First off, the track on Gustav has not really changed much since yesterday:
What gets me is the newest spaghetti chart, comparable with one I peeked at early this morning:
(NOTE: The CLP5 and XTRP lines on the chart are not to be used as forecast tracks)
That's a pretty specific landfall area for this far out, but of course this is not by any means set in stone. The consensus is somewhere west of New Orleans as a Category 3, which is bad news. The most powerful part of a hurricane resides in the northeast section, which would smack the Crescent City head-on if this scenario were to happen. Katrina hit just east of New Orleans, which gave Biloxi, MS and other cities around that area the worst of the storm. New Orleans got the surge from the storm, not so much the wind.
I'd say this is probably the worst track for New Orleans I've seen come off the models yet. The good part is that there is still a great deal of room for change in this track. This is no time to sit and wait for more models before taking action. If you have friends or relatives who reside in or near New Orleans or the western Gulf Coast, make sure you tell them it's time to get some serious plans together for evacuation. Barring any significant changes to the forecast track, official evacuations should start within the next couple days.
Here's Tropical Storm Hanna's track:
This should be a hurricane by Saturday, with no real good estimate on a location for landfall at the moment.
Compared to the tropics, our weather around here has been nice and calm for the past couple weeks. The bad part is that we need rain badly. A cold front coming through tomorrow should give us a chance for some rain, but it's not real high. We'll be seeing more brown grass for a little while if this doesn't produce any appreciable rain. Highs should stay around 90 for the weekend and into next week.
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