I am going to take the president’s advice seriously and start preparing for a nasty aftermath to this hurricane. If you are in the path of Hurricane Irene, please read the Red Cross’ recommendations. You can track the storm at the National Hurricane Center. Here is their latest public advisory. You can use that last link to get a precise forecast for your area (just type in your Zip Code in the search engine). Here’s mine:
Saturday: A chance of showers and thunderstorms, then showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm after 2pm. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 80. East wind between 7 and 15 mph. Chance of precipitation is 70%. New rainfall amounts between a half and three quarters of an inch possible.
Saturday Night: Tropical storm conditions expected. Periods of rain and possibly a thunderstorm. Some of the storms could produce heavy rainfall. Low around 66. East wind 29 to 34 mph increasing to between 30 and 40 mph. Winds could gust as high as 49 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New rainfall amounts between 2 and 3 inches possible.
Sunday: Tropical storm conditions possible. Periods of rain and possibly a thunderstorm, mainly before 5pm, then scattered rain and thunderstorms after 5pm. Some of the storms could produce heavy rainfall. High near 76. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New rainfall amounts between 2 and 3 inches possible.
Sunday Night: Scattered showers before 8pm. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 59. Chance of precipitation is 30%. New rainfall amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible.
Monday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 80.
Sustained 40 mph winds with gusts up to 49 mph should be survivable, although we could see some trees coming down and our power will almost certainly be lost, probably for several days. Our basement will be badly flooded, but we’re on high ground so we don’t need to worry about flash floods. Many of you are not so fortunate. If you live near the coast or along any major tributaries, familiarize yourself with your storm-surge risk. If you select a Category 2 from that chart and then blow up Philadelphia really big, you’ll see that it shows Center City and the Art Museum area being inundated from the Schuylkill River to a depth of fourteen feet. The airport could be under four-to-six feet of water. Interstate 95 will be washed out. Most of West Philly could be under more than ten-feet of water, too. Even a Category 1 storm looks grim, with the Schuylkill still spilling over its banks.
We need this storm to weaken substantially or we’re going to be having our own Katrina.
I don’t know what this will do, but I basically live in a forest. Not a forest, but as wooded as a paved subdivision can get. I might go sleep at my friend’s house who lives in a subdivision without trees.
The last hurricane to come through here was Isabel in 2003. It knocked a lot of trees, but one in particular fell on across the street on my neighbor’s house, caving in their entire second floor. For comparison, Isabel in my region sustained winds between 40-50 mph with 75 mph gusts.
your outlook is slightly better than mine, but not much. And, yes, we have a couple of big trees near the house that I’m very concerned about.
See, Booman. This is some serious shit. That forecast sounds kinda weak, too. You should see a Category 1 hurricane in your neck of the woods (and it is woods) after experiencing the wettest month on record. Trees could fall on your house.
I would sleep on the floor under a sturdy table tomorrow night if in such a situation.
I lived in Galveston when Alicia made landfall overnight in August 1983. I stayed 60 miles inland at a friend’s place in Houston, and I can promise you none of us slept that night. At all.
Hurricanes are nothing to mess around with. Sometimes it winds up being a false alarm or weaker than advertised (Irene is moving relatively quickly, which is good news), but you’re much better off preparing for the worst, just in case. I hope everyone in Irene’s path is taking this seriously, and wish you all well.
After posting that comment, I wanted to add “IF you are even able to get to sleep.”
I was down there for Alicia too – in Port Arthur. I was only 5, but I still remember it. That was when I first learned you could force-flush a toilet by dumping a bucket of water into it, knowledge that has come in handy several times since.
yipes! category 2 looks awful. But I’m not sure the schuykill would flood that badly to hit me: we’re well into higher ground here (although the underground creek/sewer at 51st street will flood, for sure).
Jeez, I might get some extra water just in case. I have ten gallons, but maybe I need more?
also, time to double-check my propane tank. whew! full.
You and Rae should seriously consider getting out if this thing doesn’t move east or if the winds are going to be in Category 2 territory. Or, maybe go buy a canoe.
I’m already in Chicago. Flew out of PHL this morning. The weather here is lovely.
Probably center city will be ok, but I am just 3 blocks from the schukylkill, so why risk it?
Smart. You got out while you still could. Why take chances? Chicago should be fabulous. Go have a drink in Boystown for me. I love Chicago.
link
meh. Grow some balls.
O/T: Most progressive administration evah.
Stay away from the windows. Rain and wind come in bands, so don’t venture too far if it seems calm.
Stay cool and try not to scare the kids. Remember, this is the most excitement a weather forecaster can get.
You should be fine. I hope CabinGirl can find a celebratory vacation moment.
Here’s a tip my dad reminded me of last night when we were talking about this hurricane business:
Before the hurricane, flush your water heater out. That means turning it off, opening the pressure release valve on top, turning off the incoming water, attaching a hose to it at the bottom and running that to a drain or outdoors. Open the valve at the hose and drain it. This should get the old sludge out. Then close the bottom valve and open the incoming water valve to refill it. You may want to repeat this process to get it really clean.
Then turn off the incoming water once it is full again, leaving the pressure valve open. Now you have a tank of anywhere from 25 to 80 gallons (depending on its size, of course) of fresh water stored. Use the hose (still attached) to refill water jugs.
You won’t have hot water until this thing’s over and you turn the water supply back on, re-engage the pressure valve and turn the water heater back on again, but you’re got a useful supply of good quality drinking water stored there.
BTW- If you don’t understand the “pressure valve” stuff or don’t have one, just turn on the hot water in a faucet in your bathroom or something. This will drain all of the hot water out of your house’s pipes. Leave it open until things are all normal again and you refill the tank and turn the water heater back on.
be safe everyone
Another tip: Get a PUR or Brita water-filtering pitcher and familiarize yourself with how to use it now.
Once this thing passes and power returns, your water will start flowing again, but it’s gonna be full of all kinds of bad stuff. A good filtering pitcher removes all of that stuff. You can literally run nasty contaminated pond water through one of those things and it will make it safe to drink. Don’t trust the public water supply for a few weeks. You could get sick.
Now’s the time for anyone in the path of the hurricane to evacuate if recommended.
As a “Katrina survivor” can I just say that one kinda obvious consequence of Katrina that is a good one, is that for what ever it’s worth, people now take Hurricane evacuation and Hurricane preparedness much more seriously than they used to definitely on the Gulf coast, but also along all the coast.
So some advice from someone who’s been there.
#1 LESSON LEARNED FROM KATRINA If you can, evacuate early. As a hospital lab employee, I understand that some employees are on call and have to stay at the hospital if a weather emergency is called, but if you are not considered “essential personnel”, then my understanding is that in cases of weather emergencies you do NOT have to go into work.
If you cannot evacuate, then some incidental things that stick in my head:
if you have a cell, make sure it’s fully charged and if you have a spare cell battery, make sure it’s charged too. The big lesson we learned from Katrina, was that cell phone calls may not work, but text messages do.
Make sure you have a radio or clock radio that can run on batteries and electricity just in case electricity goes out and to save energy on your phone, you can still hear updates from radio.
If you do have a land line, then make sure you have a non-cordless phone or a phone that doesn’t need electricity for connection. The is no point in having cordless phones but no electricity to allow them to connect. The phone lines may still work, but if you only have a cordless, then you are without any juice to power it if the electricity is out.
Hmm, it seems surprising that the storm would remain a Category 2 if it moved inland all the way to Philidelphia. I always underestimate how closer together things are in the east.
Well I pray you and your family come through this safe.
The forecasts I’m seeing put it at a Cat 1 by the time it reaches Philly. Let’s hope that’s all it is but that’s still terrible.
Something to think about if you want to escape the east coast…
The airlines may be cancelling all scheduled flights in and out but they have to evacuate all of their aircraft before the hurricane hits. They will be flying un-scheduled flights to other hubs of theirs in the west. Give them a call. They may be able to set you up with a cheap weekend in Phoenix or Minneapolis or San Francisco or something because they’ll bring all of the planes and crews back on un-scheduled Monday flights as well before they start their schedule back up again.