Sally Now A Big Hurricane Threat To Gulf Coast

Tropical Storm Sally was gaining steam in the Gulf of Mexico this morning, and it's now becoming a huge, dangerous threat to the central Gulf Coast, including beleaguered New Orleans.  

Visible satellite image Sunday morning of
Tropical Storm Sally developing in
the eastern Gulf of Mexico (white blob
on right hand side of photo).

Nobody is sure exactly how strong Sally will get, but on satellite images, it has "that look" that often is the way a tropical system appears as its first developing. Tropical Storm Sally had top winds of only 50 mph early this morning, so that's not the biggest deal. The problem is that Sally is all but guaranteed to strengthen. Probably a lot. 

It looks like Sally will take a somewhat similar path as the Hurricane Katrina did in 2005 as it all but destroyed Louisiana.  At this point, I don't think, or at least I hope, it won't get as bad as Katrina, but it's still a big threat. 

The only thing really working against Sally was a little bit of strong-ish winds aloft, which were slightly interfering with the storm's organization as of Sunday morning. It looks like those upper level winds might diminish some later today. 

If Sally develops a very strong inner core, it could really blow up. We'll have to watch and see.  Regardless of what happens, it already seems like Sally will create a lot of danger and damage. 

First, it will probably be a hurricane at landfall. At this point, the prediction is for a Category 2 storm with top winds of around 100 mph.

A bigger problem is the storm surge.  Early forecasts indicate it could go to six to nine feet above normal sea level.  That'll really hit vulnerable low lying areas, including possibly New Orleans and surrounding areas.  

Forecasts for Sally's predicted path shifted westward overnight toward New Orleans. 

Worse, Sally's forward speed is expected to be quite slow as it nears the coast.  A slow moving hurricane has more time to build up a bigger, worse storm surge. 

Along with that, torrential rains will linger for a long time, as compared to a hurricane which blast right through, in and out in less than a day. 

A slow moving storm would dump tremendous amounts of rain, causing flooding just inland. Then that water flowing toward the coast would get blocked by the storm surge coming in. The water would have nowhere to go except into neighborhoods just inland from the coast. 

As an example of how wet this thing already is, parts of the Florida Keys received nearly a foot of rain from Sally on Saturday. 

There will inevitably be adjustments and changes to the forecast regarding Sally.  It already appears cast in stone, however, that a part of the United States is about to get creamed by a nasty, destructive weather event.