What if a CAT 5 struck Houston?

[f5]

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NBC gets back in the ring with WWE 'Main Event'
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By Kevin McDonough
United Feature Syndicate
March 18, 2006
Tonight, NBC returns to its 1993 playbook, airing "Saturday Night Main Event" (7 p.m., Saturday, WMC-TV Channel 5). This is the first time in 13 years that the WWE event has aired on NBC. Don't look for Hulk Hogan. Tonight's showcase features John Cena, Triple H, Trish Stratus, Shawn Michaels, Edge, Diva and Candice Michelle, and WWE honcho Mr. McMahon.
Edward James Olmos directs "Walkout" (7 p.m., Saturday, HBO). Based on true events, "Walkout" recalls protests at high schools in East Los Angeles in 1968. Chicano students, feeling marginalized and ignored, stood up against academic prejudice and poor conditions.


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Could one storm flummox the entire U.S. economy? "We Were Warned: Tomorrow's Oil Crisis," a segment on "CNN Presents" (7 p.m., Saturday, CNN), ponders what might happen if a category 5 hurricane struck Houston, Texas, followed by opportunistic terrorist attacks on oil-production plants.
Another major Texas city takes a beating in "Perfect Disaster" (8 p.m., Sunday, Discovery), the first of a six-part series that explores weather at its most destructive.

In the first installment, conditions ripen for a supertornado to hit Dallas at afternoon rush hour on a summer day. This compelling series combines a dramatic story (an emergency worker and his wife and son caught in the storm) with a documentary-style look at the natural forces behind tornadoes, thunderstorms and hailstorms.

[Derek Ortt]

if Houston ever received cat 5 winds, I will retire immediately

[wxman57]

Derek,

Parts of Houston are only 15 miles from the water (Galveston Bay to the east). If a Cat 5 moved up the west side of Galveston Bay, that could put eastern Houston in the westesrn eyewall with the center of the hurricane very near the water. See the map below. While it is unlikely that Houston would ever get Cat 5 winds, it's not so far inland as some may think.

[terstorm1012]

That was already a movie on FX, Oil Shock I think it was called.

Actually it was eerily similar to Katrina...

[Derek Ortt]

if Houston got the western eye wall, wouldn't the winds be about 1-2 categories weaker that the NE eye wall, resulting in cat 2-3 winds to the city, if it managed to survviv as a 5 up Galveston bay?

[Derek Ortt]

I do have to say, a hurricane spwning an F-3 or F-4 tornado into Houston does not count as cat 5 winds, those are tornado winds

[wxman57]

if Houston got the western eye wall, wouldn't the winds be about 1-2 categories weaker that the NE eye wall, resulting in cat 2-3 winds to the city, if it managed to survviv as a 5 up Galveston bay?

That depends on the hurricane, of course. A Cat 5 could have 145-150kt winds on its western side and 160 kts on the eastern side. Interaction with land would probably lead to some reduction in that 15 miles between Galveston Bay and southeast Houston. But if the winds were 170 mph on the western side of the hurricane, then it's possible for Cat 5 winds to get pretty darn close to SE Houston. I've ralrely (if ever) seen so powerful a hurricane in the Atlantic Basin. Most Cat 5s only have Cat 5 winds in a small area of the right-front quadrant, not on the left side.

Of course, it's more likely that winds on the western side of the eyewall would be 20-30 mph lower than the eastern side, with further reductions due to surface friction.

I do agree it would be pretty hard to get Cat 5 winds into Houston, but not impossible.

[KWT]

Yeah wxman57 it'd be amazingly hard to get cat-5 winds into that area, infact it'd probably take a potent cat-5 to give cat-4 winds into SE Houston.

what if a 180mph cat-5 came bolting in from SE and gave the southern section Houston the RFQ???
You'd be talking at least gusts upto cat-5 surely, if not some sustained readings upto 155mph???

[brunota2003]

That was already a movie on FX, Oil Shock I think it was called.

Actually it was eerily similar to Katrina...

I think you are reffering to "Oil Storm" interesting side note, i watched "Oil Storm" in June when it first came out, and after it was done, I jokingly said..."yea watch, that is going to happen this year around late August or early September" we got a good laugh out of it...but...then Katrina came...as for Houston, we will not know exactly what will happen until it actually happens...

[f5]

a CAT 5 will ruin the Texas economy as well as the nation and the world if a catastrophic surge comes up through Galveston bay

[ROCK]

Derek,

Parts of Houston are only 15 miles from the water (Galveston Bay to the east). If a Cat 5 moved up the west side of Galveston Bay, that could put eastern Houston in the westesrn eyewall with the center of the hurricane very near the water. See the map below. While it is unlikely that Houston would ever get Cat 5 winds, it's not so far inland as some may think.

that map puts me in the eye.....

[wxman57]

Derek,

Parts of Houston are only 15 miles from the water (Galveston Bay to the east). If a Cat 5 moved up the west side of Galveston Bay, that could put eastern Houston in the westesrn eyewall with the center of the hurricane very near the water. See the map below. While it is unlikely that Houston would ever get Cat 5 winds, it's not so far inland as some may think.

http://myweb.cableone.net/nolasue/hobby.gif

that map puts me in the eye.....

That map has no track on it, just two lines measuring distance to the water.

[ROCK]

Derek,

Parts of Houston are only 15 miles from the water (Galveston Bay to the east). If a Cat 5 moved up the west side of Galveston Bay, that could put eastern Houston in the westesrn eyewall with the center of the hurricane very near the water. See the map below. While it is unlikely that Houston would ever get Cat 5 winds, it's not so far inland as some may think.

http://myweb.cableone.net/nolasue/hobby.gif

that map puts me in the eye.....

That map has no track on it, just two lines measuring distance to the water.

oh, I see. Well if cane did make landfall in Freeport and continued NW that would put me right smack in the eye.....still not a good thought...

[SouthFloridawx]

I remember when I woke up the morning that wilma was deemed a catagory 5 and the forcast path was right through south florida. I know that the same happend to People living on the gulf coast with Katrina. I will tell that it is not a good feeling at all. ya know what I did when I found out. I called my uncle over in port charlotte and the next day later I was helping him put up his shutters and then we came back over to the east coast to put the shutters up on his house here in boynton beach. I showed him the slosh models for a catagory 5 hitting his area and that his house would be underwater. He made a quck decision that he would not stay there with his family and decided to stay over here in boynton beach with us. Bottom line is, that you just need to make quick decisions no matter how rash they are at the time cause if you dont' you won't be prepared for it to come. We ended up being out of power for like 10 days here for Wilma and he didn't even loose power over in punta gorda/port charlotte. But we were prepared to leave even the east coast if she would have came it at cat 5 status.

[jimvb]

I saw the documentary on the oil crisis that comes about after two disasters: a terrorist strike in Saudi Arabia and a Category 5 hurricane in Houston. I notice for the Houston part, that they used footage from Hurricane Rita, and maybe some from Katrina.

To me the documentary would have been more forceful if they had assumed NO disaster and still it shows the effects of peak oil occurring.

[GeneratorPower]

People seem to have an obsession with Cat 5's. Something I'm noticing by reading the Tropical Cyclone Reports from NOAA is that the max sustained winds in the eyewall are not as important as the extent of the windfield, that is, how far out do damaging winds go. Katrina's physical size seems to be what made it such a destructive storm rather than intense core winds. The winds were strong, but not unbelievably so. The problem was the strong winds went out quite a distance from the center.

[conestogo_flood]

Unfortunately, this is going to happen eventually. Could very well be this year.

This, and a terrorist attack on refineries, and a major earthquake in Tokyo, while the war in Iraq goes on. That would just about end the human race.

[benny]

It seems unlikely that the city of Houston would get sustained Cat 5 winds. It is at least 15 miles inland and typically they weaken pretty fast... at least drop a category when all of the eye gets ashore. The only way I could envision this type of scenario is if a system was moving 15-20 kt and the northern eyewall hit that city as it was rapidly intensifying. Maybe it would also take a deep warm water eddy to be pretty far the nw in the gulf. Cat 4 seems more likely as the upper end for downtown (but in those buildings... Cat 5 aloft!!!)

[f5]

the point i was trying to make was what woould a CAT 5 over galveston bay have on the oil infrastructure not if or not downtown Houston gets CAT 5 condition.the show will come on again at 8 EDT tonight for those who haven't seen it.This is the ABSOLUTE WORST CASE SCENARIO.America is addicted to oil and it comes with a steep price

[jrod]

You would see Camile like destruction, just a lot more of it because of how densley populated the area is.