[My Favorite Headache]

Predictions calling for North Carolina landfall sometime tomorrow during late afternoon early evening. Strong CAT 2/Minimal CAT 3 expected. Between winds of 115-125 mph.

[My Favorite Headache]

[JohnHuang2]

Prayers for all of you folks. Take care and keep us posted.

[John_11_25]

This thing looks like it is starting reorganise after almost falling apart yesterday.

And the timespan it has before it reaches land mass, coupled with the slow speed, could mean big problems when it does touch down.

[TomGuy]

I use WeatherMatrix.

Even though I am in the center of the country, I put Kitty Hawk, NC zipcode in the WeatherMatrix. So far, it is only showing some clouds/rain off the coast.

[exnavy]

I hope it brings a whole lot of rain up here to the Great Lakes basin, we need it bad.

[SauronOfMordor]

It's a BIG sucker

[TrappedInLiberalHell]

Keep in mind that the afternoon high tide on September 18 for Cape Hatteras is 1:31 pm. If the storm surge hits near that time, the problem will be compounded by the higher tides. I found this information here. The main site is http://www.freetidetables.com.

[U S Army EOD]

Just did a very interesting exercise. If you have Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004, you can load actual weather which is updated automatically every 15 min. then you grab you a Cessna 172 in Wilmington, NC, take off and head into the storm. On the simulation it is really there and you can experience the weather deterioating as you head southeast. Kind of gives you a general idea what the hurricane hunter aircraft experience. They sure get a lot out a $50.00 program now days.

[passport]

Good Morning Freeple. I will be 30 miles up the road from where this monster will make landfall. I have a generator and if I can stay online I'll post a narration of what's going on in my section of the storm.

[Hatteras]

Heading to "work" bump. Give me an hour...

[bd476]

Sun's up, surf's up, riptides all over - this is not a day to go wading:

Avalon Fishing Pier, Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina

(from a link above)

[firewalk]

bttt

[Jonah Hex]

Ready here in Newport News, VA. We don't expect to see the wind and rain start picking up until about mid-day tomorow, assuming the storm doesn't deviate wildly from predictions,of course.

Never a safe bet.

[conservababeJen]

Safe to assume that LI, NY will be spared the big stuff?

[Damocles]

 

Isabel is getting frighteningly similar to this badboy...

 

Hugo 1989.

[holdmuhbeer]

coming straight for me, oh goody. forecasters put me in the 60 plus mph wind category. no power for at least a week. oh well at least its not cold out yet.

[southriver4]

Charlottesville VA checking in here. i'm due right smack of the eye for tomorrow night. The eye is due to come up between Cville and Richmond and i'm evacuating to my mom's in Gordonsville. As handle implies, i'm on a river at the base of the Blueridge - big time flood area - so mom's it is. Coleman stove, flashlights, battery operated radio, fresh batteries, canned/dry goods. They are now telling us expect 3-5 days without electricity. No word on the schools yet. God bless.

[exnavy]

later read bump

[rwfromkansas]

This is barely a Cat 3. A shadow of its former self.

[FrustratedCitizen]

Don't take this storm lightly...simply because it's a Cat 2 hurricane doesn't mean it's nothing to sneeze at.

Cavalier spirits not withstanding, the Mid Atlantic is preparnig for the worst. Let's get two things straight.

1. Isabel will intensify further before landfall. A stengthing hurricane is always more dangerous than its intensity indicates.

2. The track its taking makes it far more dangerous than Floyd. Because it's moving west of north...the wind is blowing from the ocean into all of the beaches. This takes dry air out of the picture and drives all of the waves into shore instead paralleling the coast like they would if the storm was moving east of north.

I have heard three different theories here that I need to take the time to debunk.

1. The dry air over the DC area will kill the storm as it approaches. This is flat out untrue. My dewpoint has risen 10 degrees in the last 6 hours from 48 to 59...the dry air is being routed out because the winds are blwoing from the tropical Atlantic INTO the dry air...not the other way around. Big hurricanes make their own weather...and you can already begin to see an upper level anti-cyclone forming north of the storm...displacing the cold dry air in its path.

Look at water vapor imagery...the dry air is being eliminated.

2. A category 2 hurricane is not a serious risk to life. First of all...I expect it to come back to Categor 3 status before landfall..but even i it doesn't...100+ mph winds are no laughing matter. It's also a HGUE storm...and the pressure gradient between it and the POWERHOUSE high pressure to its north will cause a much wider than normal wind field..hurricane force winds extend ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTY miles from the center...and it may spread as it gets closer to the center of high pressure.

Bottom line...75 mph wind gusts will hit every major city from Raleigh to New York.

3. Quick movement will prevent flooding.

Not quick enough...a saturated Mid Atlantic taking 6-10 inches of rain in 24 hours will be enough to cause extensive flooding. 10-15 foot storm surge all the way up the Chesapeake, plus 20-40 foot waves...plus river flooding = HUGE damage all along the bay. This is not any ordinary fast moving Cat 2 hurricane.

I don't want to hear any more from landlocked folks about how this isn't a big deal...and I especially don't want any cavalier attitudes in the path of the storm.