Hurricane Isabel: Duck & Cover!

rok

i lived almost my entire life in florida, and was even there for andrew, and i have watched a lot of hurricanes trek across the atlantic, but isabel looks vicious.



i have never seen a hurricane be a registered cat4 as far out as it was, and it appears to show no signs of slowing down. that thing is a buzzsaw.

moogs

Been a few years since we've had a really brutal one on the east coast; Andrew was the last I think....



I smell trouble a brewin' (cat 5 now apparently)





What was that Hurricane that slammed into Honduras (Mitch?) That was an ugly storm too. Lucky IT didn't hit Florida head-on. Either way, when you choose to live in south Florida, this is one of the risks you take. Not sure which is greater, this one, or the risk of getting run over by a 90 year old woman while you're sitting on a park bench.

rok

i think the one you are referring to was mitch.



now, andrew had great publicity, but it was just barely a cat5, and immediately lost a ton of power when it hit land (it was late fall, so i think the cold ground sucked a lot of steam out of it until it could cross into the gulf of mexico).



what made andrew truly damaging (and just read some of carl hiassen's old articles and books) was the shoddy ignorance of building codes for all of the subdivisions around coral gables, the air force base and the like. literally houses of cards, and they flew apart instantaneously. the damage was so complete that many smaller insurance companies went out of business because of the claim amounts (and, of course, they were looking the other way as building contractors violated every code under the sun for $$$).



let's hope southern florida learned its lesson.



(p.s. though it now looks, based upon projections, that it will hit somewhere in the carolinas late next week, where they have already been having crappy weather. that means the soil will be weakened by the rains already when the winds start up... like i said, "duck and cover")

moogs

Yah. Way too early to predict landfall I think. At 9mph, it could pretty easily change tack without much warning. The chart I saw looked like it was headed straight for the Jacksonville / Georgia coast area, but again it isn't worth much now. The chart made it appear that the periphery of the storm could reach the continental shelf area by Tuesday, but who knows it may speed up a bit as most hurricanes do at this stage.



Another interesting link



http://www.goes.noaa.gov/browsh3.html





Outstanding signature, btw!

moogs

*jaws theme is heard from orbit*