The Storms Never Set on the American Empire

September 8, 2018 1:45 PM

Florence is expected to strengthen to a Category 4 hurricane by the time it arrives at the east coast of the United States, probably targeting the Carolinas, around Thursday or Friday (Sep. 13/14). About the same, Tropical Depression Nine is expected to pass the Lesser Antilles as a hurricane (Isaac) as it passes on into the Caribbean, final destination unknown. Puerto Rico is in the range of potential landfalls and the hurricane should pass and hopefully miss the island near the one year anniversary of Maria.

Hurricane Olivia [autoplay video] is expected to maintain tropical storm strength when it makes landfall in Hawaii. Only two hurricanes are on record as to making landfall in the Hawaiian islands and no tropical storm has ever approached from the north, northeast. Finally, tropical storm Mangkhut is expected to be a Category 4 hurricane when it passes Guam approximately Tuesday.

One other Atlantic invest and current Atlantic hurricane are not expected to be threats to land. One other Pacific invest off the coast of Mexico is expected to become a hurricane but does not appear to be threatening land.

posted by dances_with_sneetches (94 comments total)

Since assembling this, tropical depression nine became Isaac.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 1:55 PM on September 8, 2018 [2 favorites]

Isaac is heading straight at the Lesser Antilles where St Maarten, Tortola, Barbuda and Dominica all got thorougly trashed at this time last year and are all still in recovery mode. Not good.
posted by adamvasco at 2:00 PM on September 8, 2018 [1 favorite]

oh good im ready to return to the sea
posted by poffin boffin at 2:07 PM on September 8, 2018 [8 favorites]

Kiss my grits, Flo.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 2:12 PM on September 8, 2018 [12 favorites]

Don't forget these storms can come pretty far inland at hurricane strength....this is a good time to refresh the storm preparedness supplies, if you are in the Southeast
posted by thelonius at 2:20 PM on September 8, 2018 [1 favorite]

Tropical Depression Nine

That's my nickname for September in Texas
posted by lefty lucky cat at 2:21 PM on September 8, 2018 [14 favorites]

In regards to the title, I am from Puerto Rico, one of the remnants of when the U.S. was actively expanding its domain through wars. In the same war, Guam became part of the United States. Among the Lesser Antilles, the U.S. Virgin Islands share with Puerto Rico and Guam no voting representatives or Senators and no vote for the U.S. President (outside of primaries).

Similar to Puerto Rico, Guam has a low per capita income ($12,864/annum) (Chamber of Commerce web page). "Whites" make up about 7% of the population. with Pacific Island natives and Filipinos making up about two-thirds.

I fear for the Trumpian response if their hurricane proves devastating.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 2:25 PM on September 8, 2018 [34 favorites]

So all in the middle of next week, Mangkhut could hit Guam & the Mariana Islands, Olivia could hit Hawaii, Isaac could hit the lesser Antilles (and keep heading west), and Florence could hit the southeastern U.S. I hope all these storms weaken and veer away from the most populated centers, but what an anxious week.

The subreddit r/TropicalWeather usually has reasonable discussions of these storms (the mods shut down a lot of commenters who aren't meteorologists yet declare they know what will happen).
posted by lisa g at 2:58 PM on September 8, 2018 [6 favorites]

Florence definitely has us worried here in NE Florida. Cars are gassed and water has been bought. And who knows what the hell Isaac is up to. Ugh.
posted by saladin at 3:49 PM on September 8, 2018

SENC; work is making preparations. Costco was packed this morning. I grabbed some water, although will have access to a ton of it at work. Got propane and charcoal, fired up the generator, and mowed the grass. I have some yard debris that needs to go away, but otherwise am fairly ready; I keep a Hurricane Box of Important Documents to take with me to work. Winston the dog hates hurricanes because he REFUSES to poop in the rain, because it’s apparently The Worst Thing To Ever Happen. He will be with me throughout the whole thing; he hung out in the fire station while Matthew rattled the shutters. After Matthew, I replaced the roof and got some much needed repairs done to my fence.

We stay here if it’s Cat 1 or Cat 2 and evacuate the island and run our Town EOC from a bank building and hotel on the mainland. If it’s for real, they actually cut us town employees loose and we can head west; City and County employees have to stay, I believe, but since NCDOT and the Town close the drawbridge, we have very little response area and aren’t needed until recovery.

We’re tracking, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Ms. Florence arrives next week.
posted by sara is disenchanted at 4:08 PM on September 8, 2018 [10 favorites]

BoatUS is my goto site for hurricane info on active storms, because i like their map offerings. Here's their page for Florence.
posted by achrise at 4:36 PM on September 8, 2018 [3 favorites]

On top of all this Florence is expected to land with high tide. In one model run Mangkhut will have a pressure of 869. That's in unbelievable territory but everything is a go for rapid and sustained strengthening and I wouldn't doubt if it ramped up to 185 mph by the time it gets to Taipan.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 4:59 PM on September 8, 2018 [1 favorite]

I'm in Raleigh, North Carolina, and our grocery stores are already almost out of bottled water. We're a couple of hours inland but Fran in 1996 was devastating to this area, and Florence looks to be much stronger and, at least right now, is on a similar path. There are about forty enormous trees within crushing distance of my house. Ugh. And yet, of course, the idea of it veering further south and destroying someone else's town is not good either.
posted by something something at 5:01 PM on September 8, 2018 [3 favorites]

DC is outside the most likely track, but within the 10-15% probability range, and well within the cone of after effects. It's been SUPER rainy here all summer, the ground is already so waterlogged that the rain today started flooding the street in front of my house, which is right on a flood plain. A month ago we had 2ft of water in the yard. We're not the most in danger, but it wouldn't take much shift, or much staying power, to have significant effects on the whole Virginia coast.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:12 PM on September 8, 2018 [1 favorite]

I visited Hong Kong earlier this year. They have a full system of Typhoon / Hurricane warnings in place; there was a brochure in my hotel room explaining it. They notify the populace when there's a risk, and as that risk reaches a certain point, public services shut down and everybody hunkers down until the storm passes; shortly thereafter, life resumes as normal.

In contrast, the United States always seems vaguely surprised when a hurricane hits it.
posted by Hatashran at 5:16 PM on September 8, 2018 [12 favorites]

I'm in Raleigh, North Carolina, and our grocery stores are already almost out of bottled water.

There will be several cycles of restocking before the storm arrives; go very early in the morning and you should find everything you need.

Fran in 1996 was devastating to this area, and Florence looks to be much stronger and, at least right now, is on a similar path.

I was new to the area, and was so cavalier about Fran. I figured it would be a bunch of rain and the power would be out for a day, at worst. Not so! Even though nothing that bad has happened in the years since, 10 days with no electricity or perishable groceries changed my outlook permanently.
posted by thelonius at 5:43 PM on September 8, 2018 [4 favorites]

I work for a college in New England with a campus in Charlotte and one in Miami and another in Denver, so every season we get to watch each other helplessly as a blizzard or hurricane or nor’easter streamrolls over one another. The Emergency Operations Center is always ready, and those conference calls are always tense no matter whose turn it is in the barrel.

Good luck, everybody. Take care of yourselves and your neighbors.⛈
posted by wenestvedt at 6:44 PM on September 8, 2018 [2 favorites]

BoatUS is my goto site for hurricane info on active storms

flhurricane.com is a weather geek site that does a good job of aggregating and discussing news sources.
posted by carter at 6:52 PM on September 8, 2018

I used to use this site and their app, but after the acquisition ... well you can click the link and see for yourself. Any good alternatives?
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 6:56 PM on September 8, 2018 [2 favorites]

Highly recommend Levi Cowan at Tropical Tidbits - he's a meteorology grad student at USF and provides all the context that your local weatherman leaves out.

I live on a barrier island in South Carolina, so am looking forward to surfing tomorrow, followed by hurricane prep at home and then at work. Be safe everyone!
posted by ElGuapo at 7:09 PM on September 8, 2018 [3 favorites]

I just realized that PR, Guam, and Hawaii are all 1898 acquisitions. The USVI are from 1917. PR is probably not going to be hit, but three separate storms are heading for the others.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 7:30 PM on September 8, 2018 [1 favorite]

The GFS model tonight has Florence stalling out over the NC/VA barrier islands as a category 4-5 hurricane for 3 days with 96" of rainfall. That's uhh...bad.
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:47 PM on September 8, 2018 [7 favorites]

EIGHT FEET OF RAIN??
posted by wenestvedt at 4:09 AM on September 9, 2018 [5 favorites]

That's only one model, days in advance. Cancel your subscription to the Resurrection.
posted by thelonius at 5:21 AM on September 9, 2018 [3 favorites]

Cancel your subscription to the Resurrection.

A discarded Idris Elba line from Pacific Rim.
posted by GenjiandProust at 7:35 AM on September 9, 2018 [3 favorites]

A discarded Idris Elba line from Pacific Rim.

It's from a Doors song
posted by thelonius at 7:40 AM on September 9, 2018 [2 favorites]

Send my credenza to the house of pretention.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:19 AM on September 9, 2018 [7 favorites]

As of right now Florence is a hurricane again (cat 1) and it looks bad for the coast of NC. I live in Raleigh but Mrs. Freecell has family in Wilmington so we're hoping the storm turns or at least doesn't stall over the coast.
posted by freecellwizard at 10:26 AM on September 9, 2018 [1 favorite]

The current storm already has hydrostatic pressure pushing little beads of water up through the basement floor.

If this thing hits DC hard I might just have to chop the stairs off and declare everything below grade "the pool we've always wanted."
posted by aspersioncast at 11:49 AM on September 9, 2018

SE NC here. And I work weekends at a big home improvement store. A tractor trailer load of generators came in this morning at 7:30. All gone in 4 hours. Plywood is running low. I'm exhausted. Did not get a break today.

Loading 250 lb generators into every kind of vehicle. Even unboxed a couple to load into the back seat of a Toyota Camry and a Ford fusion. Customers don't realize how hard that is...I was having to crawl in and heft up one end while a couple of guys picked up the other and shoved. Only landed on my hand once. Expecting another trailer load sometime in next 72 hrs.

And now I need to get my crap together but my back is killing me. I already started freezing blocks of water and filling up jugs. And then I need to help my neighbors and do the stuff at mom's.
posted by mightshould at 12:20 PM on September 9, 2018 [15 favorites]

mightshould, if you guys need anything, memail me; I’m just down the street.
posted by sara is disenchanted at 12:49 PM on September 9, 2018 [2 favorites]

Thanks Sara for the generous offer. And vice versa if you need anything.

Reminder to everyone that you can fill all kinds of things right now with water. It doesn't have to be store bought. And fill your freezer with blocks of ice that you have popped out of your container and put into zip bags. Transfer these to the fridge and ice chest just prior to storm and keep refreshing freezer as you go. If power goes out a full fridge or freezer stays cool longer. And you can always use it for drinking later if needed.

For those who have a need for caffeine get some instant coffee. Your head will thank you later.
posted by mightshould at 2:15 PM on September 9, 2018 [10 favorites]

As usual, if you want the latest hyperbolic take backed by science, you'll find it at @ErcHolthaus's feed, i.e:

9/9/2018 5pm: "The official forecast still calls for Hurricane #Florence to make landfall near Wilmington NC on Thurs at Category 4 strength --becoming the strongest East Coast hurricane landfall in recorded history, tied with Hugo (1989).

And then, a disastrous inland flood."

posted by gwint at 3:14 PM on September 9, 2018

UNC-Wilmington is already beginning voluntary evacuation of campus, according to a friend who teaches there.
posted by hydropsyche at 3:32 PM on September 9, 2018

hydropsyche, this is correct. WECT and WWAY are our local news channels, although neither are very good. Stopped down at my neighbors’ house this afternoon to watch the Panthers game and they were leaving to go to Lowes to get some plywood. I have a few things I can’t do until Wednesday. Unfortunately, I take online classes at a UNC school farther inland and I haven’t received anything in the way of weather alerts from them, although they were hit very hard by Matthew and I assume some information will be forthcoming.

I don’t go back on shift until Tuesday, but I assume I’ll hear something at some point. I’m still getting things ready should I have an opportunity to leave and decide to take it.
posted by sara is disenchanted at 4:13 PM on September 9, 2018

wxcharts still shows western Wake and Durham counties being missed by the storm. (Durham, for example, is slated to accumulate one inch of rain between tonight and next Sunday, most of that having fallen by Tuesday.) Everything to the east of Wake County, though, whoo.

Knocking on wood, of course.
posted by ardgedee at 4:24 PM on September 9, 2018

Andrew landed on the east coast as a category 5. The Labor Day hurricane went from the Atlantic to hit Key West from the south before becoming a Gulf storm and was Category 5. Of course there is no guarantee that Florence will only be a category 4.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 4:25 PM on September 9, 2018

This is really, really nerve-wracking. We've been in Raleigh since 2005 and have never had anything significant hit this area, with the exception of Matthew's unexpected rain a couple of years ago. I was raised in tornado country, which everyone who isn't from tornado country finds terrifying - but tornadoes are so brief and over such a limited area. Watching a huge storm like this approach for days and days on end is much worse. I can't imagine how those of you on the coast are feeling. It's scary stuff.
posted by something something at 4:47 PM on September 9, 2018 [1 favorite]

Having lived in the mid-Atlantic or in SoCal all my life, I can tell you I much prefer hurricanes to earthquakes and ffffff tornados. The NWS tells me “hey, there’s a hurricane coming; here’s what you should do.” And I do it. And then the rain comes and goes and we rebuild if we’re lucky. A tornado; no thank you. People in the Midwest have a special kind of courage.
posted by sara is disenchanted at 5:06 PM on September 9, 2018 [9 favorites]

So I’m supposed to fly out of Raleigh to New Orleans on Friday, and this was scheduled to be our teenage daughter’s first time staying home by herself for a few days (I’m back on Tuesday). I’m not sure I’ll make it out, and I’m not sure I want to make it out at this point. My daughter has friends and family she can stay with if it looks really bad, but she was really looking forward to this taste of adulthood. Stupid weather.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:25 PM on September 9, 2018 [4 favorites]

Model runs overnight (reddit comment link). Euro has landfall slightly further south than yesterday, with massive inland rainfall across NC and up into western VA. The GFS is even worse, still showing a stall and curve up directly over the outer bank and Hampton Roads.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:01 AM on September 10, 2018 [2 favorites]

Meta check-in thread.
posted by RolandOfEld at 7:27 AM on September 10, 2018 [4 favorites]

I’m not sure I’ll make it out, and I’m not sure I want to make it out at this point.

I was 12 and living pretty close to where you are, when Fran came through and dropped a massive oak tree on our house. Florence's track looks a lot like Fran's did, and I probably wouldn't risk it with a teenager if at all possible. That area doesn't get many bad hurricanes, but when they hit, there's a lot more big trees to come down than there are further east.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 8:12 AM on September 10, 2018 [2 favorites]

Florence is up to major hurricane status (115 mph, 11 am, EST).

Mangkhut has passed north of Guam and seems to have spared Guam the worst. The news site says tropical storm force winds will occur until tomorrow morning (their time). There are several less populated islands north of Guam that were on the direct path, including Rota.

(Above I said Taipan when I meant Taiwan. (big difference). Mangkhut is projected to head south of Taiwan, but to dump a lot of rain on Taiwan).

Olivia seems to maintaining its 85 mph strength. It's trailing a little to the north and is now projected to make landfall in Maui as a tropical storm.

Isaac has not strengthened yet.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 8:31 AM on September 10, 2018 [3 favorites]

Florence is now a category 4 hurricane. Data from a NOAA Hurricane Hunter indicate that Florence has continued to rapidly strengthen and has maximum sustained winds near 130 mph (195 km/h) and a minimum central pressure of 946 mb (27.93 inches)
posted by gwint at 9:11 AM on September 10, 2018 [1 favorite]

Having lived in the mid-Atlantic or in SoCal all my life, I can tell you I much prefer hurricanes to earthquakes and ffffff tornados.

I'll take tornadoes over hurricanes any day. A tornado outbreak didn't kill 3000 people in Puerto Rico, deliver a body blow to NYC and decimate New Orleans. And hurricanes bring rain + tornadoes over many days, so if you get a hurricane, there's a good chance you will get a tornado too.
posted by The_Vegetables at 9:17 AM on September 10, 2018 [5 favorites]

Hurricanes often spawn tornadoes. This was an argument of the home building industry in South Florida after Andrew. It wasn't our shoddy construction it was tornadoes (that magically threaded their way from one house constructed by a certain company to the next).
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 10:03 AM on September 10, 2018 [3 favorites]

Found the CERA site for storm surge predictions. Surf city currently looks to be getting the worst of it, only about 3-4' surge here in the Hampton Roads area.
posted by daHIFI at 10:25 AM on September 10, 2018 [2 favorites]

Seems relevant.
posted by DrAstroZoom at 12:39 PM on September 10, 2018

[real]

Hurricane Florence Discussion Number 46
NWS National Hurricane Center Miami FL AL062018
500 PM AST Mon Sep 10 2018

Unfortunately, the models were right.

Key Messages:

1. A life-threatening storm surge is likely along portions of the
coastlines of South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia, and
a Storm Surge Watch will likely be issued for some of these areas by
Tuesday morning. All interests from South Carolina into the mid-
Atlantic region should ensure they have their hurricane plan in
place and follow any advice given by local officials.

2. Life-threatening freshwater flooding is likely from a prolonged
and exceptionally heavy rainfall event, which may extend inland over
the Carolinas and Mid Atlantic for hundreds of miles as Florence is
expected to slow down as it approaches the coast and moves inland.

3. Damaging hurricane-force winds are likely along portions of the
coasts of South Carolina and North Carolina, and a Hurricane Watch
will likely be issued by Tuesday morning. Damaging winds could also
spread well inland into portions of the Carolinas and Virginia.

4. Large swells affecting Bermuda and portions of the U.S. East
Coast will continue this week, resulting in life-threatening surf
and rip currents.

posted by T.D. Strange at 2:30 PM on September 10, 2018

5pm 5 day cone now shows it stopping, and staying over NC and VA.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:34 PM on September 10, 2018

Oh boy, I said as much in the checkin thread but will repeat it here: those rain predictions sound tremendously worrying. Plus y'all will get tons of down tbranches since storms like this aren't all hat common there I think and if the ground stays saturated you'll see whole trees toppling under even less intense wind loading.
posted by RolandOfEld at 2:43 PM on September 10, 2018 [1 favorite]

FUck. It's gonna suck flood wise
posted by yoga at 2:46 PM on September 10, 2018 [1 favorite]

Oh, God, please keep people safe. Welcome people into your homes, if you can. If you have a boat, and are able to respond, Consider planning on helping with the response if you can.

I am now very thankful for Florida, in Louisiana. I have not appreciated how much energy a storm can build without any land between the coast and the worst.

A bad surge and a bad rain, this looks bad.some places will get hit twice. Which can be really bad if people aren t expecting it. So many bad things happen at times when you think the worst is over.
posted by eustatic at 4:56 PM on September 10, 2018

Jeez, that looks like it's going to hit Wilmington on Thursday, Raleigh on Friday, and Durham on Saturday. That's going to be bloody awful.
posted by hydropsyche at 5:32 PM on September 10, 2018

"It is important not to focus on the
exact forecast track as average NHC errors at days 4 and 5 are about
140 and 180 n mi, respectively, and dangerous hazards will extend
well away from the center."
posted by thelonius at 5:43 PM on September 10, 2018 [1 favorite]

UNC has cancelled classes starting tomorrow PM and has encouraged students to get out of town before the storm hits. This is what our local government has advised.

I was around for Fran in 1996 and I was in Greensboro (another 45ish miles west of the western Triangle). It was a scary when it came through and a mess afterwards (we were without power for almost a week). If you're planning to stick around, stock up on food and water and be careful. If you're new to hurricanes--or new to hurricanes that come inland--this doesn't appear to be the one to underestimate.
posted by thivaia at 8:09 PM on September 10, 2018

Isaac and Olivia are down to tropical storms. Isaac is expected to bounce back.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 8:24 PM on September 10, 2018

I'm far enough inland that when they tell me that they're closing the schools in my county because of the Hurricane, it's usually a positive thing, because they're being closed to house evacuees from the coast, meaning we're a lot safer here than where those poor schlubs came from. Still we double checked our evacuation room today and made sure that we had all the supplies we needed.
posted by radwolf76 at 9:33 PM on September 10, 2018 [2 favorites]

Report from the sister in law that they're safe on Guam so that's nice. Most of the island is still in pickup and get power on mode but they took a 1-2 cat glancing blow instead of a worse direct hit. Cell service is up and she posted a few pics on facebook of her backyard, which looks about like you'd expect after a storm rolled through. So, small blessings and all that.
posted by RolandOfEld at 6:18 AM on September 11, 2018 [6 favorites]

From the most recent (9/11 11am) NHC Florence Discussion release

The broken record continues -- there is no
significant [change, typo/omission perhaps] to the previous track forecast or reasoning. Although
the global and regional models continue to make minor shifts
northward and southward, the consensus models have changed little.
posted by RolandOfEld at 8:06 AM on September 11, 2018

My parents and sister are in Greensboro, far enough inland to probably avoid the worst of it. As a kid I remember losing power in multiple storms a year due to Duke Power's shitty above-ground power lines, though, and I'm sure lots of people will suffer the same from Florence.
posted by showbiz_liz at 8:43 AM on September 11, 2018

Um, so if you want to be a nerd like me you can watch the data from the buoys here. I'm keeping an eye on the Hatteras buoy here. Typical low wave heights are about 5.2 ft, highs are about 6.2-6.6. That's gonna start changing as Flo bears down.
posted by yoga at 9:03 AM on September 11, 2018 [1 favorite]

Twitter list of Florence reporters and weather sources
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:24 AM on September 11, 2018 [2 favorites]

Meteorologist/storm chaser Jeff Piotrowski will be there.
- Periscope (may not be up during landfall).
- Youtube
posted by carter at 2:45 PM on September 11, 2018 [2 favorites]

I read this tip on Yahoo. For those evacuating. Put a cup of water in your freezer. Let it freeze. Put a quarter on top. When you return, if the electricity was out for long enough for your food to unfreeze and refreeze, then the quarter will be on the bottom of the frozen water.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 4:32 PM on September 11, 2018 [11 favorites]

Model runs tonight are significantly further south, still showing a stall over NC and SC, then tracking into GA.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:27 PM on September 11, 2018 [2 favorites]

Incidentally, NPR mentioned that they have a light version of their website which may be easier to surf on a phone in an affected area.

http://thin.npr.org or http://text.npr.org
posted by ZeusHumms at 6:58 AM on September 12, 2018 [2 favorites]

Meanwhile in Hong Kong, we're getting a bit more concerned than we usually are, I think, for the now-post-Guam Super Typhoon Mangkhut this coming weekend - it's supposed to be the strongest typhoon ever recorded here (the Western Pacific Typhoon Committee's 'Super Typhoon' designation is roughly equivalent to a Category 4 on Saffir-Simpson) and be within 100 km of the centre of the city. I teach on the weekend and fully expect classes to be cancelled and for most transport to be suspended on Sunday.

The vast majority of the city's residents will probably be fine given our excellent infrastructure - though I worry about windows being blown out of skyscrapers and flying 50 stories down onto anyone unfortunate enough to be outside. The smallish 65-year-old building I live in will ride it out just fine, given where it is (in the shelter of some serious hills) and how other taller buildings shelter it in a literal canyon of tower blocks, but many thousands of people here live in roof dwellings in the centre of older neighbourhoods or in rickety village houses out in the rural New Territories or on boats, to say nothing of the city's homeless and housing-insecure population. The situation here is nowhere near as bad as in other typhoon-hit places like the Philippines or Vietnam, but there's still a rather large potential for damage depending on where on the socioeconomic/housing-security scale you look.

Also, I, like most Hongkongers, depend heavily on being able to pick up what I need on a daily basis, as no one has an American-sized living space (public-housing flats here rarely top 700 square feet for a family of four and my flat is a luxurious 300 square foot two-bedroom former studio) to accommodate cases of bottled water or something. Also, a lot of people simply don't cook because they have no space - think hotplate plus fridge plus bathroom sink as the kitchen setup - and so rely on delivery or takeaway; convenience stores and supermarkets have very long hours or simply never close. I don't know how a Category 4 hurricane/super typhoon interacts with that, but I expect people to have to be quite careful on Sunday night, companies to work through Sunday evening to restock shops and restaurants, and for us all to be back in the CBD area of the city on Monday morning, with some clean-up going into Tuesday, maybe, in the most isolated and island locations.

Good luck to everyone in the US staring down a more insecure situation in terms of housing and utilities and panic buying and all that - get somewhere safe and hunker down.
posted by mdonley at 7:42 AM on September 12, 2018 [6 favorites]

Right now Florence is projected to first make landfall at Cape Fear, because, why not. (North Carolina map)

If it does skirt the coast and has a chance to weaken before making landfall in South Carolina, it might end up being a category 2 or less at landfall as shown in this gif (pressure 980), which seems an unfair label considering the amount of damage it is going to cause.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 11:29 AM on September 12, 2018

If you'd like to watch Florence roll in, you can check out the Frying Pan cam (30 some-odd miles offshore) or the Wilmington Sky Tower cam. No idea if they will stay online during the storm, though.
Warning: the Frying Pan cam has auto-playing audio and the wind is loud.
posted by mfu at 1:41 PM on September 12, 2018 [3 favorites]

Both of mfu's referenced cams appear down for me. surprised face
posted by RolandOfEld at 6:29 AM on September 13, 2018

Both of mfu's referenced cams appear down for me. surprised face

Frying Pan cam is still working for me.
Whoa.
posted by Floydd at 6:37 AM on September 13, 2018 [2 favorites]

the explore.org link is down for me but the Youtube live is up
posted by thelonius at 6:52 AM on September 13, 2018 [3 favorites]

Weird, I had to go to Youtube to get Fryingpan to work.
posted by RolandOfEld at 6:53 AM on September 13, 2018 [1 favorite]

Jinx.
posted by RolandOfEld at 6:53 AM on September 13, 2018

Very true, Socrates
posted by thelonius at 6:58 AM on September 13, 2018

The whole explore.org site is down. Here are direct links to the YouTube feeds (which are the same streams the explore.org site is embedding anyway):
Frying Pan Sky Tower
Frying Pan Ocean Cam
Shark Cam (34 miles off the North Carolina coast and underwater, but if you'd ever wondered what hurricanes look like to fish, here you go)
posted by ardgedee at 7:37 AM on September 13, 2018 [3 favorites]

Metafilter: if you'd ever wondered what hurricanes look like to fish, here you go
posted by RolandOfEld at 7:40 AM on September 13, 2018 [6 favorites]

Thanks for finding the embedded links, all!
posted by mfu at 8:56 AM on September 13, 2018

Hurricane Florence Could Be That Much Worse Because of What's Waiting for It on Land: There are lagoons of pig shit and coal ash in North Carolina—courtesy of Republican deregulation.
posted by homunculus at 11:24 AM on September 13, 2018 [4 favorites]

> Hurricane Florence Could Be That Much Worse Because of What's Waiting for It on Land: There are lagoons of pig shit and coal ash in North Carolina—courtesy of Republican deregulation.

Because of course there are. Pig shit and coal ash, in unlined lagoons - where the state has actively gone backwards from the situation on the ground when Floyd hit in 1999.
posted by RedOrGreen at 11:32 AM on September 13, 2018

Thanks for those links, ardgedee. The ocean cam one shows the flag ripped nearly to shreds. Weirdly appropriate for the 204th anniversary of the Battle of Ft. McHenry and the writing of the Star Spangled Banner.
posted by basalganglia at 11:47 AM on September 13, 2018 [2 favorites]

Frying Pan Ocean Cam is running "Highlights" and there's a lot of angst (and some conspiracy theories) in the comments about the loss of "Kevin". I'm not sure if that is in reference to the flag, which was getting torn to shreds last I looked, or the platform.

Up in the NC mountains gas is available again and the weekend looks nice up until Saturday night, when the two days of deluge starts. Fingers crossed about localized flooding, power outage from downed trees, and landslides. We're getting it easy compared to the coast.
posted by achrise at 6:00 AM on September 14, 2018 [1 favorite]

This is how the world ends: will we soon see category 6 hurricanes?
No one in America has ever experienced the wrath and fury of a category 6 hurricane, which now genuinely seems possible and realistic. We’ve been lucky. Unofficial category 6 hurricanes have appeared in other parts of the world, and we’re seeing much stronger storms on a regular basis. It’s only a matter of time before one hits the US.
posted by adamvasco at 6:35 AM on September 15, 2018 [4 favorites]

This is how the world ends: will we soon see category 6 hurricanes?

Based partly on this link-filled 2016 post by Jeff Masters: Extreme 'Grey Swan' Hurricanes in Tampa Bay: a Potential Future Catastrophe
posted by ZeusHumms at 11:27 AM on September 15, 2018 [1 favorite]

Hurricane Florence is costing workers income. Blame federal labor laws. Low-wage workers are the most screwed.
posted by homunculus at 9:33 PM on September 15, 2018 [2 favorites]

Hurricane Florence Is Exposing Major Problems With How We Categorize Storms (autoplays)
posted by homunculus at 9:35 PM on September 15, 2018 [1 favorite]

How Hurricane Florence and Typhoon Mangkhut compare
posted by homunculus at 10:06 PM on September 15, 2018

Re: storm categories, Richard Campanella has an article about the S-S scale from 2008 that is very good.

Basically, Saffir-Simpson Scale is all based on wind speed, but surge and energy factor into many urgent concerns.

I should add that Florence is the latest in the "double hit" type of storm-that-stalls, Isaac (LA 2012), Harvey (2017), Flo (2018). So, the "Rainfall-stall" is a big concern, as well.

So many Florence is not a "3 at landfall", it is a 3-1-5 with a stall? that is how I am making sense of it
posted by eustatic at 9:07 AM on September 16, 2018

https://anothergulf.com/a-just-florence-recovery/
posted by eustatic at 8:41 PM on September 16, 2018

So I’m supposed to fly out of Raleigh to New Orleans on Friday, and this was scheduled to be our teenage daughter’s first time staying home by herself for a few days (I’m back on Tuesday). I’m not sure I’ll make it out, and I’m not sure I want to make it out at this point. My daughter has friends and family she can stay with if it looks really bad, but she was really looking forward to this taste of adulthood. Stupid weather.

I never did make it to New Orleans, fwiw. I had three separate flights get canceled out from under me on Friday, and by that time, the next thing they had to offer me was on Sunday, which would have left me with less than 48 hours in the city, which hardly seemed worth the price of the ticket. Apparently Delta kept running limited flights all through the storm, but I was flying on American.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:17 AM on September 18, 2018

Hurricane Florence Brought North Carolina an Environmental Disaster: Predictably, the state's manic deregulation has led to unsafe conditions.
posted by homunculus at 4:22 PM on September 24, 2018 [1 favorite]

Hurricane Florence: When Climate Change Meets Bad Policy. The toxic mess amid the tragedy of Hurricane Florence lays bare the bankruptcy of GOP policies
posted by homunculus at 11:25 AM on September 25, 2018