Early morning Isabel obs, discussion, and cat 5 legacy!!!!

[WXBUFFJIM]

Good morning everyone. Isabel has finaly dropped below category 5 status after being a cat 5 for nearly 35 hours. Only 4 other category 5 hurricanes that we know of have ever lasted above 30 hours time. Hurricane Dog was the longest lasting category 5 hurricane. That hurricane lasted 60 hours time, which is unheard of. So Isabel has already made history here for long duration cat 5 hurricanes. Even though Isabel is no longer a category 5 hurricane, she's still very very powerful this morning.

At 5 AM EDT, the eye of powerful hurricane Isabel was located near latitude 22.0 north, longitude 60.4 west or about 455 miles northeast of San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Isabel is moving toward the west at near 9 mph and this motion is expected to continue during the next 24 hours.

Maximum sustained winds have decreased to near 150 mph with higher gusts. Isabel still remains a very dangrous category 4 hurricane on the saffir simpson hurricane scale!!! Little change in strength is anticipated during the next 24 hours or so.

Hurricane force winds extend outward 85 miles from the center while the tropical storm force winds extend outward up to 185 miles. The latest minimum central pressure as reported the reconnaissance plane was 935 millibars or 27.61 inches. Still very powerful indeed.

Large ocean swells will continue to impact the north facing beaches of Puerto Pico, the Virgin Islands, and the northern leeward Islands through this upcoming weekend. Beyond Wednesday of next week, the track is still alittle uncertain. Florida is not completely out of it, the carolinas and Virginia need to watch this carefully. Another possibility is this hurricane moves north into New England or out to sea altogether. All 4 of these tracks are still close to if not over the eastern seaboard by late next week. However ths hurricane is anticipated to be a weaker animal than it is right now. However still a strong hurricane potential exists for the eastern seaboard by the latter part of next week. All residents from Florida up to New England need to watch this very carefully.

Jim

[WXBUFFJIM]

Also look at landfall frequency. Miami, FL gets a landfalling hurricane on average about every 4 years or so. Cape hatteras gets one landfalling hurricane every 5 years. Norfolk, VA gets one landfalling hurricane every 21 years. That year in Norfolk maybe in jeopardy by Friday of next week if Isabel moves quickly northward towards the tidewater area.

Jim

[rainstorm]

thanks for the stats jim