Now it is time to worry and activate hurricane preparation plans if you live anywhere north of the Georgia/South Carolina line to Delmarva Pennisula:
Hurricane #Florence Update, 4pm:
Mid-day models continue to be unanimous: Florence is on track to landfall in the Carolinas on Thursday, likely as a Cat 4.
Longer-range models are still hinting at Florence stalling for 3+ days—creating a potentially catastrophic flood in NC/VA. pic.twitter.com/ZKcgU5Xhj6
— Eric Holthaus (@EricHolthaus) September 9, 2018
Ready.gov has a good hurricane preparation section.
The key thing is to use the time that we have (~96+ hours) to make smart decisions. If you are told or encouraged to evacuate, do so. If you need to seek public shelter on higher ground do so. If you have a neighbor who needs to be checked in on, go over and say “hi”.
Take advantage of this time as it sure looks like Florence is coming in hot.
Don’t panic and remember your towel as well.
Adam L Silverman
And make sure you have a plan for your pets!
wvng
Here I am in WV, 150 miles east of of the blogmaster, and our ground is utterly saturated, with many streams at bankfull, from the TSGordon leftovers. Some models have Florence coming straight up here from NC. Deeply concerned for us, and everyone in the path.
raven
Looks like Tops’l is ground zero.
geg6
@raven:
That’s terrible. My ex and I rented a beach house there for two weeks many years ago. We loved it there. Best Frogmore stew I ever had was at a shack on the beach.
Luthe
We just got back from the Outer Banks (sorry, John) and I spent the whole trip silently judging people by how high their houses were elevated. Looks like we’ll be finding out who’s high enough soon…
raven
@geg6: We rented there about 4 years ago and my wife and her family went there every year when she was a kid. I enjoyed it but the water and sand are nothing like 30a.
raven
@Luthe: I spend my whole time there fishing!
Corner Stone
@Luthe:
What does Elon Musk have to do with Florence? Is he building a High Per Loop on the east coast?
David Anderson
@raven: I was at Topsail for a week this August and it was a wonderful place for a quiet family friendly beach vacation.
Corner Stone
Mack The Knife!
raven
@David Anderson: Cool! Did you get over to the Riverview Cafe at Sneads Ferry?
cmorenc
Headed down tomorrow (Mon) evening to put up hurricane shutters on our house at Sunset Beach, NC. The potential storm surge on barrier islands is actually a graver threat to barrier islands like Sunset Beach than even Cat-4 winds. The importance of sturdy window covers is that if flying debris knocks out a hole in a window, the gusty hurricane winds can literally huff-and-puff a house apart by stretching the frame like a balloon being rapidly inflated and deflated. Flying debris from less soundly built houses, flying trash cans, etc. will break out unprotected windows.
Mnemosyne
@Luthe:
Heh. My parents built our family home on a lakeshore back in the late 1970s. My dad found out where the 100-year flood mark was and built 10 feet above that after he found out the house in the process of being built next door had flooded and they had to raise the foundation after it was half-built.
This paid off when the Des Plaines had a big flood in the late 1980s and everyone on our block except us had water in their nice furnished basements. ?
schrodingers_cat
@Mnemosyne: How is your knee?
raven
Speaking of, we just watched “The Drowning Pool” and “Killing Me Softly” is heard throughout but never the vocals!
germy
It’s one damn thing after another nowadays.
lamh36
I fly out of ATL Wednesday night for London…I’m not sure how that will affect my flight though…
So news from the Creative Arts Emmys
I knew it when I saw the program…John Legend is gonna get that EGOT!
And guess…what…he sure did! Jesus Christ Superstar (LIVE) really was good ya’ll. As someone who never saw the original, it made me want to see as much of the original as I could find…
Jesus Christ Superstar won for LIVE program…John was a producer (he’s also up for lead actor)…
Mnemosyne
@schrodingers_cat:
Pretty good, actually! It hurts a little bit, especially after I do my at-home exercises, but I can take over the counter Aleve for it. It’s still hard to sleep because I’m a stomach sleeper being forced to sleep on my back, which makes my sleep apnea worse. ?
raven
@lamh36: I think you’ll be fine.
Joy in FL
Relieved for me here in west Florida, and so aware of what you on the East coast of U.S. are facing. May the storm fade and speed over you to her conclusion. Sending you positive energy for preparation and endurance.
Mnemosyne
@lamh36:
If Brandon Victor Dixon doesn’t win an Emmy as Judas, I’m gonna be PISSED! ?
Luthe
@lamh36: Do you have your itinerary set? Any other advice you need?
@Mnemosyne: Your father was a wise man.
Corner Stone
I don’t understand why Subway is raising money for First Responders that helped during Hurricane Harvey? Isn’t there a mechanism known as “taxes” that actually could properly fund these services? What does my sandwich have to do with it?
lamh36
@Mnemosyne: yessss he was THE stand out.
lamh36
@Luthe: OMG…I really don’t …I know what I want to do, and I’d like to go…but it’s harder than I expected cause I have 6 days, but there is just so much to do…and I’m on a budget
Dan B
Just an observation but if this Florence ends up in West Va doesn’t John Cole get crowned “BogMeister”?
Nevermind, he’s already earned his crown.
catclub
@Corner Stone: Yeah, whenever some big company says they are doing wonderful things I yell “Pay your damn taxes”
catclub
@Corner Stone: also the “thank you for your service” line.
– why not raise taxes and give them a raise?
Mainmata
In both MD and much of VA, the soils, streams and rivers are saturated by weeks of heavy rain. This hass been amazing for the garden but it will be disastrous if y live in a flood prone area if Flo hits this area, which itt probably will or at least its remnant.
Walker
@Luthe:
The answer is no one. None of the houses are high enough. There has been way too much overbuilding in the Outer Banks over the past two decades. Even just a return to the hurricane seasons of the 90s would take out a lot of the Outer Banks.
Mainmata
@Corner Stone: Welcome to the GOP dystopia they have long promised where it’s all about personal responsibility and public serices disappear.
Luthe
@lamh36: A few tips from my trip last year:
-Pret a Manger is your friend. Also Tesco and M&S. They all sell cheap sandwiches/salads/takeaway.
-Take the Tube everywhere. Some of the Tube stations are interesting destinations themselves, like Baker St or Covent Garden
-Speaking of, browsing the Convent Garden market is free. :)
-Looking at architecture is also free and London has lots to look at. Tower Bridge and Westminster Palace are lovely.
-Check to see if anything you want to do is covered by the London Pass and whether buying one is worth it. It might be, depending on what you want to do.
-JSYK, The Royal Observatory is up a very steep hill.
-Find out when the Horse Guard leave the Palace and cross Hyde Park. It’s a great free show.
-Don’t overdo it on the walking all at once. I walked ten miles on my first day and my feet never forgave me.
Spinoza Is My Co-Pilot
Appreciate the apt use of the “Hitchhiker’s Guide” reference, Mr. Anderson.
Omnes Omnibus
@Luthe: –
Random pubs and such can give you better food.
Gin & Tonic
@Omnes Omnibus: Plus there’s a ton of small ethnic places where you can get interesting and cheap food.
J R in WV
@Spinoza Is My Co-Pilot:
Yes, indeed. A towel is useful in so many ways.
Off Topic… but open thread, so:
Met friends for dinner at the better Indian place for an early dinner, to make a 7 show time.
Just got home, in the rain here too, from a great blues show downtown starring the historical great guitar player, probably the last old time Chicago blues player from the Louisiana delta, Buddy Guy. He was playing in Tokyo 3 weeks ago, and tonight was in Charleston WV, tearing down the house.
He’s 82 now, and it kinda shows a little bit, but it doesn’t affect his playing or singing at all. Part history lesson, working in the early styles of John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters, he did an Eric Clapton solo playing with first a drumstick and then his butt.
He did the famous walk into the audience while playing his guitar all the way up one aisle, across the back of the hall and down the other aisle. I was in an aisle seat and got to watch an extended guitar solo right beside me! The miracle of radio-connected audio systems, a roady handed him a mike to sing with as well. They lit the hall for him to do that, which was fine with everyone.
He talked about growing up in the deep south 80 years ago. “I never knew what running water was until I was 17 years old…” “My momma would buy a potato for dinner, 5 kids, if you said you didn’t want any, she would say “Get a glass of water and go to bed!” “Skin cancer, we all worked the fields all day, black and white, wasn’t any difference then, no one got skin cancer then.”
But mostly he played the blues. Closed with a huge hit “Skin Deep” inside we’re all the same, which the crowd sang along with. Wonderful evening. Great crowd, polite, some dressy some in tee shirts and jean shorts. Most of the Black attendees were really dressed to the nines, looking good!
A great, moving, emotional show. I highly recommend Buddy Guy to anyone who cares about the Blues, or even if you don’t, a chance to learn from the best.
Steve in the ATL
@J R in WV: Nice–I love Buddy Guy!
Steve in the 407
Steeplejack
@J R in WV:
Buddy Guy, “Midnight Train.”
MagdaInBlack
@J R in WV:
I saw Buddy, Tommy Castro, and B.B. at a Bluesfest here in Rosemont some years back.
I used to frequent his old club on S. Wabash, before it moved.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@Omnes Omnibus:
Respectfully – aww, hell naw. Random pubs are still much more likely to give you horrible “sandwiches” consisting of one paper-thin slice of ham between two stale pieces of white bread, mushy peas that exemplify the worst of both words, soggy french fries, and shepherd’s pie with the consistency of sewage sludge. Stick to bottled beer or cider at pubs and go ethnic for edibles.
SWMBO
@J R in WV: Way late but sometime I’ll have to get OldDave to tell you about his brother working on one of Buddy Guy’s amps.
evodevo
@Walker: Yes. This. My in-laws were OBX fans from the Sixties – went twice a year EVERY year, and finally bought a beachhouse in the late Seventies. At that time, Kitty Hawk had probably a couple hundred houses and most of them dated to the Forties/Fifties….by the time we sold it as part of my MIL’s estate in 2005 (thank Jeebus! – don’t have to deal with THOSE headaches anymore! Maintenance alone is HELL when you live 800 miles away), there were thousands. The market there peaked in 2005, and crashed during the Bush Recession, but I imagine they have kept on building ever since. We haven’t been back since, but they were wall to wall then …
Sherparick
Its been raining here in VA-DC-Maryland area since last Thursday and rain is expected all week even before Florence arrives. The Potomac and the coast line of the Chesapeake are already experiencing moderate flooding with each high tide. If this stays on track, it appears likely to break all the records for flooding. https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/capital-weather-gang/post/hurricane-agnes-a-look-back-after-40-years/2012/06/21/gJQAnDS0sV_blog.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.0b7bdb500a96
Having experienced back to back floods 30 years ago, I have always picked my residences based on them being on high ground. I am on a hill about 1 and half mile from the Rapidan, a tributary of the Rappahannock, so I am not to worry about the house, but I worry about flooding cutting us off for a few days.
A small political prediction. I have noticed that Trump hates anything that drives his name of the front pages even for a moment. Expect him to start twitting about Environmentalists somehow being to blame for all the flooding and other damage so he can detract attention from the storm.
celticdragonchick
Getting emergency supplies today