Before I get into the very dangerous Hurricane Ida approaching New Orleans, a few other news items of the day:
- The USA suffered yesterday with 190,370 new cases and 1304 new deaths.
- #2 Mexico had 835 new deaths with "only" 20,633 new cases.
- #2 India with 46,805 new cases had 514 new deaths.
- Hawaii had our worst day ever, 1035 new cases and 9 new deaths.
- Interestingly enough, Florida had the highest number of new cases with 27,584, but only 8 new deaths. Hmmm...
- The U.S. has now passed 100,000 evacuations from Kabul Airport, which will come to halt on Tuesday. Lots of fears, but no particularly serious after-attacks.
- The NCAA women's volleyball season began yesterday with Hawaii beating Fairfield, and will play Marquette tonight, with Texas A&M tomorrow. Two stars were first year freshmen.
- The NCAA football season began today, with Hawaii at UCLA in the Rose Bowl on ESPN.
So on to
Hurricane Ida, at this writing only a Category 1. However, all projections show her strengthening to a Category 4 and slamming into Louisiana near Grand Isle. The Gulf of Mexico water temperature is in the upper 80's, 8 F hotter than it should be in August.
Ominously, Ida is expected to make landfall on August 29 (Sunday), the same day Hurricane Katrina landed in 2005. Katrina did attain Category 5 status, but hit Louisiana/Mississippi as a Category 3.
The huge worry about Ida is that her eye is expected to pass New Orleans on the west side. Katrina zoomed by New Orleans to the east. The northwest quadrant of a northern hemisphere cyclonic storm is the danger spot. Katrina thus actually missed New Orleans, whereas the northwest quadrant of Ida will slam into that underwater city.
Of all the things, New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell said she can't order any mandatory evacuation for the entire city because it is now too late to do this. Thus, the populace will need to hunker down awaiting all kinds of dike and lake problems. Worse, the entire state has been suffering most, per capita, than any other state from new Delta variant cases.
Katrina killed 1836 and caused $125 billion in damages, the costliest on record. The Superdome and New Orleans Convention Center became home to too many for too long. Almost three years after Katrina struck, I happened to go to the Sugar Bowl game featuring Hawaii and Georgia. The devastation was still frightening.
I particularly remember a similar situation way back in July of 1969 when I drove from Baton Rouge, through New Orleans and Biloxi, and into Florida to see Apollo 11 ready to take Neil Armstrong to the Moon. Had lunch in Biloxi. Category 5 Hurricane Camille made landfall on August 17 at Bay St. Louis (
38 miles west of Biloxi--remember that northwest quadrant danger--Ida is expected to pass no more than 100 miles west of New Orleans, and probably much closer), Mississippi at 175 MPH with a storm surge of 24 feet. Camille wiped out the highway where we had lunch. In 1971 I drove close by on Interstate 10 and noticed that whole area in Biloxi just was gone.
My recollection is that I have never been in a hurricane. I lived in Baton Rouge for three and a half years, and never experienced one. I was in Colorado when Hurricane Iniki struck Kauai. I happened to be at a conference in New Orleans in 1989 when Hurricane Jerry was in the Gulf of Mexico, so I left early on a rather memorable trip to Tokyo (
yes, Tokyo), then back to San Francisco, and on to DC. The night I left Frisco I turned on my hotel TV set in DC and saw a scene that was unforgettable. The AMFAC hotel I had slept in the night before at the San Francisco Airport was destroyed, with the elevator shaft caved-in. My room was next to the elevator. This was that 6.9 magnitude
Loma Prieta earthquake that postponed a World Series game. I did eventually get home safely.
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