Redstate

survived Ivan, which the eye passed right over my house, and Dennis, which thankfully (for me at least) came ashore a bit to the east, I feel for the people of LA and hope everything goes as well as it might in this situation.  I hope for their safety, and do not envy them the coming cleanup.

from this storm at my house though, since it is so large.  the waters here are expected to rise 9 to 12 feet due to this, which will be BAD...  (I live about a mile in from Mobile Bay in Daphne, AL)

I rode out Andrew in my home in Baton Rouge. It was still a hurricane as it passed through town, 100 miles north of the coast line. And this one is bigger.

My friend in New Orleans lived through Andrew down there, and she told me the city officials are saying this will be significantly worse than Andrew. People who stayed put during Andrew are evacuating now. This could truly be the devastaing hurricane New Orleans has been worrying about for decades.

Everybody please pray that it weakens significantly before landfall.

I haven't watched the news in a couple days, so I hadn't kept up on this.  Katrina has become a monster.  It's amazing what a little warm water will do.

Good luck, LA.

I was up in Jackson, LA, about 30 minutes north of Louisiana and remember Andrew rode up the Mississippi only becoming a tropical storm when it was north of us.

We were without power for a week and places around us were without water for several weeks.

My parents are sticking it out in Jackson, despite my urging them to do otherwise.

My folks live up in Clinton. I used to drive through Jackson all the time!

This could be a catastrophic storm for New Orleans.  Here is a link to the American Red Cross.  Donations are tax-deductible, and you can also use their website to locate Red Cross local offices by zipcode -- I would imagine that many of them are going to be coordinating relief efforts and will have a list of things they need.  The American Red Cross is a 4-star charity according to Charity Navigator, their highest rating.

The mayor of New Orleans has asked that people who intend to ride the storm out in the Superdome bring three to four days worth of food.  If the storm is as bad as some people are projecting, they may need more than that.  My hopes and prayers are with everyone in Louisiana, Alabama and the surrounding region.  

I am also very afraid to see what this does to oil prices on monday. It may be a circumstance where the SPR needs to be tapped.

> Katrina has become a monster

"Katrina"s have always spelled disaster for The Nation.

wish you could make go away, but you can't do a doggone thing about it, other than ride it out.

Parying that she will be gentle, I did two catagory 1's (Fran and Floyd) and that was bad enough.  

Redstaters:

There are two diaries going over at DailyKos listing rooms available for people evacuating the Gulf Coast.  

Diary here.  (The other, earlier, diary URL is in the body text of the linked diary.)

It's not about politics today.  God bless you all, especially the folks in the path of this storm.

There are more listings in here.

I hope everyone down there makes it with as little damage as possible.

which is much worse than 1.  Camille was a category 5 that came ashore just to the east of where this one will in the late 60's.  My parents have told me what that was like.... Biloxi was virtually destroyed.  My grandfather owned a business that sat across the highway from the beach and the whole building - cinderblock/brick - was just gone.  no real trace of it other than the foundation, which was moved by several feet, remained.

New Orleans is in for billions in damage I'd say, and points east are in for major destruction also.  Heck, I live 3 hours to the east and we are still expecting 120mph winds and 10 to 15ft surge.

Thanks.

Anyone down there, please do not try to ride this one out.  I know other states do, but they are above sea level.  And very rarely faced with the full wall of a category 5 hurricane.

I'm in Baton Rouge too. Rode out Andrew as well, unfortunately, I was a young single person, just out of college and didn't properly prepare. My roommate and I had one can of sterno, A large bag of Gardetto's and Fig Newtons. We were out of electricity for 5 days, and they were pretty long and miserable. We found an old a.m. radio in a stuffed dog that she had, and we listened to that. I'm praying everything goes well for our friends in N.O. My best friend's family (about 25 people) are all staying with her--from Kenner and Metairie. I'm getting fairly nervous at this point, but we have lots of bottled water, dry goods, peanut butter and NO fig newtons.

My prayers are with all our brothers and sisters down south.

The article he linked is citing among other things, a huge percentage of houses lost to wind damage, High rise buildings possibly collapsing, and worse. I'm praying they're wrong. But none of my friends are professing any faith in the levee system in N.O.

Please pray especially for the homeless and indigent who had no place to go and no way to get there anyway. New Orleans has a large population living in abject poverty.

. . . at least for the "superstitious" among us.

The rest of you, please just sit quietly at your desks.

For what it's worth, we're in Lafayette 125 mi west of N.O. with a houseful of evacuees. There's not much to do at this point but sit tight.

Unfortunately, a common attitude in N.O. is that the city survived Betsy in 1965, so it can survive anything. Betsy was a 3, Katrina's a 5, and thus far looks like a bulls-eye. This has the potential to be really, really bad.

For the scientifically inclined, NOAA posts live sea-state data from unmanned observation buoys at

http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/Maps/WestGulf.shtml

Station 42001 is west of the storm's passage; current barometric pressure is 29.03 psi.

power for about a week.  The girls and I ended up going to stay with my parents, so we only experienced two of those days.

When Floyed hit we were without power for almost 5 days-we were in an apartment and we hung out with our neighbor, because they had a camp stove, and we ate together everyday (just cooked what we could before we lost it-then it was canned stuff).  All four kids slept in my queen size bed with me (my husband was working nights).

It is not an experience I would choose to repeat.

sure, at this rate, even if it doesn't get a direct hit, it is going to get hit with something, and considering it is below sea level-it is going to harm it.

I also realize cat 5's are much worse than cat 1's, my point was that those are bad enough.

trying to emphasize how bad it could be.

We should get together and have a conservative hurricane party!

That's the great thing about BR, chances are good you're talking to a fellow conservative, even without going to the conservative Red State site.

I'm really worried about the homeless, the tourists and the just to stubborn to get out groups down in New Orleans, and of course all the animals. And the hurricane center director WBRZ said quibbling about whether it goes east or west is like the difference between getting hit by a locomotive or an 18-wheeler. Not too encouraging.

Speaking of partying, I did get a big bottle of red. I figured it'd still be good even if the electricity went out!

I was 10 and living in New Orleans when Hurricane Betsy tracked straight up the Mississippi River. Betsy took out a levee on the Mississippi, pushed water over the levee at Lake Pontchartrain, flooded the Garden District. We were without power for three days. We were out of school for six weeks (Whoopee!)

Forgive me, I was a kid. Betsy's sustained winds were 105 mph when it hit New Orleans. We had tropical storm winds or greater for 13 hours. The eye passed right over us at about 3 a.m.

Katrina is 50% stronger than Betsy. Say a prayer.

after Jeannie last year. Ate lots and lots of fast food, although one night we did cook spaghetti on a camp stove. Finally went to a hotel for a night, since hanging out with no AC in Florida late summer weather did my asthma no good.