Major Hurricane Ike

[dallas]

pretty big system

http://www.ssec.wisc.edu/data/geo/

if you animate the pic you can add the convection image

Edited September 11, 2008 by dallas

[Mondy]

3 frames of a visible loop dont show you much really at all, we've been watching the IR loops and WV loops all the way through, and Iceberg has been providing the great flight information. Ike is poorly organised, and just has not been able to develop a proper eye. Which is a good thing for Texas.

But the vis sat loops always look spectacular I guess.

Probably because Ike is a fairly spectacular system, if not "different"!

That vis loop will come in handy all day now as the convection will be shown well. Was the only reason for posting it..

Here's another which does show it's not as developed as first thought

http://www.atmos.washington.edu/~ovens/loo...ast_enhanced+12

Recon info can be found on any of the US extreme weather forums.

Many loops/visibles here: http://www.independentwx.com/tropical.html

[kold weather]

The thing to note with the recon information is the outer eyewall is the strongest right now and its only just developed. The inner eyewall is already weaker so it may not last too long. IF it can gain just one dominant eyewall then Ike then it will only take 12-24hrs for the winds to raise upto the 130-140mph range as the pressure is clearly very low and conditions are condusive if it can sort out its inner core. As a byproduct the wind field may shrink a little as well if it sorts out the eyewall issue.

The other thing is Galveston is not evacuating....I almost can't believe how stupid that move is!

Ike is a huge cat-2 hurricane and will IMO strengthen into a major. The models are a little to the south of the island but then again the models tend to be a little to far west as powerful hurricane are more prone to poleward wobbles in the set-up we have right now. I seriously hope Ike doesn't strengthen, otherwise we will have another Katrina situation on our hands...

[Mondy]

[kold weather]

The main thing with Ike will be the huge surge. It seems like Ike will produce a good deal more surge then Gustav did. The main reason is max winds only play a small role when it comes to the size of a surge. The main role is how big a hurricane is, and as we all know Ike is a huge hurricane.

UPDATE---quite a large change in the inner core right now, recon suggesting the inner eyewall has weakened a lot and the outer eyewall is becoming dominant, Ike will probably start to strengthen about 6-9hrs time.

Edited September 11, 2008 by kold weather

[Megamoonflake]

BBC news are reporting that 1 million people are to be evacuated from Texas, including Galveston http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7609878.stm

Edited September 11, 2008 by Megamoonflake

[tinybill]

watching fox news to-night at the moment cat 2 could easily be cat 3 with a surge of 20 foot tomorrow night our time

[Iceberg]

Flight winds of over 100Kt justs recorded again, not much time to give more of an update.

[Coopsy]

Looks like Galveston is now being evacuated. Talk about close to the wire

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/weather/09/11/h...exas/index.html

[londonsnow]

ike may be huge but it still looks disorganised to me

[Roger J Smith]

It's sobering to realize that the 1900 Galveston hurricane was probably a strong cat-3 with a central pressure of 936 mbs. By the way, a fairly similar storm hit Galveston in 1915 after they had put up a seawall similar to the current one, and even then almost three hundred died.

The track seems to be converging on Freeport to Galveston as landfall, and there is even some chance of it going further east, for example the GEM seems to be showing High Island as landfall (that's just east of Galveston).

I suspect Ike will deepen to strong cat-3 or perhaps low cat-4, but probably not cat-5.

The evacuations around Houston will go smoother this time compared to Rita, I think, because the authorities have put some better measures in place. There will be additional outflow lanes on shoulders of the highways, and roaming courtesy vehicles with free gasoline for people who run out, so that should keep people moving better.

FWIW, be assured that evacuations will probably be as complete as one could expect given the fact that various parts of greater Houston face varying levels of risk of flooding. Also FWIW, CNN weather has made it quite clear that Galveston and Houston could be in the firing line of a strong hurricane, so this will encourage more people to leave, I would imagine, although it tends to be the local TV stations that have the biggest impact on that aspect -- of course, what the state governor and local mayors say on the news is the biggest single factor, but then people often tune in the weather segment to find out what exactly is being said about the storm in question. I'm hoping the eventual downgrade of Gustav won't tempt anyone to ride this one out, but I suppose it could.

[Katherine]

GFDL progs a Cat 5 Ike

Can you explain why?

[tinybill]

Can you explain why?

FOX NEWS said possible 4 and that could destroy Texas

[Katherine]

I mean, as it predicts a Cat 4/5, what should I be looking for on the graphic that Delta posted that foresees this strengthening?

[northeast]

Hi folks im not much of an expert but my Mother stays in Richmond TX, she was saying things were hectic with petrol and food. A good site is www.stormpulse.com.

Jackie

[Jayces]

I mean, as it predicts a Cat 4/5, what should I be looking for on the graphic that Delta posted that foresees this strengthening?

I wouldn't worry too much about trying to fathom out what makes it tick, I mena Gustav at one point was being forecast as a high 4 low 5 and look at how he fooled everyone.

Simple weather forecasting is a nightmare most times so trying to work out what a hurricane is going to do in 24-48 hours must be almost impossible!

We know it's going to be wet and windy somewhere along the Gulf coast just not how wet or how windy ;-)

[Gray-Wolf]

Hi folks im not much of an expert but my Mother stays in Richmond TX, she was saying things were hectic with petrol and food. A good site is www.stormpulse.com.

Jackie

blinkin' flip!!! the whole post just upped and off'ed....

suffice to say i'm sure your Mum listens to the blurb and will do what is best.

That said, with Ike not fully revealing his potential yet many folk may be of the mind that he's another 'Gus' and chance staying put. They oughtn't , Ike isn't full blown yet and if he leaves it 24hrs before reaching his potential the it'll be too late to 'duck out' and a lot of folk may find themselves in schtuck.

As the networks say over there 'God's Speed'

Ian.

Edited September 11, 2008 by Gray-Wolf

[Roger J Smith]

It's a complicated hurricane for sure, very large in extent, very wide in terms of strong winds, not quite matching up peak winds to pressure. The fear is that it could organize into a more compact and very powerful hurricane in the 24 hours left before imminent landfall. This has often happened with major landfalling hurricanes in the past.

Greater Houston has been warned to evacuate, at least from zones that are low enough to sustain major flooding. The coastal strip is under mandatory evacuation but here the logistics are a lot easier. Houston is a huge, sprawling mega-city that is really a cluster of cities, and road congestion is already quite bad, four or five lanes of traffic are crawling at 10-15 mph in 90 degree humid heat and sunshine, as people get home from work and hear that the storm is now rated a direct risk to their region. Then there is all the pressure on gas stations from thousands of people realizing they need to fill up at the same moment, and reports that the stores are running low on groceries and supplies.

However, they have a good 24 hours left before the storm will close in, so if evacuation proceeds through the night which is still six hours away from starting there, I would imagine by noon or 2 pm local time Friday everyone who wants to leave will be safely away. And so they should be, this storm has a lot of potential and is showing every sign of hugging the right (east) side of the track cone.

One wonders if in the future, Americans will recall both a 9-11 and a 9-13, to which they could add 9-8 or 9-9 for the storm in 1900. This seems a bad time of year in general.

[kold weather]

Yep Roger if Ike ever decides to sort its inner core out then the pressure is low enough that Ike could wind up the inner core quite quickly, thats possibly the worst case because the wind field would still be bigger then average as it won't compact itself in time, the surge would obviously stil lbe huge and you've got a cat-3/4 on your hands. Needs to be watched, the next 12-18hrs are key to see what happens.

[Iceberg]

There seems to be some intensification again, convection has pepped up around the centre.

Your right roger this is a very troublesome storm, conditions seem to be too good for its size, it's got multiple inflows into different competing eye/walls the eye itself it almost drunk it's so all over the place. Outflow is so good it doesn't really need to bother.

All in All a kind of Gasgoine type hurricane, lots of potential but finds becoming a record breaker far to easy and is wasting it. This is all very good news for Texas, almost too good.

The track is still north of the predicted one by NHC. As to winds the NHC are insisting that surface winds are not responding and are probably only at 80% or so of the 10,000 flight winds. This might be due to the lack of convection etc that the storm seems to suffer from time to time, almost the dry air which seems to be entrench for most of the day.

[SMU]

Interesting press release from the NWS-

LIFE THREATENING INUNDATION LIKELY!

ALL NEIGHBORHOODS...AND POSSIBLY ENTIRE COASTAL COMMUNITIES...

WILL BE INUNDATED DURING HIGH TIDE. PERSONS NOT HEEDING EVACUATION

ORDERS IN SINGLE FAMILY ONE OR TWO STORY HOMES WILL FACE CERTAIN

DEATH. MANY RESIDENCES OF AVERAGE CONSTRUCTION DIRECTLY ON THE

COAST WILL BE DESTROYED. WIDESPREAD AND DEVASTATING PERSONAL

PROPERTY DAMAGE IS LIKELY ELSEWHERE. VEHICLES LEFT BEHIND WILL

LIKELY BE SWEPT AWAY. NUMEROUS ROADS WILL BE SWAMPED...SOME MAY BE

WASHED AWAY BY THE WATER. ENTIRE FLOOD PRONE COASTAL COMMUNITIES

WILL BE CUTOFF. WATER LEVELS MAY EXCEED 9 FEET FOR MORE THAN A

MILE INLAND. COASTAL RESIDENTS IN MULTI-STORY FACILITIES RISK

BEING CUTOFF. CONDITIONS WILL BE WORSENED BY BATTERING WAVES. SUCH

WAVES WILL EXACERBATE PROPERTY DAMAGE...WITH MASSIVE DESTRUCTION

OF HOMES...INCLUDING THOSE OF BLOCK CONSTRUCTION. DAMAGE FROM

BEACH EROSION COULD TAKE YEARS TO REPAIR.

[bazookabob]

Interesting press release from the NWS-

LIFE THREATENING INUNDATION LIKELY!

ALL NEIGHBORHOODS...AND POSSIBLY ENTIRE COASTAL COMMUNITIES...

WILL BE INUNDATED DURING HIGH TIDE. PERSONS NOT HEEDING EVACUATION

ORDERS IN SINGLE FAMILY ONE OR TWO STORY HOMES WILL FACE CERTAIN

DEATH.

Eh? that seems a bit over-dramatic doesn't it?! you say the national weather service said this? do they know something we dont?

[❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️]

Buoy link

http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/station_page.php?...it=E&tz=STN

[Somerset Squall]

Eh? that seems a bit over-dramatic doesn't it?! you say the national weather service said this? do they know something we dont?

I guess they're just really stressing the importance of getting the hell out of there. Ike's size simply means the storm surge will be massive, even if he doesn't strengthen anymore in terms of wind.

[opplevelse]

Buoy 42001 down to 964 mb 40knt sustained and 50knt gusts ... Ike still looks fairly poor in terms of organisation, but is big, very big. Like Gustav the lack of intensification is surprising.