Hurricane Katrina Live Thread, Part VI

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

[NautiNurse]

Extremely dangerous Hurricane Katrina is bearing down on the North Central Gulf of Mexico and New Orleans metro area. Thousands of people did not evacuate New Orleans. Outer bands of Katrina are reaching the Louisiana coast.

Due to the size and intensity of this storm, all interests in the North Gulf of Mexico should be in their safe locations.

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:

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

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

[hole_n_one]

The stupid yacking hair-doo on the FNC is incredulous at the fact that these people are out there without any authorities going out to drag them back in..........

[don-o]

Yup. I believe I heard him, at least someone at the presser say, "think of going camping." Not that these folks coming to the Dome are equipped.

[Fudd Fan]

Thought Brian Wilson was excellent this morning.

"Moose" is always excellent. I like him very much, he's really one of the best!

[Jrabbit]

Yes. I didn't hear anything about food, though. Babies will need formula, diapers....people will need prescriptions...what a nightmare.

[tomahawk]

I have never see such a well formed hurricane eye as this one.

[Amelia]

I heard that one of the delays at the hotels was that they were still going through the formalities of checking people out of their rooms.

What CNN said early this afternoon was that there were no more rental cars or flights out available.

Again, that could have been taken care of - if they'd started yesterday and/or actually had a real, viable PLAN. Hire charter buses to take them to Houston, put them on Amtrak, get a national guard troop transport plane - any number of options that could have and should have been included in the much-vaunted plan that doesn't seem to have included very many contingencies at all.

[Coldwater Creek]

Now is the time for Pat Robertson to open his mouth and start praying for this thing to turn back out into the Gulf. Or better yet just completely fall apart.

[Freedom'sWorthIt]

Oops thanks.

[spanalot]

If the winds blow hard enough on the Superdome structure and create extremely LOW PRESSURE zones, like wings on a plane create low pressure on the wing and cause it to lift UP, then the SuperDome structure will also create LIFT into the low pressure zone as the internal air pressure (under the wing-roof-walls) reacts to the lift...poof, one dome opens up like a JiffyPop!!

---

Don't quit your day job. You are spreading emergency weather myths (about opening windows) and structural engineering ignorance.

---

Well let me muddy things - I know that most storm tree damage happens just BELOW the crest of a mountain on the DOWNWIND side - and I am led to unsderstand this is due to turbulence or such.

Also, I recall that domes structures that do not have coners to create such turbulence can withstand more wind - e.g. the geodesic domes at the antartic

[oceanview]

it depends on what longitude its at when it makes the turn.

[yield 2 the right]

Nagin: superdome open as last resort; 25-30,000 there; still nervous, not opening up other shelters; next phase 6 PM curfew---this will be last pick-up; curfew means lockdown no police, fire, ems services, except some police; will be pounded 14 hours; expect devestation, collapsed buildings,national guard, lots of boats in streets, most buildings expect to survive 165 mph, few 200 mpn, very naive to not expect casualties, so much water will topple levees; parts of city may be uninhabitable for a while; two weeks to drain city, pumps inoperable when submerged, max output of pumps 1 to 1.5 inches per hour; electricity maybe 6 weeks to get back, maybe a whole lot quicker for water;not really concerned about toxic water--pumps to be flushed just before storm; "its gonna be a mess;" white house called Pres ready to move in and help; pipelines if shut will cause big jump in oil prices to over $70; "God bless us;" people calm, no violence; people need axes to bust through roofs to avoid flooding;need to be above 2nd floor. 128 posted on 08/28/2005 5:53:04 PM EDT by Founding Father

No words can do justice if this come to fruition

[conservaDave]

Agreed!

[kjam22]

Yep.... like they should be shot or something for wanting to see the waves...

[beckybea]

We've stayed at the beautiful Royal Sonesta Hotel in NO and there's no way anyone should be in the French Quarter. Has Shep lost his mind?

[Coldwater Creek]

Shep is just another Ole Miss snob ie Trent Lott!!!!!!!!!

[jeffers]

"I guess the best we can hope for now is for it to pass west of NO far enough to avoid the eye. Looks too
far gone to curve east enough to avoid pushing the lake into the city and over the levees. "

Agreed. The course it is on now is the best we could hope for. Close to half the storm would be over land for a couple hours or more, bleeding off energy, before the eyewall ever made it ashore.

The supercomp models have been wrong before. The future of New Orleans hangs on them being wrong now. The next update will tell much of the tale.

[js1138]

Why are people going into a single structure is beyond me . Is it the highest elevation around?

Possibly because it is made of reinforced concrete and is more or less flood proof.

[rwfromkansas]

must be

[NautiNurse]

FReeper report: There are already sustained power outages in the Baton Rouge area.

[theophilusscribe]

I like Brian Wilson too. He's knowledgeable and has a good sense of humor.