Charlie sucked.

It had SRQ as the target and then it took a right turn and throttled Charlotte.

You can still see damage left by that bastard.

I think that GFS model is screwing everything up.

It is pushing the consensus track more westward while the more historically accurate EURO has it coming right up the mouth of Tampa Bay with a landfall of Cat4.  It is making a lot of people thinking it is not too much to worry about.

There should be massive evacuations in Pinellas and Hillsborough County going on right now.

Come Tuesday when the track has it going over downtown St Pete and Tampa and people start taking things seriously I-75 and US 19 will be a parking lot to the Georgia border.  You can add I-4 and SR 60 into that mix also.

I hope I am being overly pessimistic and the EURO track is either wrong or changes.

This is exactly Mike said in his report this AM.

This.

The Euro models always seem to be far more accurate, and realistic on intensity. Look at Michael, and how everyone poo-poo'd the idea that it was going to strengthen like it did. Lots of downplaying the effects of sitting on the hot bathtub of the Gulf, and how that thermal energy tends to ramp shit up fast.

I-75 is going to be a parking lot to the state line, and if it hits as a 4, that's going to be potentially deadly for people stuck in the evac

Tracks heading back to Tampa.

5pm update.

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Fack.  Also, beaten.

Back east? Please don’t hit swfl…

Remember?! I was there.

This met claims it's going to turn directly into Tampa based on his interpretation of the Euro model. Cat 4 and catastrophic damage. He has a pretty decent record of calling big storms a few days out.
Wx risk

People in Tampa will need some help.

Leave tomorrow morning? Where do you all think is safe to weather the storm? South Carolina coast? My elderly parents are in Z-Hills area.
@WesJanson

Euro has been very good so far this year. NHS seems to be splitting the difference between the two models for now.
GFS has been bouncing around, the Euro has been holding pretty much to one area.
Until it gets into the Gulf who knows?

If they were going to bail out, a hotel in Lakeland or Orlando or towards the east coast of Florida would be plenty fine, concrete structures like hotels do very well

I've lived here 60 years.
3+ days out is a lifetime. It could wobble 100 miles either way in 12 hours. The difference between the eye and 10 miles out is significant. Irma's eye was 4-5 miles from me. Charlie's eye missed me by about 20 miles.
I saw tree trimming crews out everywhere today. You got to give it to them and the Linemen. They can get mobilized quick. I live about 3 miles as the crow flies from a power plant. They are already getting staged. There will be caravans of trucks following the hurricane as it passes. Kinda makes me feel more American!!

NOAA needs to get rid of that idiotic five day track forecast. Three days is more than enough. Anything after three days is an exaggeration of inconsistencies.

If I haven't already said so, FUCK FPL

Yep

Florida today

Thanks!

Accuweather just posted this on Twitter a couple minutes ago.



[tweet]https://twitter.com/i/events/1573687917645627395[/tweet]

Of course AccuWeather has to put the entire state of Florida under The cone of death.

If it hits Tampa, Sarasota and St Pete will be hit even harder.
Stores are all sold out of bottled water here. gas stations have lines. I am just gonna sit tight and ride it out here at home in Bradenton (The mouth of Tampa Bay). Looks like the winds will be starting Tuesday night. I will ride out to the beach to watch the waves for a bit before it hits. Will try to post videos if I can.
Onw bad thing about Starlink. It cuts out in heavy storms. Oh well, will see how it goes.

I'd have to totally disagree. Being stuck in a hotel, and your car destroyed, isn't exactly a win. If you're going to bail, get out of the cone entirely, don't just run from one side of the cone to the other.

SC coast will wind up with a good sized storm out of this for sure, wind and rain, but would probably be safer than Lakeland. Anyone who saw Central FL after Charlie can attest to the damage it wrought right up the middle of the state, even 50-100 miles after landfall.

On the plus side, leaving Zephyrhills allows them to take back roads north and east to get away from the crowd (provided they know how to use GPS maps). Avoid 4 and 75, and 301 will likely be a zoo as well. 471 up to the turnpike area of 75 might be viable, and from there taking 301 or county roads on north.

Local weather tv guys have been doing live streams discussing the storm and their consensus is that it will probably continue to track east based on a lot of modelling.  They are concerned that Tampa really could be in play.   They think that once it catches the trough, it will make a turn to the east.  If it misses the trough, then it will track more west.  But they believe the odds are it will catch the trough and turn back east.

They believe it will be a Tampa or north of Tampa west coast impact versus a panhandle impact.

Either way, it will be bad for Floridians.

ETA:  He just mentioned GFS models have adjusted east over the last 3 updates.  He named model after model from the Europe, UK, Canadian, Japanese and so on showing Tampa/St. Pete area impacts model after model and not really doing the major adjustments of the GFS model.

Just booked a cancelation free place in Orlando.. will make my go/no go Tuesday. We are high above flood, but only miles from the shore in Largo, so an eye hit is unnerving.

I bet on Tuesday the backup on I-4 East will be unbelievable.

Take 60 East and North 27 at Lake Wales and cut over on 17-92 in Haines City.

I am from Lakeland (now in SWFL). Jeanne put a 60' tall Magnolia through my parents living room. As for running, Irma taught us to plan better. I have never left. Nor have I ever hung a piece of plywood. I have a metal roof, 150 mphw windows, and my house was built in '06. We didn't get the mandatory storm shutters. Our home was in a "debris free zone". Hell, I just bought our first Genny after Irma. That taught us all a lesson, for sure. I'm still not leaving.

Wasn't the Euro model the only one that showed Sandy making a hard left into Jersey?

How far up in georgia do people go to evacuate. I have to be in Lawernancville, Ga for work.

Them cats are 60, 75 bucks an hour?

It' kinda gonna depend on where the storm goes. If it's a couple of major cities that are having to evacuate, they could probably fill up every hotel room in Georgia.

Great. We have a Charleston, SC trip planned. Drive down early Wednesday to to arrive at Mt. Pleasant by evening. Do trips to a few sights Thursday. Friday morning, ferry to Ft. Sumter. Later that evening, sunset ferry on the harbor. Reschedule or wait and see?Tickets already bought coule weeks ago.

Lol.

This has been going on since Thursday night in the Bay area.

Stores are limiting purchases since that time.

Memphis and Jackson TN hotels got sold out a few times from people fleeing hurricanes.

The problem with running form a Florida ‘cane is, by the time you can tell where to go, it’s too late to leave.

I'm headed to Bostic, NC to shoot the Dixie Grand, Wed thru Sun.  Those clay targets might be squirrely next weekend.

Check what he says tonight after the update..

https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/

Those two things together are a shit show on a normal day anymore.

Tomorrow, I’ll be spending the afternoon trimming tree branches back from the long driveway. Luckily, no trees are close enough to the structure of my house to make a huge enough impact. Though some are pretty close. I can’t do much about getting them topped…they’re 40 feet high.  

I just bought 15 more gallons of gas, and extra oil changes for the generator.

I have a lightweight 3-point fertilizer hopper sitting out I have no idea what to do with.   Maybe I’ll strap it to the fence near a post.

My neighbors worry me more, since most of them have junk in different parts of their yard that will make nice projectiles.

I wen thru Charlie. The eye went right over my house in Punta Gorda.
I don't wish that on anyone. Fortunately the trees around the house gave a us a great wind break. I didn't even lose a window screen but I've never seen a sliding glass door move like I did that day. As the storm was raging that slider frame was bowing in & out like 6". Wind pressures were unreal.

A mile from my house I was building a 90 acre county park. Next door was the school bus maintenance facility. Old metal building with 25' long metal panels. It ripped off those panels & threw them across our construction site. Our road contractor had a motorgrader on site & one of the panels blew up against it & got stuck. The wind beat that panel so hard against the equipment, it looked like the machine was wrapped in tin foil. You could read the raised lettering on the tires thru the metal. Cleaned every bit of paint off one side of the grader due to the sand on site.

Driving thru Port Charlotte & Punta Gorda right after the storm passed was surreal. It was like a bomb went off. Sun was shining like any other normal day but destruction everywhere. People were standing in their front yards with just a dazed look on their faces. Power out at my place for 14 days.

Honestly, Irma was more frightening to me. We were in our new place on Alligator Creek east of I-75. We had a ton of rain weeks before & the creek was swollen full. Irma dumped a shit ton of water and flooded its bank up to the bottom of my porch & halfway up my driveway. The creek is normally 25' wide at the top of bank but it wound up like 400' wide from the major road leading into my development back to my neighbors place behind me on the creek. 3.5' deep at the end of my road getting out. My house looked like an island & I was glad I built the 1st floor an additional 1 foot higher than FEMA required. The creek is really low right now so I'm not worried about flooding. I just hate putting up the storm shutters. Oh my MIL will be here too

Tuesday is my day to secure our place if the track looks like we will get a direct hit. I'll ride out a CAT 4 storm at home. If anyone in Charlotte County needs a hand with anything, I'll have my 2 able bodied sons available to provide assistance before or after. PM me a message & hopefully our phones will still be working.

Tie that fertilizer to a tree.

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No change for this update.

So Jim is headed to Clear Water ....

Thanks good sir. I will let them know. It sounds like they are bailing out tomorrow morning and heading north. I think they're coming here to Raleigh. If the cane comes here. We will all go west to my cabin in the Blue ridge mountains. I can play dodge the cane all week.

The track only updates on the 5am & 11pm notifications.
That being said with the northwards movement today the 11pm update tonight will have all of the new data added to it.

Palmetto here.  I was hoping to not put the hurricane shutters up, but not looking so good right now.  I'm going to put it off as long as I can.  I did it early for Irma and ended up having to help all of my neighbors put their's up...

Yep, and the modeling is so inaccurate early on that if you leave early enough to avoid the I-95/I-75 parking lot, you might actually be going to somewhere worse.

Anyone here know if the waste storage at the Crystal River nuclear plant is protected from cat 3-4 hurricanes? Is this a nonissue?