming and this and that.
Speaker 2: Nobody's talking about that. In Florida.
Speaker 3: They're all just helping each other out right now and
Speaker 3: giving each other hot coffee and given each other generator
Speaker 3: and making sure their neighbors are okay. And in a way,
Speaker 3: after a storm, people on the outside are thinking like, oh,
Speaker 3: you'd want to get out of there. For me, it
Speaker 3: makes me think about how much I want to stay
Speaker 3: like it. Just I like Floridians. I like it here
Speaker 3: a Florida. Do you ever hear that term Florida man?
Speaker 3: Bill Like, I'm a Florida man, and I guess I'm
Speaker 3: just proud of it.
Speaker 1: You know, Mother nature can be awful, but human beings
Speaker 1: can be so good. And when these events happen, it's
Speaker 1: like the best of humanity in the worst of mother
Speaker 1: nature meat and the human always wins in a sense
Speaker 1: over mother nature until the next storm and the next storm,
Speaker 1: and then it's, oh my god, here we go again.
Speaker 1: There's two more hurricanes out in the Atlantic now, I
Speaker 1: am told by Tony Bender and others don't worry about it,
Speaker 1: that's gonna go north, gonna go east. But to have
Speaker 1: a hurricane form quickly in the western Gulf of Mexico
Speaker 1: and then they had to east at that rapid race
Speaker 1: and to become a category five hit at category three.
Speaker 1: I think this sand has talked about the other day
Speaker 1: is that that's not happened. It's very unusual. Every sixty
Speaker 1: five years it happened. But when it happens, boom about
Speaker 1: a boom bauta bing bauta, bang like you have with
Speaker 1: with Ian Helene and Milton, and there were two other storms.
Speaker 1: When I talked to Mayor Dan Alllers of Fort Myers
Speaker 1: Beach yesterday, I talked to him also on Monday. Uh,
Speaker 1: he talked When I talked to him on Monday before
Speaker 1: the crises really hit, I said, what's going to happen?
Speaker 1: He said, well, we're probably going to have five to
Speaker 1: eight feet of storm surge that's going to envelop go
Speaker 1: over the top of the whole island for several hours,
Speaker 1: and then after that it's going to recede and we're
Speaker 1: going to rebuild. So I talked to him yesterday and uh,
Speaker 1: and he was wonderful. He couldn't have been better about well,
Speaker 1: you know, everything is basically destroyed, every building is affected.
Speaker 1: We have we start to rebuild. It got up at about
Speaker 1: three o'clock in the morning after the storm passed, and
Speaker 1: I got here with my with my crew from the
Speaker 1: City of Fort Myers speech. We got to work. So
Speaker 1: the first thing we got to do. We have one
Speaker 1: to two feet of mud and sand everywhere. There's no
Speaker 1: road that's passable. And so the first thing we got
Speaker 1: to do is get bulldozers and start getting this scrape
Speaker 1: scrape the roads, and then we we kind of get
Speaker 1: the utilities going. He said, within a week or two,
Speaker 1: we're gonna be functional again. Isn't that almost the attitude
Speaker 1: of the Alamo, in which, okay, we're Americans, but we're
Speaker 1: gonna cat And I thought most people would have to
Speaker 1: go through that, they would say I'm done, I've had it,
Speaker 1: not gonna do it. But that's that's not the Florida attitude.
Speaker 3: No, it's not, especially if you live on those barrier islands.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know that you are vulnerable, so you've
Speaker 3: got plans in place, and and again you just you.
Speaker 2: Have to cut through some of the red tape. I
Speaker 2: was listening to DeSantis this morning.
Speaker 3: You know, they got all the bridges open right away
Speaker 3: that the storm passed through overnight and by the morning
Speaker 3: they were opening up all the major bridges because they
Speaker 3: had the bridge inspectors ready to go. You know, they
Speaker 3: weren't going to start at nine am the next morning
Speaker 3: and be able to just chill and come on over
Speaker 3: and do the whole bureaucratic thing. You know, they had
Speaker 3: them staged in hotels and ready to get out immediately
Speaker 3: when the storm passed and go inspect the bridges were
Speaker 3: do you know how it is with some states. You know,
Speaker 3: they'd be out there seven hours later and make it.
Speaker 3: You know, they they'd all have to there'd be all
Speaker 3: this red tape to jump through. Just like with the dumps.
Speaker 3: They kept the dumps open twenty four hours ahead of
Speaker 3: the storm because there was still all this debris all
Speaker 3: over the place from Hurricane Helen. People had to get
Speaker 3: rid of that debris or it was going to fly
Speaker 3: around and fly into their houses. So they said, you
Speaker 3: know what, we're keeping the dumps open twenty four hours
Speaker 3: and the dumps that were still closed that were locked.
Speaker 3: I don't know if you heard about this SHP flow
Speaker 3: to Highway Patrol. They chained their cars to the gates
Speaker 3: and they busted open the gates to one of these
Speaker 3: dumps so that people could keep dumping their debris, because
Speaker 3: you can't have bureaucracy when you've got a major hurricane
Speaker 3: coming I mean, or they're just going to have more problems.
Speaker 1: Well, when you look at this from around the country,
Speaker 1: those watching listening in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, and I've
Speaker 1: heard so many people say that is stupid, why would
Speaker 1: you live there? But then on the other side of
Speaker 1: the coin, you get the benefits of living there, and
Speaker 1: the attitude is, well, that's fine, let's move on because
Speaker 1: those barrier islands have been there for centuries. Florida's been
Speaker 1: there for five thousand years. It's not going anywhere, and
Speaker 1: the Floridian says, okay, let's go play golf. In fact,
Speaker 1: a couple friends of mine from where I belonged to
Speaker 1: a club in Naples, Florida. They're going to play golf
Speaker 1: today on the back nine cart path only, cart path only.
Speaker 2: I said that.
Speaker 1: He said, that's a major problem. I said, well, no,
Speaker 1: wait a minute, and it's like, okay, let's move on
Speaker 1: with life. And they will not let weather defeat them.
Speaker 1: And I think it began with Governor Jeb Bush. He
Speaker 1: was in power for eight years now the Santas. He
Speaker 1: institutionalized what's happened with hurricanes, and it's like, okay, now
Speaker 1: we know what to do.
Speaker 2: Let's do it.
Speaker 1: And if you're if you are hit by a series
Speaker 1: of tornadoes, you don't have things stayed ready to go,
Speaker 1: you don't have meals ready to eat, you don't have utilities.
Speaker 1: Ronda Santas has thirty thousand utility trucks. I didn't think
Speaker 1: there was not many left in the world. And so
Speaker 1: the Calvary came and today hitter is Friday afternoon. I
Speaker 1: would think by most of Florida by Monday or Tuesday.
Speaker 1: Will it be back to normal?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it will be, especially in the places
Speaker 3: that aren't. You know, there's certain areas where no matter what,
Speaker 3: no matter how many power trucks you have, they've got
Speaker 3: to get the water down.
Speaker 2: The infrastructure is destroyed.
Speaker 3: But yeah, most of them listen, they'll get the power
Speaker 3: on fast. And you mentioned Jeb Bush. You know the
Speaker 3: building codes. He was instrumental in standardizing the building codes
Speaker 3: across the entire state and starting during the Jeb Bush years.
Speaker 3: If you built anything in Florida, it's so strong. It's
Speaker 3: like you build the houses now here like bunkers. So
Speaker 3: when you see any new construction Jeb Bush and on,
Speaker 3: it's the houses are pretty much untouched. Even category category five.
Speaker 3: The roofs don't blow off. The issue is still the water.
Speaker 3: You can't stop the water from getting in. But yeah,
Speaker 3: I mean, people are prepared here for the most part.
Speaker 3: I mean, look, if you just lost your house, you
Speaker 3: might not be as optimistic as I sound right now,
Speaker 3: but you know, hopefully you had insurance. And again, Floridians
Speaker 3: just kind of endure and people who make a choice
Speaker 3: to live in Florida and move here. I'm from here,
Speaker 3: I was born here, but I'm rare. I mean most,
Speaker 3: that's so rare. Most people have moved here because they
Speaker 3: make the choice to live here. They like the culture,
Speaker 3: and you know, they the hurricanes kind of come with.
Speaker 2: It a little bit.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: Mayor Dan Allers is from Minnesota, and when Minnesota or
Speaker 1: Cincinnati has a say it was a foot of storm predicted,
Speaker 1: people come together. They shop to go to Kroger, get
Speaker 1: everything prepared, They get milk, they get their bread, they
Speaker 1: hunger down. There's a coming together because there's an outside
Speaker 1: crisis in which we have to come together. That happens
Speaker 1: in Florida all the time. Now, lastly, there was a
Speaker 1: question about global warming, asked to run Sanus and I
Speaker 1: might play it later on again. He had a fabulous answer,
Speaker 1: can you going to summarize because the national media often
Speaker 1: wants to, you know, there has to be certain pigeon
Speaker 1: holding of certain events to fit in the category. And
Speaker 1: of course the category is global warming, and Republicans especially
Speaker 1: get global warming questions all the time. And probably the
Speaker 1: atmosphere and the environment is warming a degree or two
Speaker 1: over the last one hundred and fifty years. But can
Speaker 1: you kind of summarize ron to Santas's answer when some
Speaker 1: reporters said, mister gavin or mister Gammon or mister gavinor
Speaker 1: went back global warming and he kind of gave an
Speaker 1: answer that was unbelievable.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, and you got to play it later.
Speaker 2: Because it was good, and I won't do a justice,
Speaker 2: but he basically.
Speaker 3: Said he went back and he was able to write
Speaker 3: on the spot to recount all of the major hurricanes
Speaker 3: that happened, you know, one hundred plus years ago that
Speaker 3: impacted Florida, including like the strongest hurricane ever I think
Speaker 3: was almost one hundred years ago, And he had the
Speaker 3: dates and everything in his answer, but he basically was
Speaker 3: just making the point like, look, we've been dealing with
Speaker 3: storms forever here, and in fact, these aren't even as
Speaker 3: strong as the ones that came long before global warming
Speaker 3: was even a concern. And regardless of how you feel
Speaker 3: about global warming, look, I mean there's all sorts of
Speaker 3: stuff on both sides, and all sorts of scientists, But
Speaker 3: I guess I just never understand why these questions come
Speaker 3: up right during the crisis, Like, you know, people are
Speaker 3: literally still being pulled out of houses and we don't
Speaker 3: know who's dead and who's alive, and you've always got
Speaker 3: this one reporter that wants to talk about global warming,
Speaker 3: and I don't know, I mean just always seems like
Speaker 3: isn't there a better time to do that? You know,
Speaker 3: It's just I don't know, like, isn't there something more
Speaker 3: important to ask the governor right in this moment when
Speaker 3: you know, have so many people don't have power, And
Speaker 3: it's just always kind of it's it's never a low.
Speaker 3: It's always it's always someone from some other place or
Speaker 3: someone with some agenda that I feel like doesn't really
Speaker 3: care about what's actually happening in Florida.
Speaker 1: Brian Anton, thank you. And it's a perfect shut up
Speaker 1: because the trade winds coming off Africa, they have a
Speaker 1: long way to develop many times. Or in the Gulf
Speaker 1: of Mexico, it's hot water, it's summertime, it's been warm,
Speaker 1: and it's shallow. And here you have the Canadian plateaus,
Speaker 1: and you have the Mexican plateaus, and you have the
Speaker 1: two bumpers between the Alleghanies and the Rockies. Those are
Speaker 1: the tornadoes and the hurricanes have a perfect body of
Speaker 1: water to form. Hundreds of miles of open ocean that's
Speaker 1: shallow and hot, and the winds begin to swirl. Here
Speaker 1: we go, you pick up the heat from the ocean,
Speaker 1: fantastic winds. They have to go somewhere. They pile into
Speaker 1: the golf coast somewhere. It's just the way nature is.
Speaker 1: It's kind of like nature's air conditioning. The reason that
Speaker 1: exists is it distributes different temperatures throughout the globe. And
Speaker 1: that's the purpose of a cyclone. The purpose of a
Speaker 1: hurricane is to take warm from the south and drive
Speaker 1: it up to the north to moderate temperatures. It's kind
Speaker 1: of like God's air conditioning, and that's why it happens,
Speaker 1: and it's part of nature. But Harry Anton, give my
Speaker 1: best all the folks at the News Nation, especially Sean Compton,
Speaker 1: once again, thank you for coming on the Bill Cunningham Show.
Speaker 1: And Brian Anton. You're a great American and you're a
Speaker 1: great Floridian.
Speaker 2: Well, I appreciate that. Thank you, Bill. It's nice to
Speaker 2: talk with you.
Speaker 1: God bless America. Let's continue with more the line becomes
Speaker 1: available five one, three, seven, four, nine, seven thousand. Bill
Speaker 1: Cunningham getting ready for the Bengals on Sunday News Radio
Speaker 1: seven hundred WULW