Hurricane Katrina, Live Thread, Part V

NHC - NOAA ^ | 28 August 2005 | NHC - NOAA

[NautiNurse]

Extremely dangerous Hurricane Katrina is bearing down on the North Central Gulf of Mexico. Mandatory evacuation of New Orleans is finally underway. Louisiana officials are warning of complete failure to levy systems, and pleading with people to leave low lying areas. For those who choose to stay, they are recommending picks and axes for breaking through to access their roofs during flooding.

Due to the size and intensity of this storm, all interests in the North Gulf of Mexico should be rushing hurricane preparations to completion.

The following links are self-updating:

Public Advisory Currently published every 3 hours 5A, 8A, 11A, 2P, etc. ET
NHC Discussion Published every six hours 6A, 11A, 6P, 11P
Three Day Forecast Track
Five Day Forecast Track
Navy Storm Track
Katrina Track Forecast Archive Nice loop of each NHC forecast track for both three and five day
Forecast Models
Alternate Hurricane Models via Skeetobite
Bouy Data Louisiana/Mississippi
Buoy Data Florida

Images:

New Orleans/Baton Rouge Experimental Radar Subject to delays and outages - and well worth the wait

Mobile Long Range Radar Loop

New Orleans/Baton Rouge Radar

Ft. Polk, LA Long Range Radar Loop

Northwest Florida Long Range Radar

Storm Floater IR Loop
Storm Floater Still & Loop Options
Color Enhanced IR Loop

Other Resources:

Hurricane Wind Risk Very informative tables showing inland wind potential by hurricane strength and forward motion
Central Florida Hurricane Center
New Orleans Web Cams Loads of web cam sites here. The sites have been very slow due to high traffic
New Orleans Music Online Couldn't resist--love that jazz
Golden Triangle Weather Page Nice Beaumont weather site with lots of tracks and graphics
Hurricane City
Crown Weather Tropical Website Offers a variety of storm info, with some nice track graphics

Live streaming:
copy/paste into player:

http://www.wjbo.com - BR radio station. Callers calling in and describing traffic etc.
WWL-TV/DT New Orleans (WMP) - mms://beloint.wm.llnwd.net/beloint_wwltv
WVTM-TV/DT Birmingham (WMP) - mms://a1256.l1289835255.c12898.g.lm.akamaistream.net/D/1256/12898/v0001/reflector:35255
WDSU-TV/DT New Orleans (WMP) - http://mfile.akamai.com/12912/live/reflector:38202.asx
Hurricane City (Real Player) - http://hurricanecity.com/live.ram
ABCNews Now (Real Player) - http://reallive.stream.aol.com/ramgen/redundant/abc/now_hi.rm
WKRG-TV/DT Mobile (WMP) - mms://wmbcast.mgeneral.speedera.net/wmbcast.mgeneral/wmbcast_mgeneral_aug262005_1435_95518

Hurricane Katrina, Live Thread, Part IV
Hurricane Katrina Live Thread, Part III
Katrina Live Thread, Part II
Hurricane Katrina Live Thread, Part I
Tropical Storm 12

Category	Wind Speed	Barometric Pressure	Storm Surge	Damage Potential
Tropical Depression	< 39 mph < 34 kts			Minimal
Tropical Storm	39 - 73 mph 34 - 63 kts			Minimal
Hurricane 1 (Weak)	74 - 95 mph 64 - 82 kts	28.94" or more 980.02 mb or more	4.0' - 5.0' 1.2 m - 1.5 m	Minimal damage to vegetation
Hurricane 2 (Moderate)	96 - 110 mph 83 - 95 kts	28.50" - 28.93" 965.12 mb - 979.68 mb	6.0' - 8.0' 1.8 m - 2.4 m	Moderate damage to houses
Hurricane 3 (Strong)	111 - 130 mph 96 - 112 kts	27.91" - 28.49" 945.14 mb - 964.78 mb	9.0' - 12.0' 2.7 m - 3.7 m	Extensive damage to small buildings
Hurricane 4 (Very strong)	131 - 155 mph 113 - 135 kts	27.17" - 27.90" 920.08 mb - 944.80 mb	13.0' - 18.0' 3.9 m - 5.5 m	Extreme structural damage
Hurricane 5 (Devastating)	Greater than 155 mph Greater than 135 kts	Less than 27.17" Less than 920.08 mb	Greater than 18.0' Greater than 5.5m	Catastrophic building failures possible

[jpsb]

Still has a strong west component to motion, landfall might be well west of NO.

[Altamira]

Thanks for saying that. Apology accepted.

[filbert]

Riding this storm out anywhere in N.O. is like knowing that the Twin Towers were about to be hit by two jumbo jets and riding it out in one of the other WTC complex buildings.

Some folks down there don't have a choice.

[Txsleuth]

Oh, thank God....I have had to skip posts...I can't keep up and must have missed that. Thanks!

[NautiNurse]

Thank you for the info--please check in with us when you get back.

[El Gran Salseron]

The Eastern half of a storm is always the worst. Mobile is East of the storm's predicted path. Mobile and everything West of Mobile will get hit hard. The Western half is dangerous, no doubt, but not as severe as the Eastern half.

[Torie]

Or am I reading this wrong?

Yes. They are in Mobile, because any farther west is a death zone, and too dangerous. This hurricane will kill almost everything in its path near the coast, with water and wind.

[mvpel]

Someone made the decision that the underclass was expendable.

Leftists have always felt that way about people they see as "lower" than them - just look at the DDT ban, which led to the death of 50 million Africans from malaria.

[steveegg]

If this thing hits at 179 mph, put a long string of expletives after the "Oh".

[StACase]

I can see a 50 cent + increase tomorrow once the speculators hit the floor. 25% of our oil production is from the gulf I heard.

I can't do anything but hope and pray with regards to the folks in the path of this monster. Well I'll probably donate to the Salvation Army, but I just went out and filled up both cars and the gas can for the mower.

[jeffers]

"I can't find references other than the usual square of the wind speed. (That is, a 90 mph wind vs a 30 mph
is nine times more destructive)"

Links are hard to find because you really need a lot of processing horsepower to deal with all the variables. Till some math whiz tells me different, the figure the "experts" left me with was roughly the cube of the velocity.

[al baby]

Humor Break

What is going on with the Fox info babes...they seem to have the giggles.

[vox humana]

My money's on Houston for a landing point.

Did you alert NASA for a possible UFO landing? LOL

[fishntex]

I like that analogy. Puts it into perspective a little bit. Think of rocks and sand and even worse plywood flying around at 160 mph.

Jet airliners can take off at about 130-160 mph depending on the aircraft.

[monday]

"Can you explain to me what this means? What do you mean by pressure dropping to 902 mb?"

Millibars is a measure of atmospheric pressure. The eye of a hurricane creates a low pressure area which acts as a vacuum which sucks surrounding high pressure air into it. The lower the pressure in the eye the faster the winds blow as they wrap counter clockwise around the eye.

A hurricane acts as a giant air pump that sucks warm moist air from the lower atmosphere above the ocean and pumps it up into the upper atmosphere creating rain and vicious winds in the process.

[cubreporter]

Football will just have to go elsewhere. Lives are more important.

[Jeff Head]

They better start advising people caught in any rush as night falls to get to the center portions of the highrises...and they better open them and provision them right now if they are not already doing so.

[pax_et_bonum]

The reason I wouldn't want to be in the Superdome is that, even though it's big and strong, in such strong winds all it takes is large wind-driven debris breaking a hole in the side of the dome and the wind would continue to break open the hole and then who knows.

There are lots of houses that could withstand winds of average hurricanes but flying debris creates an entry for the wind and it's downhill from there. That's one of the main reasons we board our windows.

[hole_n_one]

FNC reporters have elected to "ride it out" inside the Superdome.

[Dr. Eckleburg]

Glad you survived. The news makes this storm sound Biblical in its impact.

Suddenly earthquakes aren't as scary.