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There are now three disturbances churning around in the tropics. Thankfully hurricane Maria doesn’t look like it will be a threat to any land.

Thankfully we missed the worst of Katrina. It was only a category 1 storm when it hit us and it’s now far away from us. After it left south Florida, it strengthened to category 5 and it’s now heading towards New Orleans. This is going to be really bad. Hurricane Andrew was a category 5 storm, but it was a lot smaller than Katrina so it only destroyed a limited area. Katrina is about 3 times as wide and will cause more damage when it hits. It can also pick up more strength before it hits.

For anyone in New Orleans, GET OUT NOW!

We escaped with little damage other than a lot of downed trees and a few signs destroyed. Luckily we never lost power, although much of the surrounding neighborhood still has no power. The Publix around the corner has only emergency power with no refrigeration or air conditioning. The ATM was working & they were selling only foods that don’t need to be refrigerated. Most areas are expected to have full power back by Tuesday.

I went to visit my mother in Pompano Beach today. Although most traffic signals are out to the south of me, almost all of them were working north of here. My mother lost power Thursday night until last night & her phone was out until late this afternoon.

Katrina demonstrated that there’s no such thing as a ‘minimal hurricane’. Katrina was barely a category 1 storm and the winds we got here didn’t even reach hurricane strength, yet we had as much damage as we did last year from Frances & Jeanne, which were category 3 & 4 storms that didn’t hit us directly. Katrina also didn’t hit us directly, but it was a lot closer.

Is something missing?

Originally uploaded by mike3k.

The wooden “Embarcadero” sign in front of the clubhouse is gone.

08-26-05_1351

Originally uploaded by mike3k.

A whole stalk with 6 flowers broke off this orchid during the storm. Yesterday I noticed the stem was bent & I planned to cut it off and put the flowers in a vase, but it got blown away before I could do it.

Damaged tree

Originally uploaded by mike3k.

No major damage and we never lost power. There were a lot of branches down and a few damaged screens. The worst damage we had was this newly planted palm tree that got taken down. I’ve posted a full gallery at www.mcdevzone.com/gallery/katrina.

It’s now 11:45PM. The wind died down but it’s still raining.

We’re getting hit by the worst part of Hurricane Katrina right now. The rain is very heavy and we’ve had some strong gusts of wind. A lot of trees are down & most of the neighborhood is without power. Our condo is one of the only places that still has power around here, just like last year with Frances & Jeanne. We could see bright blue flashes in the distance as transformers blew out.

The winds seem as strong or worse than last year’s storm, even though this is only a minimal hurricane (barely category 1 and most likely about to get downgraded to a tropical storm). Katrina hit us directly, but last year’s storms were about 60 miles north of us.

Katrina is still a tropical storm, expected to become a weak category 1 hurricane before it hits the coast near Fort Lauderdale tonight or tomorrow morning. We’re already getting lots of rain. This storm is expected to be mostly rain rather than heavy winds.