hurricane coming...

we're poised to get about a foot of water in san antonio this weekend and i have no idea how monday is going to be the first day of school

― seven mambas (m bison), Saturday, August 26, 2017 12:52 AM (fifteen hours ago)

school is not canceled on monday???

Just went through back to back tornado warnings. Rain's really picked up and is heavy now.

It keeps coming... a lot of LCRA rain gauges in the Lower Basin (southeast of Austin) are showing 9-11" of rain in the past 48 hours. This morning they were half that.

Stay safe all in TX

kinda surreal to look at the NWS site and see a Flash Flood Watch in effect for the next 96 hours.

we're poised to get about a foot of water in san antonio this weekend and i have no idea how monday is going to be the first day of school

― seven mambas (m bison), Saturday, August 26, 2017 12:52 AM (fifteen hours ago)

school is not canceled on monday???

― k3vin k., Saturday, August 26, 2017 3:17 PM (six hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the rain in SA today wasn't ever nightmarish, but it's been steady. you can still drive and stuff. it just depends how much water is on the ground by monday and how much is falling out the sky. if it makes getting to and from school treacherous, they'll cancel.

Feeding bands moving pretty quick right now. Earlier tonight a tornado touched down in the burbs across the street from where my family had a store back in the '80s (and just few miles from where I was living during Allison & Ike).

Friends in Houston have now retreated upstairs as their ground floors are flooding... they saw it coming and moved furniture and valuables up, but damn. That didn't even happen on the Tax Day Floods last year.

I know that dread all too well. Sending thoughts and $$s out to the victims of this one. Glad your friends have an upstairs to retreat to, f. Got my fingers crossed that under/unstaffed FEMA somehow respond better than with Katrina.

Reports on TV that people in certain areas of SouthEast Houston have been driven to their attics by flood water (shades of Katrina).

There are no words. pic.twitter.com/zbrFENCDsA

— Eric Holthaus (@EricHolthaus) August 27, 2017

Up next?

These are the highest windspeed forecasts I've ever seen in my 10 yrs of Atlantic hurricane forecasting. #Irma is another retiree candidate. pic.twitter.com/e6nMsp1myY

— Michael Ventrice (@MJVentrice) August 31, 2017

Fuck me running

uh

No way to sugar coat potential for catastrophic Hurricane #Irma nearing South Florida this weekend. Please monitor & be prepared.

— Ryan Maue (@RyanMaue) September 4, 2017

getting a wee bit tired of the histrionics from some on my feed (Orlando). obv this is a motherfucker of a storm and we should all be refreshing the latest forecasts (as I do on the minute) but even in recent years w/ forecasts tightening to incredible precision, the average error in miles at the 5-day point is 200+ miles, and we're at like 6-7 days out.

Cent Florida has a tendency to unnecessarily pre-emptively cause gasoline shortages in situations like this by doing what I saw some dickhead doing an hour ago and filling like five humongous canisters of it.

I was already planning on hitting the Carolinas from 9/13 - 9/15, depending on where this ting goes, might either cancel that or might force me to go earlier.

like I don't blame anybody for anxiety after Harvey but it helps to focus on facts ("this is the current forecast") vs unquantifiable hysteria ("this is the WORST CASE SCENARIO", as our local news said on two separate forecasts for the same storm last year).

Strength-wise, we seem to be back to the 2004-2005 era of hurricanes where the warm waters churn out consistent mega-beast storms. I miss the tropics of my youth, small # of storms, few making landfall, all of them Cat 1s. Oi.

Cent Florida has a tendency to unnecessarily pre-emptively cause gasoline shortages in situations like this by doing what I saw some dickhead doing an hour ago and filling like five humongous canisters of it.

― Neanderthal, Monday, September 4, 2017 11:44 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

been dealing with this bullshit in south texas for the last few days. gas lines and empty pumps all over the place.

is there gouging as well?

hi!

heh was gonna ask if you're stocked up yet

Uh, no.

ME NEITHA

Too early. The forecast track still puts the middle line skirting Cuba, where I can hope the mountains will sap some of Irma's strength. But we're talking about six days hence.

And, yeah, local coverage has been hysterical. The tone is "Please party safely this Labor Day weekend BUT YOU'RE GONNA DIE NEXT SATURDAY DON'T YOU SEE."

I have one friend who basically does his best "You're all doomed"-guy from F13 impression every year, like he doesn't remember how ridiculous he got last time.

guys, take a few minutes out of your day to be prepared

it's a holiday, come on

I've been living here for 30+ years. I know how this works

I am -- cocktails at 5 p.m.

I have to buy the week's arugula at Publix in a few minutes. I'll grab water and batteries.

Cocktails, arugula, water and batteries should get most folks through most emergencies.

Aperol!

Aperol and/or Campari makes everything better.

I plan to get some bud if things go down.

btw my earlier response wasn't meant to be snippy, more like "I got this, I ain't dyin any time soon" :)

i just want you to be safe! I'm sure you've got it under control tho

is there gouging as well?

― Neanderthal, Monday, September 4, 2017 1:17 PM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

There was a little. Prices in general jumped up about 50 cents a gallon, it seems.

here too with the latter.

one of my friends irresponsibly took to FB to tell all Floridians like, two weeks ago to stock up with canister upon canister of gasoline cos of a rumor she heard saying prices would skyrocket due to Harvey (in a sense they did, but she was for some reason thinking like $4/gallon). really glad nobody listened to her, woulda caused more widespread shortage in the Gulf region and had a longer impact on the price (really learning how dumb a lot of people on my feed are these past few weeks).

Damn, I just saw the current forecast for Irma, and...ouch.

Classic Florida post from my Ike thread:

I really hated the sensationalist local media over in Florida, who almost seemed to want to will Ike over here with their constant ominous warnings.

"Despite all forecasts indicating that Ike is going into the Gulf, OMG U DONT KNOW IT MIGHT TURN BAK ARUOUND AND HIT PENSACOLEAS AN LOOT UR BUILDINGS AND RAPE UR WOMENENE OMG AND UR DAUGHTER IS HAVIN TEH SEX"

― Officer, I Just Shot Seven People (Bo Jackson Overdrive), Thursday, September 11, 2008 11:09 PM (eight years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

DON: well, yeah

oi that was me in a previous (terrible) incarnation.

been dealing with this bullshit in south texas for the last few days. gas lines and empty pumps all over the place.

― Rob Lowe fresco bar (m bison), Monday, September 4, 2017 1:15 PM (seven hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i was in austin a few days ago and my gf and i ran into gas station pandemonium, it was bizarre

Things look grim for Florida at present

I have a friend training for work in Tampa. We've just been messengering and she was supposed to be heading out to New York for the job on Saturday. She wasn't totally aware of the Irma situation, so I may have just accidentally scared the crap out of her.

the models all tend to agree a hard right is coming, many of them disagree on when. and what the intensity will be (which will depend on whether it interacts w/ land and for how long prior to making continental landfall). interestingly, the local network that was the most OTT in Matthew coverage still is non-committal over Central Florida impact (that's a level of restraint they rarely show).

hoping no ILXOR is impacted. (or anybody really). if it does come, I'm not sticking around for it, though would have to make sure not to evacuate somewhere that is also in its forecasted path (which I had many friends foolishly do in 2004, though they all got lucky in the end)

It looks grim!

It's grim down south.

Cuba makes a huge diff as to where it goes

#Irma is the strongest #hurricane in the Atlantic basin outside of the Caribbean Sea & Gulf of Mexico in NHC records https://t.co/tW4KeGdBFb pic.twitter.com/P8ebbQJR4k

— NHC Atlantic Ops (@NHC_Atlantic) September 5, 2017