Hurricane Harbor: 20 Dead in US From Matthew ...NC FLOODING... Towns EVACUATED.. Rivers RISING... Is Nicole Headed to Bermuda as a Hurricane? Watching CARIB Down the Road for More Tropical Action. Perceptions of Life in Carolina.. From a Miami Girl Who Loves Carolina Too.. Hurricane Country.

Nicole is the only game in town today in the tropics.

As the sun comes up on Nicole...

..we see an Atlantic spinner in motion.

In motion spinning around in circles.

About to board the NE train out to sea.

Doing my editing of the NHC Cone.

Bermuda may get a visit from Hurricane Nicole.

Go figure.

Right now it's down to the South still moving slowly.

Spinning.

Nicole is a spinner.

And she is going to spin NE out to sea.

No tango Fujiwara dance for Nicole.

Maybe next time.

Seems to be Nicole was lucky to form at all

I've said often I'm a dancer.

I studied dance as a hobby and for exercise.

I'm Southern.

I did a lot of tap dance and baton twirling when I was young.

So let's show how this relates..

Check it out guys do ballet too...

And girls chase storms and work at the NHC also.

It's a new, wonderful world.

But if I say "ballet dancer" you and Google think:

When I say "storm chaser" Google shows:

There are some girls out there now days.

Check out the NHC

The world is changing in many ways.

Good ways.

Don't get locked in your box with perceptions.

IF I say to you Hurricane Matthew..

Do you think Haiti?

Daytona? Jax?

Tybee Island storm surge?

Landfall in SC?

Inland Flooding NC?

Broken piers and torn up beaches?

Inland flooding and evacuated towns?

What you think is your perception.

Another perception is the models can do no wrong.

The EURO that is seen as King made mistakes.

Does that make the GFS the Queen?

They both made mistakes.

LOL Just being silly today after a long week of serious discussion.

People think Matthew is gone.

He is gone but his misery lingers on.

Going to show you what the Millenials see..

Snapchat and Matthew

Pretty much tells the story ...

Rivers only going up today.

Not cresting yet either.

Good to have a sense of humor...

And we all use that index don't we?

And the bottom line.

10 people have died in NC from Matthew.

That means in reality Matthew had a bigger impact in NC.

And yet early on the NHC was insistent it was turning by SC.

Well after the whole model snafu..

This was supposed to be about FL, GA, SC...

Matthew made landfall in SC where 3 people died.

Florida got a mess and 4 people died last I saw.

3 dead in Georgia.

Some people missing so it could rise like the rivers.

And from the flooding the death toll could rise.

So far the total US death toll from Matthew is 20 so far.

Sad isn't it?

NC INLAND FLOODING

So this was a huge storm in Raleigh.

I'd say Raleigh by and large had a strong Tropical Storm.

Drenching record breaking rain. Rained ALL day heavy.

Strong winds, strong enough to make howling hurricane like sounds.

Not all day but in the stronger squalls.

You walk down one street everything looks normal.

Next street.. not so normal.

Luckily that oak tree fell away from the house.

New pretty house recently built.

You can see from Google below how big that tree was..

More views of those homes today.

Flooded parking lots 3 days after the storm ...

I know leaves, clogged drains.. etc.

A lot of rain ...

Down by the golf course they are cutting up this tree.

Was a huge beautiful tree.

I stood under it... but not posting that pic.

It is way over my head.

It's about the tree and the storm not me.

But it was way over my head when I stood under it.

Huge tree.. probably cut up and hauled away now.

Golf Courses clean up fast ...

...faster than poor people with broken homes.

That's the tree last year in the winter time on Google.

The tree closest to the street.

The fence was a bit bent there then.

So yeah we had a strong taste of Matthew in Raleigh.

But it's a matter of perception to many..

Those who turned off TWC when it was slamming Daytona..

.. People who woke up, heard it hit SC then put on CNN.

Back to the election... sports.. life goes on.

But life is not going on so easily today in inland NC.

Far from the beaten up coastline.

Or the homes that were under water on Hatteras Island..

Odd if a tree falls in the forest and no reporter is there..

...does the world know about it?

I wrote this in 2009 reflecting on an AMS Meeting I went to in Miami.

I helped put out some snacks and set up things with Neal Dorst..

..I spoke to Bill Read before he spoke to the public.

Just after a trip to NC when I was dating my now husband back then..

..I heard massive crazy stories on towns never rebuilt after Floyd.

We heard about the flooding but til you live in NC you don't really get it.

From an old blog...

http://hurricaneharbor.blogspot.com/2009/11/problem-with-ida

-now-tropical-storm-ida.html

So where am I now?

Sitting in Raleigh just back from a trip to Miami.

Chased Julia a bit.

Matthew chased me in Raleigh after I was home.

I didn't get any damage but got a good clue...

...... on what it looks like here in a real tropical event.

8 years I've been coming here never saw tree damage like this..

..and we didn't get the hurricane just tropical storm conditions.

Raleigh is not prepared for a hurricane, trust me.

MY friend just got her electric back, cable still out.

So much in life is perception. For instance am I a Miami girl living up north in North Carolina or am I a Carolina girl these days from Miami? Does it make a difference? Yes and no... maybe not really. Why can't I be both? Turning back and forth from NFL football to NASCAR though I watched NASCAR with my son in Miami.

My power is on, there is no huge oak tree strewn against my lawn and I don't have flooding. To me Matthew was a much wished for encounter with a tropical system from the comfort of my home where I could sit on the balcony and listen to the wind. Down the block some homes are in perfect shape and others have huge trees down on their lawn; many already being cut up and hauled away. Some houses have yard debris piled high reminiscent of post Hurricane Andrew and Wilma. The house next door has no signs of a hurricane and political signs up as if nothing else was going on in the world.

Life is often about perception. The hurricane season is NOT over and it's common for Caribbean storms to move NE towards the cold front moving South. In Miami today my kids were all over Whatsapp in the Family ground because it was 77 degrees in Miami and beautiful. That's a clue that we could have another storm forming still this year. Otto is out there somewhere I believe. He might not be a big storm but it's not over til it's over. Watch the Carib, GOM and stalled out frontal boundaries...