Deadly plane crash & election stress

Good morning, everyone. And thanks so much for joining us here on this Monday, November 2nd. We are officially another month down and saying goodbye to Halloween. I know on our stream, they were just having the conversation about whether or not you're going to decorate for Christmas just yet. I am not there yet, but I bet some of you are. Either way. Happy November. We are just one day out from election day and we've got a lot to get to on this rendition of Fox Tampa Bay Live. I'm your host and executive producer Regina Gonzalez with you for the next hour. And here's a little look at what we are following and what we're going to cover. So I actually do want to take you out live right now to this breaking news out of the West Palm Beach area that we have been following for quite some time now. A horrendous, This horrific story, nine people killed and major questions. After a private jet. Crashed in Palm Beach County, retired naval pilot Rich Kolko is going to join us in just a few to explain what the video that we have of this happening and even the crew's radio calls could tell investigators. Plus, we did just get word from the NTSB that there is going to be an official media briefing today on yesterday's crash at one o'clock eastern time at the Emergency Operations Center in West Palm Beach. So we are going to be. We're going to be streaming this at 1 o'clock on the Fox Local app and on social media. So be sure to stick with us for any updates because your heart just breaks for these people. And now the questions surround what happened, how could have this have happened? And a lot of questions surrounding the scene, so we will get to that in just a moment. Meanwhile, like I said, just a day away from election day and the candidates for Florida A governor are making their final Push for votes, they are crisscrossing the state and we are gonna follow today's campaign stops as David Jolly and Byron Donald make their closing arguments to voters. Byron Donald's already in the Bay Area, David Jolly expected to speak at 11.30, so we're gonna have a little chitchat about why this time is stressful for people who might be casting their votes. We're gonna talk with the crisis center of Tampa Bay, but we're also going to take some of their remarks. These are usually pretty long pressers. When they do them, but we'll let you listen into both of the candidates at some point on the show. For sure, and big news with the lightning over the weekend, we are going to follow any feeds coming in from Benchmark Arena today because there were reports over the weekend that Nikita Kucherov requested a trade. So while the Lightning say they have no intention of trading him, we're monitoring feeds to see if we can get any sound from the general manager, from the head coach, from Nikita himself. So Mark Scull Jr. with our sports department headed over there right now. And we will try to get you some information on that and what could possibly be happening. And then really quickly, towards the end of our show, Tampa Bay landmarks are going to light up in teal tonight for Alzheimer's Awareness Month. So we're going to meet a woman who turned her experience caring for her mom into a mission to help other families. So that's a look at some of what's coming up. And then, of course, we are monitoring some pretty severe weather. So I want to head out to this live feed that we have coming in right now from. West Central Florida, we don't have too much information. This is courtesy of our Fox 35 Orlando team. But, I mean, we had a huge amount of rain in a really short period of time. We can even go from Central Florida out to a live look we have of Lakeland right now, where the rain is still coming down. So how long can we expect to see these showers? And is this going to continue well beyond the week? I know because of El Nino, we could see more rain than we We normally are used to seeing over the winter. So let's head out to the weather lab where Fox 13 meteorologist Jim Weber is joining us on this Monday. Hey, Jim, yeah lots of rain. A lot of rain all weekend long, especially yesterday, just rained all day through the evening hours. And you still, you're looking at the Sky Tower vector scan and you see a lot of that rain out there. So it's gonna continue for several more hours. The good news is it is going to start to taper off as we go through later today into tomorrow. But I wanna start off by just showing you this here. And this is our weather alert system and it is lit up like a Christmas tree and that's not a good thing. With all the alerts, we've got flash flood warning, We have flood advisories, the bottom four, those are for river flooding, and you see the reason why. You look at the rainfall totals, especially over on the East Coast and also throughout some of our interior locations, Hardee, DeSoto, Highlands County, into eastern Polk County, between 7 to 11 inches of rain. We also have that flash flood warning currently over on the eastern side of the state. We have that over our interior locations as well. So it is very busy. You look at Sky Tower Vector Scan right now and you see we just continue to watch these very slowly inching towards the west. But these areas that have been hit really hard over the past 24 hours, that is Hardy DeSoto in the Highlands County, continue to see some very heavy rain. You look right along US 27. Between Lake Placid and Sebring all the way up towards Avon Park, you see some very heavy rain. You notice how slow it is moving as well. So they're going to pick up an additional several inches, two to three inches of rain in this area. And then you look over in the Polk County, especially into, say, southern Polk County. From Lake Wales all the way down towards Frost Proof, Hillcrest Heights, seeing some very heavy rain in these areas as well. You stretch over towards Lakeland, along I-4, you're heading over towards Orlando. Not a really fun drive right now. It's never a fun drive, but now you have the heavy rain on top of it. As you move over into Hillsborough County, it's eastern Hillsborough County, where we have that sea light, in some cases some moderate rain in those areas. But throughout downtown Tampa, it's dry right now. Pinellas County, you are dry as well. You look down into Manatee and Sarasota, and you're seeing just some light to moderate rain in those areas. So we'll continue to see more of this slowly tapering off as we go through the afternoon. You look at what we have as far as the flood advisory. You see that large area throughout Polk County all the way down into eastern Manatee, and then that flash flood warning. That goes for Hardy, DeSoto, and Highlands County until 1. 45 this evening or this afternoon, so flood watch that is until three o'clock this afternoon. The rain, it's gonna continue for several more hours. You watch the Fox weather model and there you see as we head through this afternoon, still lots of clouds, we'll still have some showers, but at least we're starting to break this up. So I'm heading into tomorrow, still some showers around, but compared to what we've had, Over the past several days, the rain chances, they're going down, so only about a 50% chance as we head into Wednesday and Thursday, and then we start to dry things out even more as we head towards the end of the week. So, seven-day forecast after we get past this period here today into tomorrow, better weather heading our way, drier, in fact, much drier air will be moving in as we head towards the weekend. That means we finally get back to... Be in the sunshine state because it has definitely not been that over the past, what, 36 hours or so. Yeah, that weekend forecast looks pretty nice, Jim. Yeah, it seems like the last several weekends we've had issues, so it'd be nice to get a good weekend in here. Definitely. Well, Jim, thank you so much. I know you're going to keep us posted on the rain throughout the day, so we'll talk to you soon. Alrighty. All right, and we did get word that this shot of flooding from our sister station, Fox 35 Orlando, is coming out of Brevard County. So as Jim was just describing, you've got the radar showing lots of different clouds passing by with just dumping several inches of rain on some of these areas in short periods of time. So we're going to continuously check this shot. We'll keep in touch with our team out in Central Florida. And we'll let you know how conditions remain throughout the day. But this is just a pretty wild visual at how fast streets can flood when you see this much rain in a little period of time. Meanwhile, we do want to continue as we track rain here and really all across the state. We're also following questions about the weather conditions before this deadly plane crash in South Florida. Nine people killed when a private jet traveling from Texas to the Bahamas crashed yesterday. Yesterday along military trail in Palm Beach County. This is a live look at the scene right now. If you go beyond that tape, you can see a literal crater in this street. And it actually does look like we've just managed to lose that. That had been up for quite some time. So hopefully we'll be able to get that back. But we do have really disturbing footage that a dash cam on a car managed to capture of the moments that this crash happened. So I want to warn you, this is just really shocking to look at, but I feel like it puts into perspective how fast this plane came down and the way that it came down. And we want to show it to you before we bring on Rich Kolko, a retired naval pilot. Now we know before the crash, the crew reported ice and turbulence to air traffic control. We're going to get off this video because it's like you can only look at it for so long. Rich Kolko, retired naval pilot, very friendly face here on FOX 13, joining us now. Rich, I know you've had a lot of conversations about this over the course of the last 12 hours, but I need to ask your immediate reaction when you see something like this. What goes through your mind in your former profession? Good morning, thanks for joining our coverage. Yeah, Regina, good to be here. Sorry, it's such an awful story and just you're right, difficult to watch and that audio that's out there is difficult to listen to. There's decisions that people have to make, that pilots have to make and the first one, one of the first ones they teach you in flight school is you never, Fly into, near, over, under a thunderstorm. Well, you can try and get over it, but you don't enter a thunderstorm and it appears that may have been what happened here. That creates that turbulence, that creates icing. And if you have icing, there's very little else that can go wrong in an airplane that has every single thing that can cause a problem other than icing, perhaps other than a fire on board. Everything that can go wrong does go wrong. Maybe what we've seen here, we certainly won't know until the NTSB issues a final report, but based on the radio information we have, the weather reports we can look at, the ATC communications, it's certainly very possible that that is the cause of this tragedy. Yeah, you mentioned that ATC communication, Rich. I actually do want to play a short portion of that because there's some technical language here. And I want you to help us understand what they were experiencing. Here's that real quick. Clear ice and moderate turbulence. Say again. 722 Bravo Delta 350. Moderate turbulence. Plus or minus. Okay, now 700 feet. 600 feet. Roger, say outside air temperature. Negative 47 degrees Celsius. We're managing the ice, but it is moderate turbulence. We're at direct freeze point. Okay, N722BD, roger. Let me know if you need anything else. I'm just working here in my airspace right now. Thank you. If you have any better rides, let us know, N722BD. N722BD, the rides do improve in my airspace. You're kind of far outside of it right now, and you can expect better rides ahead. Roger, 722 Bravo Delta, and now we're picking up precipitation. We need to climb 370 if we're able, 722 Bravo Delta. November 722, Bravo Delta, roger. Climb and maintain climbable 370, no further right than your present heading for traffic. Climb 370, 722 Bravo Delta. 722, Bravo Delta, we're descending 8,000, mayday, mayday, we're descending 10,000 feet per minute. Roger, November 722, Bravo Delta, roger. Rich, I just I hate and we honestly cut the portion of the call where you can really hear the pilot getting frantic and you hear I think the co-pilot praying in the back. It's just we'll get to that in just a moment. But the crews reporting ice and moderate turbulence, then you hear them talking about that really quick descent. I guess my question to you is how do pilots assess whether conditions like this are manageable and when they need to get out of Well, let's break that down a bit. First of all, the pilot you heard talking there was probably the co-pilot, because traditionally in a two-person flight deck, the person operating the controls flying the airplane, the other person is doing the radios and the navigation. So the fact that you heard her voice on there. Don't know yet for a fact but likely she was acting as the co-pilot at least at that moment while the other person was trying to control the airplane. This comes down to icing and icing on an aircraft is absolutely disastrous. Anybody who's flown out of any airport in the north knows that if the weather's bad, they stop and de-ice your airplane because even a quarter inch of ice can change the size or the shape of the wing. And if that happens, it doesn't work like a wing anymore. It just works like an anchor and an airplane will fall out of the sky. Once you get a quarter inch of ice or a little more built up, the airplane starts to lose lift and it increases the drag. So the power settings won't keep the airplane going in the air. Stall speeds change. And even at 35,000 or 37,000 feet, airplane can stall and falls out of the sky is maybe what we saw happen yesterday. So what occurred is you heard them say the temperature was minus 42 or 47. That's Celsius, which that comes out to. For those that think in Fahrenheit about minus 50, which believe it or not is actually a little too cold for ice. Yes. So you typically don't get the icing on the airplane because you're not bumping into the water at that temperature. However, if you're flying over or near a thunderstorm, the precipitation can actually come upwards and the water can come up onto the airplane and cause that ice. So a lot of people's initial reaction is, it's cold up here, I want to get of icing, I'm going to go down, okay? Well, surprise, the icing level or icing layer yesterday in Florida was 15,000 feet. So at 35,000 feet, they still got to get 20,000 feet down to get below icing conditions. So that's why they asked for 37,000, they want to go up 2,000 and hopefully get up over the thunderstorm. And be out of icing conditions or at least where no more precipitation was getting on the aircraft causing the icing. There's anti-icing tools on the airplane, there's de-icing tools on the airplane. There are two different things. You turn on anti-ice when you're. Entering the icing conditions that heats up the inlets to the engines to make sure no ice forms going into the engines. And then on the wings, you have de-icing. So when you start to look out and see some icing and you've got some indicators that say icing is building up on the wings, you operate the de-icing. For those of you that I've sat on an airplane and looked out the wing and it looks like black rubber on the leading edge, that's a de-icing tool. It's almost like a little balloon. If ice builds up, the pilot can inflate it, it pops the ice off. And hopefully fix, this can happen very, very quickly. Preliminarily, it certainly looks like that may have been what happened here. They were flying into a thunderstorm, never should have done that. Should have deviated, should have landed, should have turned around. They had options, and I say that. From the safety and security of sitting in my chair here in my office, making pilot decisions in the air can be much harder. So you gotta give them some grace on making the decisions that they made at the moment. But just a dangerous awful situation and once they got into that dive, the controls would not have worked and that led to the death of those nine people on board. And I know there's a part where she says 60 degrees. Do we know, was that the outside or the angle that they were banking? Yeah, that's the angle of bank. That just simply could be that one wing had a little more ice on it than the other, and that wing stalls first, okay? And so you think of the Take an airplane, look outside, you got two wings, they're both flying. And airplanes stall, which means they don't provide the lift anymore. So if one wing had a little bit more ice on it or something like that, that wing may have stalled first and that led them into a 60 degree angle of bank. And at that point, the pilot may be putting on more power to try and pull out of that. And it just becomes... One level of thing getting worse after another, so they crashed into the ground. You hear stories all the time about pilots, when they know they're going down, they'll do everything they can to avoid homes, buildings, whatever, not trying to hit anybody on the ground. These pilots wouldn't even have had that opportunity here. They had zero control over the airplane at that time. And the fact that nobody was killed or injured on the ground is just miraculous. I know, I did think that same thing, Rich, because I mean, you look at this scene and it looks like they may have just missed some sort of neighborhood or you know there were cars in the dash cam video. But Rich, people looking at the scene, May expect to see a recognizable aircraft, I've seen a lot of chatter about this on social media. Instead, they were seeing debris, but smaller debris scattered across the road and then of course a large crater. Can you explain what a high-speed impact can do to an airplane? Well, that's, Probably comparisons going back to 911 of those of remember that plane that crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. There's nothing left. There's nothing left here. There's nothing larger. I'm sure there's nothing larger than a shoebox. If that even exists of an aircraft hitting the ground at this speed, I would have just completely disintegrated. There's not going to be. Any remains, there's not gonna be any airplane parts. There may be a few bits and pieces that they do find in that crater. NTSB will be digging through that very soon. They'll use the FBI actually. The NTSB is a very small agency, just a couple hundred people. And it turns out they They have what's called an MOU, which is a- A Memorandum of Understanding, which means the FBI comes in and does the evidence collection on behalf of the NTSB. So I wouldn't be surprised to see the FBI showing up out there at some point to start going through that crater to help them collect any evidence that may possibly exist. Of course, they'll look for any other black boxes on the plane are supposed to be built. They'll look for them if there's any possibility they survived or portions of them survived where they can recover some of the information. But they got the radio calls, they have the weather reports, they'll look at the airplane maintenance history, they'll look at the training of the pilots. They'll look at a lot of things and then they'll be able to do a report at some point here. And then you think about the fact that. Is it gonna be hard identifying these people? But I'm guessing they can do that from flight records. We already know that this was a business plane or carrying business folks, huh? A charter, a charter. It may have been family, it may have been a group going on vacation. It may have been a business meeting, as you said. People leaving from Austin, Texas, heading to the Bahamas, chartered a flight instead of taking commercial aviation. And Unfortunately, disastrous results. Yeah, they'll have the manifest. They'll know who was on that plane. They probably had to clear customs or show passports since they were going to another country prior to departing. So they'll have the list of people that are on the airplane. They know who the pilots are by now. I've seen some names starting to float around out there. And it's a tough investigation and this one's gonna live on forever and I feel bad for sort of the family Family and friends and... Of the pilots on the radio there, that voice, they've got to hear that terror in her voice. I know. And the family members of the passengers in the back, knowing their family members went through this. We all have thought about airplanes going down and guessing, what is that last few moments like? People always are, what happened or what was it like? And barely do we get to understand that, but in this case, we do, and we see how absolutely horrific and terrifying it is. Yeah, it just puts a lot into perspective. Rich, I know we have to let you go, but last question, we're gonna hear from the NTSB at 1 o'clock. I know you obviously said that their investigation might be a little lengthier because of the You know, the aircraft. Disintegrating, for lack of better term, like it did. What do you necessarily expect us to get this early on? Well, I think they use the same script at every NTSB initial briefing, which says we're here, we're investigating, we're gonna gather those things we just talked about, pilot records, training records. Airplane maintenance records, passengers, weather, radar, talk to the air traffic controllers. And then they'll say that we'll hopefully have a preliminary report in a couple of months, but don't expect a final report for a year or two, and reality is how it always turns out. They kind of go by the same script because they just don't have the information yet. They're what's called a go team. There's always a team of NTSB investigators ready to go at a moment's notice. They have their own aircraft that can fly them places and They were likely on that airplane last night and on site this morning, already starting to go through that and already trying to lock down that evidence to make sure none of it just makes it harder to find later as time goes by. And these companies, they understand that. And that they, they. Accommodate the NTSB and then provide assistance to them, the plane manufacturer will help them the maintenance people help them, the pilot trainers will help them. There's no reason to withhold any of that information. They've got to figure out what happened here. What went wrong? Because I mean, there's two things here. You talk about the NTSB wanting to do an investigation. They want to know what happened here. What went wrong? But the real reason they wanna do the investigation is, can they prevent the next one from happening? They wanna see if they can get any information, any advice, any training changes, any maintenance changes to make sure this doesn't happen again. So that's a real significant reason that they conduct these investigations. Yeah, no, absolutely. You want to listen to a call like that and you hope this never happens again. Rich Kolko, retired FBI special agent and naval pilot. We appreciate you joining our coverage. I wish we were talking under better circumstances, but we'll look for that update at one and we'll talk to you soon. Thanks so much for your insight. You bet, Regina, thanks. Have a good day. You as well. All right, everyone. As we said, we do have an update from the NTSB newsroom not too long ago telling us that there is going to be a briefing at one o'clock. We are going to stream that on Fox Local and our social media pages as well. So just look out for that because I know, as Rich was saying, we have a lot of questions on what could have happened. And we'll see how much information they allow us to get. In just less than 24 hours since it happened. All right, guys, we are gonna take our first quick commercial break of the hour. When we come back, we're gonna shift gears a little bit to some election coverage and we will continue on. Stay with us. All right, everyone. We are just a day away from election day, although I know a lot of you have been taking advantage of mail-in ballots, early voting. Well, of course, one of the biggest races we are monitoring here in Florida is the race for Florida's next governor, as Governor Ron DeSantis is term limited. Democrat David Jolly versus Republican Byron Donald and both candidates. Are back in the Bay Area today. Byron Donalds has already been in Tarpon Springs this morning. We know David Jolly is holding multiple rallies throughout the day. So we do know that he mentioned a lot about, you know, what he Is campaigning for what he wants to see happen to the state of Florida. So what we want to do is play for you just a tidbit of his remarks before we then have a more in depth conversation about why election season is stressful, what you can do to ease that stress. I'm gonna share something a little personal for a moment. It's the last day. It's been a great campaign last day. Tomorrow we're gonna win because you guys are gonna get out and vote. But I want to share something personal, like my wife and I, like either it's sometimes on stage, sometimes behind the scenes, she'll come up, she'll give me, you know, like the hug hug vibes, you know, every husband's laughing because they're like, yeah, I know that one, or they kind of grab you around the neck. And so somebody saw a picture of Vaughn. They turned it into a caricature using an app. And so she sends it to me. And I go, oh, look at that. That's pretty cool. She goes, I know I love it. She's like, don't you love it? And I didn't respond for like two hours. I got caught up in something else. And I got a question mark coming back. I go, no, I do love it. It's great. I do. It's those little things sometimes in life that you think about. I want to thank you. I want to thank you. Thank you. I'm 48 years old now. My face was like, really? Yeah, I'm 48. I'm 48 years old, and you've been with me every step of the way. You've always believed in me. You always had my back. I love you, and I thank you. Most people know in life, if you're going to do anything, put politics aside. We're going to come back to that. Anytime you're doing anything in life that is worthwhile, it's a big step forward. You've got to have your people behind you. And for men, that first person is always our wives. You can't do anything powerful in life if your wife's not going to be behind you. So, honey, I very much appreciate you. Okay, I'm going to leave the nostalgia now. Now we're going to get down to business. I woke up this morning. I looked out the window. I prayed for a while. And then I said, it's time to get to work. Because we know that we're going to win this race tomorrow. And we know we're going to win. Because in Florida, the people of our state have chosen common sense time and time and time again. I was there eight years ago. I was on the debate team for then Congressman DeSantis when he was running for governor. And I remember what that election day looked like. And the people of Florida showed up. They showed out loud because they said to themselves, we live in the best state. We want to keep it going. And over the last eight years, a lot of the people sitting here around the horn in this inside the ropes, they've sacrificed in their lives, too. They've left business opportunities, they've left family, they've been on the road, they've talked to voters, they've talked to each other. When we do events and I hear a baby in the room, I never want the babies to leave. Because babies, when they cry, it's a joyful noise. But the people sitting here, they will tell you when you listen to adults cry, it's not a joyful noise. But that's the stuff that we work through every single day. But it's all for one purpose. It's all for one goal in mind. It's to make sure that the Florida dream is alive and well for the people of the Sunshine State. And that's something that we choose every election cycle. It's something we choose. In this election cycle, I'm running against a guy that Pinellas County knows. His name is Jolly. But he's an angry Jolly. He is still angry today that he lost his congressional seat 10 years ago to Charlie Crist. Oh, they got bullhorns today. That's okay. That's okay. Let me just be very clear. David Jolly is still angry that he lost his seat to Charlie Crist 10 years ago. If you listen to him, he's not talking about lowering costs for the people of Florida. If you listen to him, he's not talking about the dreams about our young people and how they're successful. If you listen to him, he's not talking about the accountability measures that matter to our state, making sure that we're doing all governments here in Florida, making sure that you know how the money's being spent. He doesn't talk about those things. All right, everyone, we are listening in to Congressman Byron Donalds campaigning in Tarpon Springs earlier today. They are gonna be all across the state. David Jolly is expected to speak any moment now. So we're gonna try to dip in and out of both. Obviously, you could see Donald's taking this time to bash David Jolly as we are just one day away from election day. And this kind of brings us into our next point. There can be a lot of conflicting opinions Around this time, we always say what should never be spoken about at the table, religion, politics. And I mean, the conversation is just really something that needs to be had, especially as we go into election day tomorrow. So what I wanna do right now is welcome in Clara Reynolds to the conversation. She is the CEO of the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay. Clara, thank you so much for being with us. How are you? Good morning, it's wonderful to be here. Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to talk about this really important topic. Yeah, I mean, especially when you're talking about really, really high stakes elections, like the next governor and US Senate seats. Do you feel like there's even more tension between folks sometimes? Or what have you noticed this election season and why is it Well, I think there are so many strong feelings across the board. so important to talk about this? I think that people feel really passionate, probably more so than I have seen in my 50 some odd years around this election, which is wonderful. It's wonderful that we are so engaged in this important democratic process. But those strong feelings can also lead us to really difficult feelings that we're struggling And so, I think it's important for us to recognize that we recognize that government plays such an important role in our lives. And I believe that's why we're so passionate about it. But at some point, that passion can become exhausting. And... Particularly when we don't have an outlet for it, so I think this is a wonderful time to have this conversation in advance of the elections tomorrow and then even post election because we know people are going to continue to have strong feelings and emotions regardless of how tomorrow plays out. Yeah, and you know, when you talk about the emotions that people feel, what have you seen at the crisis center? Is it anxiety? Is it anger? Is it all of the above? And I guess how can people deal with those emotions? What's your best advice? Yeah, it's really all of the above, although always we see many more people calling us with anxiety, lots of worry, lots of worry, no matter who is elected. And so what's really important for all of us to remember is that we can only control what we can control. And what we can control tomorrow is to make sure that we exercise our voice, is that we vote. And we want to make sure that everybody stays informed, but But when we start becoming more agitated than educated, that's when it's the time to turn off the TV, turn off social media, and do something that brings some joy. Give yourself permission to find something peaceful and something that you enjoy. And post-election, if things didn't turn out the way you wanted them to, turn that passion into action. Get involved somewhere in your community so that you can really feel like your voice is contributing to something positive in your local community. Because there's nothing that's going to continue to increase that anxiety if you continue to feel powerless over the process. And sometimes the only way you can feel and take back your power is by doing something to support whatever cause it is that is important to you. Yeah, I think that's great advice. I mean, obviously, you want your voices to be heard. And if you feel so passionately about something, you should take action with it. I want to talk about sleep because it is one of the most important things we can do. If someone is having trouble sleeping over the election, what are some tips to help them get some rest? First of all, make sure you're disengaging from any form of media at least an hour before bedtime. Give yourself that quiet space just to maybe pick up a book of something that you enjoy, not something that's necessarily related to the election. Something that can help your brain focus on different things that help you to relax. So do that first. Make sure that you're stopping your caffeine intake several hours beforehand. Make sure you've got a nice dark room, turn off the notifications, turn off all of those kind of light things. And then just, you know, if you utilize music, I tend to be a counter. I like to count backwards, anything that you can do to really disconnect your brain. It's also important that you try to get some exercise as well. So if you, you know, maybe before you go to bed an hour or so before going to bed, go for a walk. Take in some nature if you can. I know we've had some crummy weather recently. But if you can get outside, get some fresh air in, it really will help your sleep. And I know we're sitting in time change, which also can impact your sleep cycle. So kind of take that into consideration as well. But again, create those routines, stay with those routines, and it will help you with your sleep patterns moving forward. Definitely. Clara, I know that people watching this may not know how to reach you guys. If anybody watching is feeling that stress, anxiety, depression, all of the above, how can they reach out to you guys and talk those feelings through? Please know that you can call 211 24 hours a day, seven days a week to talk with one of our amazing staff who really understands what you're experiencing, what you're going through. We are here for you today, tomorrow, next week and next month. Because we recognize that the election is just the first part of this process, that there's gonna be many more feelings and emotions over the next coming week. So if you're struggling today or if you're struggling tomorrow, please know That we're here to support you. And I also just want to say thank you for being involved in our process. An involved electorate is so very important. And so make that passion into action and make sure you get out to vote. Definitely. Clara Reynolds, we always appreciate talking to you. Thank you so much for helping us even have a conversation about this because it is a really stressful time for many. So I'm sure we'll be talking to you again soon as the weeks go on and we get into the holidays. I look forward to it. Take good care. Thanks, you too, Clara. All right, everyone, stay with us. We will be right back with more news after this break. All right, everyone, as we continue our pre-election day coverage here on Fox Tampa Bay Live, we are continuing to bring you in and out of different campaign events happening by both big-time candidates for governor, Byron Donald and David Jolly. This is a live look from Haines City, where Jolly is expected to start his kind of go-around in the Tampa Bay area. We know that Byron Donald is also headed to Polk County for an event with Sheriff Grady Judd that's going to be taking place in the noon hour. So Carla Byron, our Polk County Bureau reporter, going to have some coverage of that later. And then I should mention that Fox 13's Evan Axelbank is following multiple rallies today. So he'll kind of have a good wrap on things in our later shows today on Fox 13 News. But Heather Healy doing a really great job this morning, kind of keeping us where we're at when it. It comes to polling and campaigning and how the governor's race has been looking from, you know the last few weeks up until this point. So let's listen into her latest report. Well, we are down to the final hours before election day in the race for Florida's next governor is coming down to the wire. Today, both Republican Byron Donalds and Democrat David Jolly are crisscrossing the state in a marathon sprint to rally supporters and make their final pitches to voters. Republican nominee Byron Donalds, he's going to kick off Election Eve in Tarpon Springs this morning before bringing his defending the Ford Dream bus tour to Polk County at noon. Joined by Sheriff Brady Judd and U.S. Senate candidate Ashley Moody. Donalds wraps up his trail this afternoon with a final Bay Area stop in Sarasota. Speaking to supporters over the weekend, Donalds expressed full confidence heading into Tuesday. What we know is that the voters of Florida are going to show up. Polls in a major way on election day. And we are going to win this race, and I'm going to be your next governor. Meanwhile, Democratic nominee David Jolly is on a four-stop campaign blitz across Central and South Florida to wrap up his Believe in Better tour. Jolly and running mate Gwen Graham are visiting Haines County and Polk County this morning before heading east to Brevard County and concluding tonight with rallies in Palm Beach and Broward. Speaking in South Florida on Sunday, Jolly urged supporters to seize the moment. Early voting closed across Florida over the weekend, meaning anyone who has not yet voted must cast their ballot in person tomorrow. Polls open statewide at 7 a.m. and close at 7 p.m. local time again on Tuesday. And be sure to stay with FOX 13 all day and all night tomorrow for all of your election coverage. Reporting Heather Healy, FOX 13 News. All right, thank you, Heather, for that great report. Again, David Jolly not stepping up to the podium just yet in Haines City, but we'll keep a close eye on this. If we are not able to get to it in the next 15 minutes, which I don't think we are, we will definitely have a better explainer with FOX 13's Evan Axelbank coming up later today. On Fox 13 News. All right, guys, we are going to take another quick commercial break. And when we return, we're going to have a really important conversation about Alzheimer's because it is Alzheimer's Disease Awareness Month now that it has officially hit November. So we're going to have a special guest in to talk about that. Welcome back into Fox Tampa Bay Live, everyone. Tonight, bridges, landmarks across the Tampa Bay area are going to be lit up just like this in teal. This is some footage we have from years past, all to raise awareness for Alzheimer's disease and show support for the families affected by it. November is Alzheimer's Awareness Month. And for our next guest. This mission is incredibly personal. Cheryl Ann Haley spent years caring for her mother, Sandy, as she battled Alzheimer's. And after losing her mom to the disease just a few months ago, she's made it her mission to help other families navigate that same journey. She is now a positive approach to care dementia educator and founder of Sandy's Daughter, an organization that offers support groups, workshops, and even private consultations to To help families better understand dementia and to it. To adapt to the changes that it brings, and she is actually joining us here live now on Fox Tampa Bay Live. Sherrilyn, thank you so much for coming here to talk about this incredibly important topic, and we're so sorry for the loss of your mother. I know it's only, what, it was April? April, so. Seven months, we're going into seven months now. Wow, I know we could talk about this forever, but I wanted to ask you, talk to me about when your mom first got the diagnosis, what that looked like for you and becoming her caregiver and kind of how it progressed over the years. So I began seeing signs and symptoms of Alzheimer's in my mom. Years before I realized there were signs and symptoms of Alzheimer's. And then it took some time to get her diagnosis from her doctor. Thank And even though I knew. Getting the diagnosis kind of hit hard. And after a while, I decided I had to make a decision. Either Alzheimer's was going to continue to steal my mom from me, or I was going to learn all I could you. and fight to maintain that relationship. And that's what we did to the very end. Yeah. I know that one of the toughest parts is watching a family member go through this and And start as you know them. But then in the end, it's like they're a different person. Do you feel like that's what you experienced? I don't. Good. So the positive approach to care skills that I learned, we look for what still remains in our person and how to interact with them. So I was able to keep looking at that. Sometimes I would have to step back and take a pause and try to figure out where we were headed and what was being changed with our brain. And then learn how to adapt to it myself. Yeah, when did you start Sandy's Daughter? So I started the Facebook page in 22. That was when I began my training for Positive Approach to Care. And I realized that I had so much information to share, but I didn't want my personal Facebook to be dementia heavy. I wanted to maintain myself while navigating this with my mom. But I wanted other family caregivers and families to know that they could still seek out Like I don't want to candy coat this. It's hard and it's horrible. It's the worst thing that you can maybe go through, but there's still opportunity to have great moments. Yeah, and then that's what's most important is just soaking in those moments before God forbid you do lose them. Sherrilyn, you have been to DC, Tallahassee. Talk to me about all of the work you have done to advocate for research and awareness, especially as we go into November. So I accidentally became an Alzheimer's advocate because I read an email that said I could talk in person to my local representatives and senators. And so I just think there's a lot of injustice in the attention that's received for Alzheimer's. Insurance, medical insurance, what it pays for, what it doesn't pay for. So when I had the chance to be in my room to share my story one-on-one, I took it. And I drove to Tallahassee not knowing what was going to happen, but it was probably one of the most life-changing moments. And I continue to go. I think it was less than a month after my mom passed away, I was in Washington, D.C., sharing our story and advocating for the ASAP Act now. And I'm sure she would be so, so proud to see that you are continuing to advocate. And what is it like? My final question to you is, I can imagine caring for her brought you some of the toughest moments, but now you get to help families through those tough moments for them. What is it like even seeing an increment of change or positivity come from that? So right now I'm doing some support groups and workshops called Positive approach to the holidays. And so I kind of help a family walk through the holiday situation. And then when somebody messages me back and says, we tried that and it worked. There's nothing more rewarding than that, and then, of course, I cry. And you're allowed to cry, you're absolutely allowed to cry, that's part of it. Really quickly before we go to break, Sherrilyn, how can people reach out to you, find Sandy's daughter if they're watching this and they're dealing with the same thing? So my Sandy's Daughters page is now Sandy's Daughter. PAC Dementia Educator, PAC, short for Positive Approach to Care, or they can email me at sandysdaughteratoutlook.com. Awesome. Cheryl Ann, I know this isn't an easy conversation to have, so we're so grateful that you came on to chat with us. We're so sorry for the loss of your mom, but I'm sure tonight seeing those monuments lit up, hopefully that makes you smile. It's kind of cool, right? You kind of want the rain to stop so you can go maybe take a selfie in front of one of them. I love it. Thank you so much for being with us, Cheryl. And we appreciate you. Guys, we'll be right back after this break. All right, everyone, as we wrap up today's show, we just want to let you know to keep it here on Fox Local at 1 o'clock this afternoon. We are going to be streaming this NTSB newser on the horrific plane crash that took place in West Palm Beach. So any more information we can bring you, we will certainly do it. And we will start with this press conference at 1. We also want to let everyone know that we are monitoring feeds from Benchmark Arena. Nikita Kucherov apparently. He's apparently saying that he wants a trade deal, but the Lightning's saying, no, we have no intentions of trading him. So we're monitoring any remarks coming from the team or management. And then, of course, it is just one day away from Election Day. David Jolly's still not up at the podium in Haines City, but we are going to keep at it on both gubernatorial candidates' campaign trails today. They're all over the Tampa Bay area. Fox 13's Evan Axelbank is going to have some good information on that. And then, of course, the weather. It has been a rainy weekend. And is it going to continue? Well, Jim Weber is going to have an update of your forecast. But this is some pretty shocking video coming out of Brevard County, just showing the rain building up so quickly. We saw some cars. You can look out in the distance and see some cars flooded in the streets. So just a really shocking scene there. But we're going to send things over to the news at noon with Linda Hurtado. Hey, Linda, how's it going? Hey, Regina, yeah, we're going to have a live report, too, from someone. Someone over on the East Coast talking about all of that flooding. Good afternoon. Have a good day, Regina.