Hurricane warnings up. Rush preps to completion...

[WXBUFFJIM]

New hurricane warnings have been issued as of the 5 PM EDT advisory from Florida City northward up to St Augustine. This includes the Lake Okeechobee area. A hurricane warning means hurricane conditions are expected within 24 hours or less.

Anclote Key to Florida City are now under tropical storm watches meaning tropical storm conditions are possible within 36 hours.

A hurricane watch is in effect from St Augustine northward up through the Georgia coast meaning hurricane conditions are possible within 36 hours.

At 5 PM EDT, Hurricane Jeanne was centered near latitude 26.4 north, longitude 73.5 west or about 225 miles east of the Great Abaco Islands. Movement is towards the west at near 12 mph and this motion is expected to continue with some slight increase in forward speed.

Maximum sustained winds are up to near 100 mph with higher gusts. Further strengthening is anticipated during the next day or two and Jeanne could become a major hurricane just prior to landfall sometime later Saturday or Saturday night.

Minimum central pressure has dropped to 965 mb or 28.50 inches. This is about 4 millibars lower than we saw it at around 2:46 am this morning when recon measured a 969 mb pressure. Jeanne has shown some subtle signs of strengthening, but just a small amount of strengthening is what we're dealing with at this time. However we got a dangerous and life threatening situation coming our way along the entire east coast of Florida. Even the Miami area could see hurricane force winds easily clocked and the same for the Melbourne region. The expected landfall site should be closer to Palm Beach of possible even Fort Lauderdale the way it looks at this hour.

Folks along the east coast of Florida are urged to rush any last minute preparations to completion immediately as numerous mandatory evacuations will be needed tomorrow morning for the barrier islands as well as mobile homes.

Jim

[rainstorm]

thanks for the info