HURRICANE KATRINA A MOST POWERFUL HURRICANE WITH UNPRECEDENTED STRENGTH...RIVALING THE INTENSITY OF HURRICANE CAMILLE OF 1969.
MOST OF THE AREA WILL BE UNINHABITABLE FOR WEEKS...PERHAPS LONGER. AT LEAST ONE HALF OF WELL CONSTRUCTED HOMES WILL HAVE ROOF AND WALL FAILURE. ALL GABLED ROOFS WILL FAIL...LEAVING THOSE HOMES SEVERELY DAMAGED OR DESTROYED.
THE MAJORITY OF INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS WILL BECOME NON FUNCTIONAL. PARTIAL TO COMPLETE WALL AND ROOF FAILURE IS EXPECTED. ALL WOOD FRAMED LOW RISING APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL BE DESTROYED. CONCRETE BLOCK LOW RISE APARTMENTS WILL SUSTAIN MAJOR DAMAGE...INCLUDING SOME WALL AND ROOF FAILURE.
HIGH RISE OFFICE AND APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL SWAY DANGEROUSLY...A FEW TO THE POINT OF TOTAL COLLAPSE. ALL WINDOWS WILL BLOW OUT.
AIRBORNE DEBRIS WILL BE WIDESPREAD...AND MAY INCLUDE HEAVY ITEMS SUCH AS HOUSEHOLD APPLIANCES AND EVEN LIGHT VEHICLES. SPORT UTILITY VEHICLES AND LIGHT TRUCKS WILL BE MOVED. THE BLOWN DEBRIS WILL CREATE ADDITIONAL DESTRUCTION. PERSONS...PETS...AND LIVESTOCK EXPOSED TO THE WINDS WILL FACE CERTAIN DEATH IF STRUCK.
POWER OUTAGES WILL LAST FOR WEEKS...AS MOST POWER POLES WILL BE DOWN AND TRANSFORMERS DESTROYED. WATER SHORTAGES WILL MAKE HUMAN SUFFERING INCREDIBLE BY MODERN STANDARDS.
THE VAST MAJORITY OF NATIVE TREES WILL BE SNAPPED OR UPROOTED. ONLY THE HEARTIEST WILL REMAIN STANDING...BUT BE TOTALLY DEFOLIATED. FEW CROPS WILL REMAIN. LIVESTOCK LEFT EXPOSED TO THE WINDS WILL BE KILLED.
AN INLAND HURRICANE WIND WARNING IS ISSUED WHEN SUSTAINED WINDS NEAR HURRICANE FORCE...OR FREQUENT GUSTS AT OR ABOVE HURRICANE FORCE...ARE CERTAIN WITHIN THE NEXT 12 TO 24 HOURS.
ONCE TROPICAL STORM AND HURRICANE FORCE WINDS ONSET...DO NOT VENTURE OUTSIDE!
LAZ038-040-050-056>070-282100- ASSUMPTION-LIVINGSTON-LOWER JEFFERSON-LOWER LAFOURCHE- LOWER PLAQUEMINES-LOWER ST. BERNARD-LOWER TERREBONNE-ORLEANS- ST. CHARLES-ST. JAMES-ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST-ST. TAMMANY-TANGIPAHOA- UPPER JEFFERSON-UPPER LAFOURCHE-UPPER PLAQUEMINES-UPPER ST. BERNARD- UPPER TERREBONNE- 1011 AM CDT SUN AUG 28 2005
I don't normally read these warnings - are they normally this bad?
The reason why this is worse than even the normal major hurricane is because: 1) Katrina is a Category 5, and should hit land at either that strength or a Category 4. 2) And, more importantly, New Orleans is built below sea level. With 3 sides of it surrounded by water combined with being below sea level, it means that the tidal surge will get trapped inside the city and the city could be 20-30 FEET below water once the storm passes. That's not even factoring in the 150 mph plus winds and rain.
In plain English, if the brunt of this storm hits New Orleans, the city is royally screwed, and royally screwed might be best case scenario.
I made my first visit ever to New Orleans last weekend, and the possibility of bad weather scared the shit out of me. The only run-in I had was a pretty bad T-storm last Sunday that delayed my flight home by an hour. And now this, only a week later...I can't even begin to imagine. Here's to hoping for some amazing good luck for the folks down there.
I'm not sure if they webstream but AM 870 WWL is a blowtorch signal that should be audible thru the Midwest and East thru the evenings....my prayers are with them in the storm.
As of 2/28/05: 101 pounds since December 7, 2004 OFFICIAL THREE-MONTH COUNT: 112 pounds on March 9, 2005 OFFICIAL SIX-MONTH COUNT: 142 pounds on June 8, 2005 As of 8/15/05: 153 pounds "I've lost a junior middleweight"
Originally posted by Guru ZimI'm not sure if this is a hoax or not, but damn.
Originally posted by http://weather.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/iwszone?Sites=:laz062THE MAJORITY OF INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS WILL BECOME NON FUNCTIONAL. PARTIAL TO COMPLETE WALL AND ROOF FAILURE IS EXPECTED. ALL WOOD FRAMED LOW RISING APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL BE DESTROYED. CONCRETE BLOCK LOW RISE APARTMENTS WILL SUSTAIN MAJOR DAMAGE...INCLUDING SOME WALL AND ROOF FAILURE.
Um, isn't there a grave danger in filling the Superdome with people (usatoday.com), if all of this is truly expected? I mean, I don't know a lot about how solid the roof is (although it covers an area of 9 acres), but I hope it is VERY solid....
Look, I appreciate bringing the yuks in the face of impending tragedy as much as the next guy*, but this is the sort of dumbass conversation that makes good people form bad opinions about New Yorkers and I'd really rather not have it here.
They just went through this last year, too. I was in town for a show set-up and flew back just as the hurricane forecast started including New Orleans. I flew back the day before the evacuation started, the show was cancelled and I flew back a couple of days later (after the storm had missed). Checking into my hotel at 8:30 on a Friday night in a DESERTED New Orleans was one of the weirder things I've ever experienced. It was a total ghost town.
"You know what you need? Some new quotes in your sig. Yeah, I said it." -- DJFrostyFreeze
They've been saying that the SuperDome is perhaps the strongest and most durable building in the City, so here's hoping those assessments are accurate.
I've been glued to the news today regarding Katrina, even though I'm a thousand miles away. It's just awe-inspiring and horrifying at the same time how powerful nature can be.
New Orleans is one of the most wonderful places I ever visited, and served as the backdrop for one of my all-time favorite vacations. My prayers are with the folks that haven't been able to evacuate, and that the city as a whole manages to make it through.
"Remember, it's not a lie if *you* believe it." - George Costanza
...God. I just read a couple articles and saw a "worst-case scenario" video on CNN.com, and while I'd known Katrina was closing on New Orleans for a little while now, I had no idea it was going to be this bad. Seriously, if Katrina's still a category-five when it hits land, thousands of people could be killed, and New Orleans won't be safe to live in for months. The death toll will be absolutely catastrophic. CNN hit it right on the nose-- it could be our version of the Asian tsunami.
I'm praying for everyone trapped down there, hoping that God will see them through this. It's just horrifying to know a disaster's about to happen, know that a lot of people are going to die, and not be able to do anything to prevent it. I can only hope that they get as many people as possible out of the city before it's too late; hope that New Orleans' emergency services can respond to this disaster; hope that the Superdome is as structurally sound as advertised; and hope that God will see them through this nightmare.
Great. He spends skill points on Perform (Kazoo), and now I have to make a Knowledge (Limits of My Own Sanity) skill check." --Roy Greenhilt, The Order of the Stick
Four-Time Wiener of the Day (5/27/02; 7/3/02; 7/30/04; 8/28/04)
The Only Five-Time (and Last) N.E.W. World Heavyweight Champion
Certified RFMC Member-- Ask To See My Credentials!
Originally posted by Pizza PastaThey've been saying that the SuperDome is perhaps the strongest and most durable building in the City, so here's hoping those assessments are accurate.
I've been glued to the news today regarding Katrina, even though I'm a thousand miles away. It's just awe-inspiring and horrifying at the same time how powerful nature can be.
New Orleans is one of the most wonderful places I ever visited, and served as the backdrop for one of my all-time favorite vacations. My prayers are with the folks that haven't been able to evacuate, and that the city as a whole manages to make it through.
According to these people, the dome can take winds up to 215mph, so it appears to be about the only safe spot in town.
They still got lots of party people who are going to ride it out in French Quarters. Guess they haven't learned anything from the hippies who died in Camille.
Originally posted by NagGuess they haven't learned anything from the hippies who died in Camille.
As a Florida resident for far too long now, I can safely say that not a whole lot of people learn anything from any storm that happened more than 10 years before. I guess the community fear just drains away after a decade. I remember Hurricane Opal hitting the Florida panhandle in '95, and I had friends who lived in BEACH APARTMENTS trying to drink their way through the storm. They'd never seen a big one, so they figured it couldn't hurt them. Thankfully, they got dragged out of their apartments and taken inland. The apartments wound up having watermarks on the ceiling and two feet of sand on the floors. Flash forward to last year's hurricane season: the panhandle had gone 9 years without a major storm, and people I knew in that area were out drinking, waiting for it. Stupid.
I don't know what causes the indifference or the disregard. Maybe it's the randomness of hurricanes: how they can sputter out, even if they come straight at you, or how they can appear to go for you, then veer off somewhere else. I know that growing up in the San Francisco bay area, I knew earthquake drills down pat. My mom had her bookshelves bolted to the walls, and pushed her books as far back into the shelves in hopes that they wouldn't fly out at us. Then I got to Florida, and most people's parents just bought more beer and some barbecue meats when a hurricane threatened.
Then, of course, a hurricane hits their/your area, and the beer-and-brat buying goes out the window. The storm passes; you buy tons of canned food and bottled water. You check your plywood window coverings and get more batteries. You have hurricane preparedness plans. Then no storm comes for the next 12 years, and you forget all about it. You drank the water because it was in the garage and you were thirsty while working on the car. The batteries got used when you went to the beach. And maybe you wanted canned chili one day and ate a bunch. Then a storm comes long after you forgot they would; you're out of necessities, and it looks like all hell has broken loose at the grocery store.
I don't know why this happens, but it happens a lot. It's not that people don't learn. I think they learn, then they learn to forget. You can't train people to live in dread perpetually. They get sloppy. To draw a sloppy parallel, I don't even know what the "terrorist threat advisory level" is. It's at the bottom of The-W main page. I've just learned not to worry, regardless of how wrong that might be.
Just a quick note: this isn't meant to sound like lashing out at you for your comment. I'm as mystified as you are when it comes to unpreparedness. I just know I've been part of that process too.
What's really odd is that they do the same thing in North Carolina - if it's been 6+ years since the last big hurricane, nobody bothers to prepare anymore. But EVERY YEAR at the first sign of snow, everybody raids the grocery stores and gas stations like its the end of the world, no matter how light the snow is supposed to be.
I hope the death toll for this hurricane is low or even non-existant. That would make me happy. As for the buildings? If something's got to give and New Orleans gets wrecked, better the city than the people. You can always rebuild.
Of course, I would be very sad because I was just saying after the last hurricane in the gulf, "I really need to go see New Orleans before a hurricane comes and wipes it off the map." Should've taken my own advice.
BEHOLD MY POWER February 2nd, 2001 - August 9th, 2005 The End of an Era
If you're looking here for news about Katrina, well, you're a little nutty. But I just saw a report that pieces of the roof of the Superdome had stripped away and that it was leaking water.
Man, for once I wish I could watch me some TV today.
If you do the praying thing, I think a few directed at the US Gulf coast would be in order today.
(edited by AWArulz on 29.8.05 0935) We'll be back right after order has been restored here in the Omni Center.
I work in a call centre that handles overflow insurance claims for a couple of insurance companies...and I can say that some of the claims I've processed for hurricane Katrina victims in Miami and southern Florida are just amazing. The damage these hurricanes can do in such a short amount of time is breathtaking.
What's almost as amazing is how calm they are in processing their claims. One would expect if half their roof has been blown off, they'd be really freaking out, but not in this case; most people are patient and happy to help us process their claims.
Originally posted by Pizza PastaThey've been saying that the SuperDome is perhaps the strongest and most durable building in the City, so here's hoping those assessments are accurate.