Quick Hanna Thoughts

I thought I would point out that Hanna never made it back to hurricane strength, so my initial prediction was correct. The NHC said the hurricane hunter SFMR instrument was over estimating the wind speeds at the surface by 5 knots, thus the 75 mph wind speeds really should have been 70...and no hurricane. That's what I get for writing an entry that explained why I was wrong!

And as for the North Carolina landfall: Hanna decided to go back west and ended up making landfall right on the South/North Carolina border. That is still much further north than the original NHC forecast at the time, but not quite North Carolina. Either way, both SC and NC got hit hard from the storm, but luckily it was a fast mover and it is already moving up through NC into Virginia.

IKE

Hurricane Ike is still trending south. Actually, the European has went completely south of Cuba now and takes Ike into southern Texas! I am starting to think, with each model run, that Cuba (not Florida) will be the strike location of a nasty Category 3 or 4 storm...not good for a country that is so small and was hit only a week and a half ago by Cat 4 Gustav. I half want the storm to stay north of Cuba since they have already been hit hard...but if it does that, and goes through the Keys into the Gulf, it would explode and head for the US...There really isn't a good solution right now.

Hold on to your hats folks, Ike is going to give us a show the next few days. Just not a happy one.