So Gustav is rumbling ashore as I type. The initial impression is that he wasn't as bad as his hype. However, given that C Ray hyped him as 'Storm of the Century' on minimal basis, that's no real surprise. I guess for Nola what we're looking for now are levee breaches. There's lots of live footage on the TV of the repaired Industrial Canal by Pontchartrain being overtopped, but no breach. OTOH, the main fear was for the West Bank. The blog news has dimished rapidly: nothing coming out of the area right now. Which I find disconcerting: somebody should be getting a message out. It reminds me a little too much of Katrina - that after the storm relaxation, when in fact the devastation was appalling, but the journalists were just out of touch. Gustav was intensifying before landfall, for some reason. And he was reported as 440 miles across, same as K. Pressure falling, and though the winds may not have caught up, the storm surge may well be 14ft & upwards. He looks very impressive on satellite, after landfall.
Hanna just got declared a hurricane today too, far ahead of schedule. For some reason, there are credible extreme wind speeds being reported out of her by the HHs now. I'm presuming they're erroneous measures, but they're not being flagged as such. Either way, she's a very big storm, going to hit SE CONUS within the week. Intensity right now is anyone's guess.
And there's more storms lining up to get names. Ike should be called at 11, and well probably the next one will be named within 2 days.
It's not quite 2005, but OTOH the fat lady hasn't even started warming up yet.
