Not good. Things are not looking good for you guys in Houston. I have some family living there still, so I'm really concerned. Hopefully Ike pulls a Rita and misses Houston and Galvestan altogether.
New 18z Sep.7th model runs. 18z GFDL 18z HWRF 18z GFS The next update of these models should be in or around 2am as usual.
I think if it comes to Houston, people will underestimate it because of the way Gustav barely did anything to New Orleans and of course the troubles of what happened when Rita was coming. I still think it has at least a 50% chance of coming to Houston. That's high right now, but I think we will be able to see better on Tuesday/Wednesday.
The weird thing about Hurricanes is that they are like a train wreck, you know they are deadly and harmful but you just can't stop looking. I love Hurricanes, they are inherently beautiful as a storm...but it is a tough, mean and nasty love - 4 sure. DD
Actually that should be 3 of the models as they cut the GFS run short on that map. The complete run of the model takes it into Louisiana as well. Here is the complete run:GFS
It's way too early to tell, we'll probably have a good idea of where Ike goes by Tuesday. But I'm betting Central Louisiana. GFDL is the only track I follow and for good reason...
Looks like it takes a hard right turn there so the models seem to be finding a weekness in the High at that point.
New update on IKE from Berger over at the SciGuy blog on the chron. (Link and Blog Update below) Ike nears Cuba, but final landfall still unknown Hurricane Ike neared the northern coast of Cuba's eastern end this evening, and it has undergone an eyewall replacement cycle , and weakened to 120 mph. Further weakening should occur tonight when Ike moves fully over Cuba, and tomorrow and into Tuesday, when it should remain over land. Ike near its maximum intensity of 135 mph. Everyone wants to know where Ike will go once it enters the Gulf of Mexico, which probably will happen sometime Tuesday afternoon. But the models have been bouncing back and forth between Texas and Louisiana, and there's just no way to have any confidence right now. The official forecast track leaves room for plenty of uncertainty. This is because the computers are still having a difficult time with deciding when to turn Ike northwest, and there's little confidence in where the storm will actually travel in five days time, when the hurricane might be approaching a landfall. In addition to the high pressure ridge steering Ike, which is now slowly retreating eastward, there's a low-pressure system moving south along the east coast that will complicate matters (possibly by allowing another high pressure ridge to build in its wake), as will a Pacific cool front forecast to reach the Texas coast this weekend. All of these complicated atmospheric dynamics mean that we simply don't know where Ike's going, and that the Gulf coast, especially Texas and Louisiana, need to pay close attention to the storm's progress. If you're in Texas, and looking for a reason to have hope tonight, consider the following plot prepared by Lew Fincher of hurricaneconsulting.net . The map shows all 50 tropical cyclone tracks of storms that are similar to Ike that have developed since 1852. You won't need a calculator to count the number of storms that have struck Texas. Lew Fincher, Hurricane Consulting, Inc. There's just one storm, a September 1886 hurricane that hit Brownsville.
Seems like a few models have shifted towards the north. I guess we will have to wait and see until about Tuesday to see where this thing goes.
The projections had the wind speed dropping as it crossed Cuba, so no surprise there. Even as a mild Cat 2 (100 mph), that is enough to take off roofs from some buildings, down power lines, knock down trees and spawn tornados. That scenario might be humorous to you and a few others on this BBS, but it isn't to the rest of us.
Didn't the GFDL (or as I like to call it...the blue one) pretty much nail Gustav's track? That one seems to be moving more north.
