The Bastardi Take vs. NHC vs. Me

[Steve]

For anyone who has Accupro and lives in general threat zones, you've probably already read Joe's column or watched today's video. He makes some pretty compelling points (again) why the GFS is biased right (E of FL track) and why the GFDL initialized with GFS data does what it does. He favors the Canadian and UKMet solutions anticipating a hit between Apalachacola and the mouth of the Mississippi River. He's done fairly well so far with his ideas and certainly with the idea that Ivan would potentially get down to sub 925mb levels and that it might hit Cat 4 or 5 levels. Joe, whether or not he hits a track, usually gets a few things right - e.g. he had Frances slowing down off the SE Coast and weakening toward landfall. He showed the other day that his 8-9 day ideas were 180 miles off (not bad at all considering), but that was the difference between a mid-Atlantic landfall and a central FL landfall. Whether people like him or hate him, he's usually dead on in some aspects of a potentially landfalling storm.
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In my world, I'm not thinking of Ivan as a direct threat to New Orleans. However, many locals will recall recent hurricanes that went in east of here (Opal in 1995 and Georges in 1998) and their impacts on the city. In the case of Opal, we had 40+mph winds coming right off of Lake Pontchartrain as the center moved inland in WFL. We got a very dry flow from the storm. Georges was much closer (landfall near Pascagoula/Moss Point) and the majority of fishing camps on the southshore of Lake Pontchartrain were destroyed (along with Brunnings Seafood Restaurant). Camps in the Rigolets also sustained heavy damage. I've got a feeling that if Ivan does indeed pass south of Jamaica, it's probably headed for a MS/AL/Escambia Co., FL landfall. It's far too early to say at what strength it will hit because 1) we don't know what interactions with land await, and 2) most Cat 5's can't maintain quite that intensity level for any lengthy duration of time (5 days). But if nothing else, it appears that our 4th landfalling US hurricane of the year is almost inevitable as well as our 3rd Gulf landfall and possibly 4th FL landfall of the season is in the offing. While no one is out of the woods yet, for anyone east of New Orleans, and Slidell to Panama City specifically, I'd be making my preparations before the crunch on Saturday and Sunday. If the CMC verifies (allegedly the best performing model on this storm so far, and the 12z likes an AL/FL solution), then you eastern Gulf Coast residents and business owners are in for trouble.

See it here: 12Z

Steve[/url]