Katrina affecting my area (DC area)

After a marathon news watching 48 hours (minus time to go to dialysis) of all the events surrounding Katrina, the storm has finally moved north enough to affect the DC metro area. As of this writing there is a Tornado Watch box over my location and most of central and north Virginia. One "preliminary" report from Fauquier County of a touchdown. Nothing like 2004 when the remenants of Hurricane Ivan passed through. I will be keeping an eye out overnight however.

After watching so much news about this Hurricane I have come to few conclusions: CNN rocks on coverage for this event, and The Weather Channel blows (pardon the punn). I was very disappointed in TWC's coverage of the event. With very little input from the crews they actually had out there, to not providing dynamic coverage of event and weather. While I understand they are not a 24 hour news channel, but a 24 hour weather channel (that also has to provide daily weather updates), I just felt that The Weather Channel did not show enough initiative. They quite simply relied too much on the way they've done it in the past, and did not recognize that they are competiting for airtime, coverage, reputation, and more. In the I would rank CNN as having the best coverage, MSNBC in second. FoxNews would come in third place and TWC in last place. If there were others, well they'de have to be ranked lower, cause I didn't even know they were covering it.

I heard from Amos Magliocco that Jeff Gammons and Chris Collura are safe and heading back to southern Florida. Jim Edds is staying behind, likely to film aftermath footage. I can't wait to see the footage.

Katrina making landfall

Katrina is making landfall in the Mississippi delta and eastern New Orleans area. Slightly diminished in wind speed (around 145mph), the storm took a slight turn to the right a missed a direct hit to New Orleans.

Talked with Jeff at 2am and 9am. At 9am they were already getting significant winds (upto 100mph). They are located near the coast between Gulf Port and Biloxi. I suspect the footage to come out of this storm is going to be quite good.

The eye of the storm looks to go right over where the Weathervine team is located. Might finally get the "stadium" shot that has evaded hurricane chasers.

This is quite an event, and one to remember. I just wonder if the winds will have been as strong as Hurricane Charley from 2004. And I guess there is still a good chance I'll intercept that landfalling Catagory 5 since this once didn't make it at landfall.

Early AM

I'm very sleepy at 2:15am eastern time.

I have not heard from Jeff as expected so I don't know where the team is for landfall. I will try around 4 or 5 am, a little before landfall is expected.

Katrina is still at Catagory 5 and the more time elapses with little degradation in strength. A few eyewall regeneration cycles have occured with sometimes mean the wind swath (diameter) increases. New Orleans is pretty much the bulls eye with areas just of the north east being the likely "ground zero"

I'm watching lots of CNN, TWC and MSNBC. All the coverage, even over the late/early morning hours is impressive. Wonder if I'll get any sleep.

Thats all for now, will update when I get updates.

Katrina sets sights on New Orleans

Well my predition of Katrina moving further west of New Orleans is no longer valid. I can now see from the radar and satellite images that the ridge from the Texas area is pushing closer to Katrina and now we see a more northerly component to the track. In fact, depending on the forward speed overnight, we might see Katrina go a little east of New Orleans. Time will tell, and of course for overall safety reasons, all people from Louisana to the Florida Panhandle should realize that they will see dangerous, life threating conditions in their area. I am merly talking of position for chaser seeking "ground zero" aka the northeast eye and eyewall.

Katrina is expected to dimish a little, perhaps even as much as 30mph, down to a high Catagory 4. Most hurricanes can sustain their maximum conditions for more than a half-day. My personal suspision tell me that Katrina is going to be borderline Cat.5 about 155 mph at landfall. There will be some controversy likely because of the "official" landfall location due to the heavily varied coastline geography.

The rest of the Weathervine crew is in the Mississippi area. A good place to be in my opinion. A slight move to the west may be good, but they need to find a back-up shelter location should the need to travel back east. I will be talking to Jeff before midnight, and will update the blog after the call.

Staying Home

I tried, but no such luck. I looked at flights, but the airports are closed. I looked at Rental Cars, but too expensive, and too risky even with the extra coverage. And the storm is too strong to bring in my own car. So now I am shifting my mode from possible intecept mode to team support mode. I will be providing as much necessary support for the Weathervine Crew and others as I can hopefully provide.

Katrina is a major hurricane at this point. It still is drifting west a little which I did have my suspitions early one. Winds are upto 175mph and gusts are exceeding 200mph. This storm is so strong I am a bit worried about the rest of the Weathervine Crew. They need to find secure structure, and since I'm not there, they don't have my professional architectural/engineering opinion (as in Hurricane Charley). If they don't find a good shelter, their safety will be greatly in jeapordy.

I will have multiple updates tonight and tomorrow.

Intercept?

OK, I'm checking to see if I can make it to this storm. We're talking 175mph major catagory 5 storm with gusts upto and exceeding 200mph. This maybe the storm to be talked about for years to come. Winds in New Orleans are already upto 20mph.

I most likely won't be able to make the storm because logistics this late in the game usually mean a no-go. I am currently checking flights and car rental information.

Would have been on top of this better, but yesterday I went downtown (DC) to watch the National baseball team play, then went to the convention center for a free expo, then out to eat. I very fun day, but nonetheless distracting me from knowing how serious Katrina got.

Katrina moving Southwest...huh

Katrina, Katrina. Well within the probable track....it has decided to take quite a little jog to the southwest. This manuever wasn't quite expected. I guess it was almost a good thing, since it stayed over the Everglades and away from population. The bad news about this little southwest movement is that it hit into Miami-Dade and Broward Counties more. I just hope my stuff in storage in Dade is OK?

The Weathervine crew (Jeff, Chris, and Jim) did intercept I believe in the Palm Beach area. We (as always) like to intercept the Eye at its northeast corner where the most significant winds are. Actually with the slow movement and a westerly track the maximum winds might have even been in the north and northwest portion of the eye. I will get information from Jeff soon.

Katrina is slowing moving into the Gulf of Mexico, and expected to turn to the right and move north in a gradual curve and head toward the Florida panhandle (yes, another system headed to the panhandle). However, I have my suspitions about the model tracks and predictions. The movement so far south from the initial models may have but the storm in a new storm pattern. I will look into this further later in the day as I am monitoring the movement. To early to give a predition as to a different heading, but I do have my doughts.

More later today!

Katrina heating up, about to make landfall

Hurricane Katrina (weak Cat.1 ) is slowly moving toward the southeast coast of Florida. The area between Miami and Ft. Lauderdale will likely see the strongest winds from this system. Of course, it would hit this area, since I was living there just a few months ago, and can't travel there at this time (medical reasons). Another case of proof for the "Foster Affect".

I will be closely monitoring this storm the rest of this evening. I'm also hoping to get in touch with Jeff Gammons (Weathervine.com), Chris Collura (Sky-chaser.com) or Jim Edds (Extremestorms.com) who are in position for this storm.

The MTV awards show is (was) suppose to be this weekend in South Beach. It will be very interesting to see if that event continues. When I lived on South Beach in 2004 I noticed many folks there did not take Hurricane evacuations very seriously, and knowing how pushy these MTV folks are, they likely won't back down, and could become a costly mistake.

I've missed intercepting this storm, but still hoping to intecept a storm before the close of the 2005 season.

More updates, faster, easier!

Since updating the website has become somewhat cumbersome at the moment, and many of my chase partners have a blog, I'm starting one now. This blog will focus on weather discussions, but a few comments about the current health or other comments may be made from time to time.

As you may have read from the front page of my websites, I was diagniosed with Kidney failure in April. I have moved back to Maryland to get the best possible care. While I miss Florida, I don't think I will be returning for a number of years.

The good thing about being back in Maryland....winter! Yes, I will once again be enjoying the cold temperatures and snow of the Mid-Atlantic. Once the winter season arrives I likely will be traveling throughout the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast to film and photograph winter scenes.

I am hoping that I will be able to intercept at least one major (Cat3 or higher) hurricane this season. Because of the medical condition and financial restraints that may not be possible, but I will be pushing hard for it should the opportunity arrise.

Jason Foster
The Weather Warrior