Posts from — September 2012

Position: 25.2N 62.8W [10PM CDT 0300 UTC].
Movement: North-Northwest [345°] near 2 mph [ 4 kph].
Maximum sustained winds: 65 mph [100 kph].
Wind Gusts: 75 mph [120 kph].
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 230 miles [370 km].
Minimum central pressure: 994 mb.

Currently about 505 miles [ 815 km] South-Southeast of Bermuda.

The storm is generating large swells that are affecting coastlines from Bermuda, along the US coast, and down to the Caribbean. It is a very large storm and it is just creeping along.

Here’s the link for NOAA’s latest satellite images.

[For the latest information click on the storm symbol, or go to the CATEGORIES drop-down box below the CALENDAR and select “Hurricanes” for all of the posts related to storms on this site.]

The Florida legislature has put 11 constitutional amendments on the 2012 ballot, and they all suck.

Once again they are pandering to their base while attacking judges, women, the separation between church and state, and the ability of local governments to fund themselves.

The legislature is trying to cut taxes that they don’t get, while raising the fees that they do get, and holding the sales tax that they get at 6%.

A blogger at the Sun-Sentinel renders his opinion of them, but the most important point made is that the League of Women Voters recommends voting ‘NO’ on all of them.

The most egregious is Florida Religious Freedom, Amendment 8 (2012). This isn’t about ‘Religious Freedom’, this is about giving tax dollars to sectarian schools. It is supported by the ‘Clan of the Red Beanie’ because funding of Catholic schools by the state would free up more money to pay their lawyers and the penalties they owe.

Understand, the state can’t regulate religious schools in any way, so they are free to do whatever they want with the taxpayer funds. I can hardly wait until the first Muslim school receives the money. This is going to get so nasty and cause so many law suits.

They will be Federal law suits because the legislature is trying to stop the state courts from pointing out when they violate the state constitution. They want mob rule, as the Florida legislature has become a mob of angry, ignorant people thanks to the voters and creative redistricting.

This was the rainiest August in local records, and Isaac had almost nothing to do with it.

The Local Puppy Trainer reports that we got 21.05 inches of rain during the month, and even without the 3 inches we picked up during Isaac, it would have still been the rainiest.

This was also the fourth rainiest June, July, and August on record. The July record holder of 1994 will not be broken for a very long time, as it is based on the rain received from Tropical Storm Alberto, which was the heaviest rain anyone I know has ever seen, even worse than the week of Georges in 1998.

It’s to the point that the mushrooms on the lawn are getting mildewed…

Position: 25.9N 42.8W [10PM CDT 0300 UTC].
Movement: Northwest [305°] near 5 mph [ 8 kph].
Maximum sustained winds: 35 mph [ 55 kph].
Wind Gusts: 50 mph [ 80 kph].
Minimum central pressure: 1012 mb.

Currently about 1390 miles [2235 km] West-Northwest of the Cape Verde Islands.

Here’s the link for NOAA’s latest satellite images.

[For the latest information click on the storm symbol, or go to the CATEGORIES drop-down box below the CALENDAR and select “Hurricanes” for all of the posts related to storms on this site.]

Position: 24.0N 63.1W [10PM CDT 0300 UTC].
Movement: Stationary.
Maximum sustained winds: 65 mph [100 kph].
Wind Gusts: 75 mph [120 kph].
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 205 miles [335 km].
Minimum central pressure: 998 mb.

Currently about 585 miles [ 940 km] South of Bermuda.

The storm is essentially stalled and meandering in the Atlantic looking for something to steer it.

Here’s the link for NOAA’s latest satellite images.

[For the latest information click on the storm symbol, or go to the CATEGORIES drop-down box below the CALENDAR and select “Hurricanes” for all of the posts related to storms on this site.]

If you are a US resident I hope you enjoy this panicked and unsuccessful attempt to salvage the Democratic nomination for President by Grover Cleveland, the 22^nd and 24^th President. Having sent in Federal troops and marshals to break the Pullman Strike, Grover thought he could win back support from labor by giving them their own holiday before the bodies of the workers killed by said troops and marshals were cold in the ground, and to preempt the possibility of labor declaring May 1^st, the commemoration of the Haymarket affair, a day for labor action. [Zero wasn’t the first Democrat to attack the party’s base. Grover lost the nomination, BTW.]

It is rather unique, as it is the only holiday I’m aware of that was imported from Canada where it’s spelled Labour Day.

When I was young, Labor Day was the last day of summer vacation from school, but now schools start in early August, so it’s just a long weekend filled with annoying drunken boaters clogging up my little street with their trailers.

Earth Bound Misfit has a piece of world-class snark that the DNC should pay attention to: So, Will George Clooney Talk to an Empty Suit at the Democrats’ Convention?.

Mike Konczai actually runs the numbers and pays attention to the policies that candidates propose. In a moment of almost heroic self-sacrifice, he listened to the Mittser’s speech at the GOP convention and concludes that: Romney Will Solve the Crisis with the Exact Same GOP Plan of 2008, 2006, 2004….

This would be plan that led to adding $10+ trillion dollars to the deficit, produced fewer jobs than were necessary to for the new workers entering the workforce, and created the conditions that resulted in the global financial meltdown.

They believe that ‘a rising tide raises all boats’ so they had the banks foreclose on the ‘boats’ of the bottom 80% of Americans, and now they want to take their ‘life preservers’.

Position: 23.4N 61.7W [10PM CDT 0300 UTC].
Movement: Northwest [325°] near 10 mph [17 kph].
Maximum sustained winds: 60 mph [ 95 kph].
Wind Gusts: 75 mph [120 kph].
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 205 miles [335 km].
Minimum central pressure: 998 mb.

Currently about 435 miles [ 700 km] North of the Leeward Islands.

The storm has encountered wind shear on the north side, and is slowing as a result of changes in the steering pattern.

Here’s the link for NOAA’s latest satellite images.

[For the latest information click on the storm symbol, or go to the CATEGORIES drop-down box below the CALENDAR and select “Hurricanes” for all of the posts related to storms on this site.]

Position: 49.7N 33.6W [ 4PM CDT 2100 UTC].
Movement: Northeast [035°] near 47 mph [76 kph].
Maximum sustained winds: 50 mph [ 80 kph].
Wind Gusts: 65 mph [100 kph].
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 140 miles [220 km].
Minimum central pressure: 1002 mb.

Currently about 965 miles [1550 km] East of Cape Race, Newfoundland.

Kirk has become a post-tropical cyclone, and this is the final advisory from the NHC.

Here’s the link for NOAA’s latest satellite images.

[For the latest information click on the storm symbol, or go to the CATEGORIES drop-down box below the CALENDAR and select “Hurricanes” for all of the posts related to storms on this site.]

Jeff Masters outlines some unanswered questions about Isaac and I want to talk about one of them:

2. What’s the deal with these super-sized Category 1 and 2 hurricanes that have been hitting the U.S.? The past three landfalling hurricanes in the U.S.–Isaac (2012), Irene (2011), and Ike (2008)–have all been exceptionally large, among the top ten on record for horizontal extent of tropical storm-force winds. Each of these storms had an unusually low pressure characteristic of a storm one full Saffir-Simpson category stronger. Is this the new normal for U.S. hurricanes?

I said that Isaac was weird, this is really what I was talking about. The inability to establish an accurate track for the storm is related, but not the real issue.

The minimum pressure is an indicator of what the storm will do, which is why you may notice that there may be an up or down arrow after the pressure. If the arrow points up, indicating that the pressure is rising, you can expect that it is weakening and the wind speed will drop.

If you look at the 10PM Day 7 for Issac, it was a Tropical Storm with 70mph winds and a pressure of 979mb. Compare that to the 10PM Day 3 for Kirk which was a Category 2 with 100mph winds and a pressure of 980mb. This should not happen.

This was the problem with the tracking models. Isaac’s pressure said it should have been affected by the trough building in from the East, but that didn’t happen. That’s why the track kept moving West, because Isaac was totally ignoring the trough.

Kirk, OTOH, was pulled out into the Atlantic and away from land as the result of being pulled by a trough, and it looks like Leslie will follow, but Isaac only seem to respond to ridges of high pressure.

I didn’t remember the two earlier storms that were mentioned, probably because they didn’t directly affect me, but Isaac did. Dr Masters did notice that all of the storms had names beginning with “I” and wondered if they would also be the only storms to hit the US.

CNN reports that Isaac is still causing trouble in Louisiana:

Earlier in the day, the state’s office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness posted on Twitter that “Pearl River Lock No. 2 is in danger of failing” and urged “anyone living in the mandatory evacuation area to leave immediately.” St. Tammany Parish warned on its website at 1:15 p.m. that “failure of Lock 2 is imminent!”

The lock is on a man-made canal off the Pearl River.

If they relieve the pressure and save the lock they can minimize the flooding below it, but the Pearl River is set to flood anyway, so more people are going to watch their homes washed away.

Isaac has become a rain maker for Missouri and Illinois, and should bring rain to Indiana and Ohio later on. They can use it, so it hasn’t been a totally ‘evil’ storm, but the people downstream are still facing problems that will last until midweek, when the real recovery process can begin.

An additional thought: I wonder how long it will be until we start hearing people saying that their problems were caused by the Corps of Engineers repairing the New Orleans system.

So Zero’s minions sent me an e-mail to tell me that they have a ‘great tool’ that will allow people to register to vote on-line. Apparently they believe that the code they want me to embed will work everywhere, and they will get the hits from people using it to boost their numbers.

It doesn’t work that way in Florida, and given the state’s record with IT projects, even if it supposedly did, I wouldn’t recommend that anyone use it.

What you can get on-line is the state’s standard form for registration. They tell you that you can fill it out on-line, but you still have to download and print out the form, because you have to sign it, and you can’t do that on-line. Actually, I wouldn’t fill out anything at a site controlled by our fraudster-in-chief, because they will probably do something stupid with the data that is collected.

If you have a Florida drivers license or ID card, you can fill out the form, sign it, and then take it or mail it to your county supervisor of elections. You must register at least a month before an election.

When you sign the form you are acknowledging the following:

If the information on the application is not true, the applicant can be convicted of a felony of the third degree and fined up to $5,000 and/or imprisoned for up to 5 years.

I don’t have a problem with that except that it should be applied equally to the information provided by the candidates for public office in the state. When they lie and get caught, they get to ‘correct and amend the form’ or simply ignore the facts and continue to lie.

Position: 20.2N 58.4W [10PM CDT 0300 UTC].
Movement: Northwest [305°] near 18 mph [30 kph].
Maximum sustained winds: 65 mph [100 kph].
Wind Gusts: 80 mph [130 kph].
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 160 miles [260 km].
Minimum central pressure: 998 mb.

Currently about 310 miles [ 495 km] Northeast of the Leeward Islands.

Here’s the link for NOAA’s latest satellite images.

[For the latest information click on the storm symbol, or go to the CATEGORIES drop-down box below the CALENDAR and select “Hurricanes” for all of the posts related to storms on this site.]

Position: 41.2N 41.8W [10PM CDT 0300 UTC].
Movement: Northeast [040°] near 29 mph [46 kph].
Maximum sustained winds: 60 mph [ 95 kph].
Wind Gusts: 80 mph [130 kph].
Tropical Storm Wind Radius: 105 miles [165 km].
Minimum central pressure: 999 mb ↑.

Currently about 675 miles [1090 km] East-Southeast of Cape Race, Newfoundland.

Kirk will probably become a Post-Tropical Cyclone overnight.

Here’s the link for NOAA’s latest satellite images.

[For the latest information click on the storm symbol, or go to the CATEGORIES drop-down box below the CALENDAR and select “Hurricanes” for all of the posts related to storms on this site.]