Obersturmfury Ike – Category 4
Position: 23.6 N 59.5 W. [10 PM CDT]
Movement: West_Northwest [275°] near 14 mph.
Maximum sustained winds: 135 mph.
Wind Gusts: 160 mph.
Hurricane Wind Radius: 45 miles.
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 140 miles.
Minimum central pressure: 945 mb.
It is about 475 miles North-Northeast of the Leeward Islands.
Note that Ike went from a 70 mph tropical storm to a 135 mph Category 4 hurricane in under 12 hours yesterday. [Hurricane records are recorded in 6-hour increments] and it wasn’t forecast. It would be nice if we had some more satellites over the Atlantic Basin to watch these storms, but some people think that wars and manned missions to the moon are more important.
2 comments
Holy crap!
Imagine if this had been closer to landfall. People don’t evacuate for tropical storms, and don’t have time to evacuate when something like this happens. Something similar happened with hurricane Opal and it was a mess. The storm spun up and increased its forward speed at night.