2024 Atlantic Hurricane Season Running Thread

Everywhere has some kind of feature that makes it a no go zone under the right conditions. Hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, wildfire danger, blizzards, ice storms. I don’t blame people who want out of Florida, but you’ve got to make a stand somewhere.

 

Don't forget get heat. I was listening to an SF radio station and the area is in a heat wave with temps in the 90's.

 

Great news!

 

Hundreds. The Niners game hit 101. I hit 102. It was 105 last week in the South Bay. Closer to the bay hit 90s and the coast was bearable, but it’s been bad this last week and we have one or two more days of it.

 

Milton hits Cat 4.

 

Lee County evacuation plans to be announced today.

 

Storm surge question … this is a very unusual hurricane in that it’s moving more or less directly west-to-east. Does that make the storm surge worse for the Gulf Coast or does it not matter?

 

As home ownership goes, it does make a difference though.

Hurricanes in the Gulf and the southeast have become so common as to be predictable, which means home insurance rates skyrocket or home insurance isn’t offered at all.

Same thing for wildfires out west.

As for a retirement destination that seems to have little weather drama? Um, New Mexico? (But NM likely has wildfires in its northern areas.)

 

It is largely insignificant. The real impact on the Gulf Coast -- at least south of the Big Bend -- is not the storm moving west to east, but whether it's north or south of your location, specifically an inlet/bay. For example, the worst-case scenario for the Tampa Bay area has always been the storm coming ashore north of the mouth of Tampa Bay, because the counter-clockwise spin of the hurricane drives water up through the bay into Tampa and St. Petersburg. To the west/north of Big Bend on the Gulf Coast, the side you don't want to be on is east of the center. (It was the opposite for New Orleans in Katrina because even though the city was on the west side of the landfall spot, Lake Pontchartrain is north of the city, and thus the counter-clockwise spin of a storm that passed to the east drove the lake waters down into the city once the levees failed.)

 

And we have a Cat 5

 

Thanks! This land-locked denizen isn't up to speed on such things.