Hurricane Harbor: Cat 4 Hurricane Laura Made Landfall Cameron Louisiana .. A Look Back, Ahead and Where Are We Now? 20% Yellow Circle in the Distant Atlantic.

This is Laura currently.

Laura doing Louisiana.

Laura Over Inland.

New Yellow Area debuts at 20% Yellow.

Laura made landfall at Cameron Louisiana.

Then it moved towards Lake Charles.

Official NHC wordage above on landfall.

Using this cone to show the cities in the path of Laura.

The projected track of Laura and her rains.

It won't be a hurricane much longer.

But it will bring heavy rain, flooding possible.

They seem to have downgraded it's inland potential.

It's one of those subtle things you notice.

The immediate rain concerns from Laura above.

If you are in those regions watch your Weather Apps.

You can always tell tropical rain from a cold front.

I notice that in Raleigh often, rain associated with a storm..

...often a far away storm feels and smells different.

After moving here years back after getting remarried my husband and I were walking to a friend's house on a Saturday Shabbos afternoon and a fast moving squall came through out of nowhere from a storm that was down at the coast moving North of us but splattering tropical rain across the Raleigh region. We ran to a nearby Magnoila tree, and when I say a tree I mean a huge massive tree covered in huge white velvet like saucer shaped flowers that hung from the lower branches close enough to the ground to peer into their magical beauty. There was no thunder, we stood there sheltering from the heavy rain that "felt" tropical, more like Miami than what you feel up here often and yet the tree mostly sheltered us as the fast moving squall raged all around us. There was a huge, white magnoila that was at it's peak meaning close to a foot wide across easily and the scent was heavy but light in the way magonoila's smell and it was mesmering standing under the huge, old magnoila tree with a squall racing through and then it was gone as fast as it came. I wanted to stay longer, watching the rain, barely any raindrops falling through the heavy canopy and every few moments putting my nose .. my face ...down into the delicate but strong magnoila and inhaling deeply the beautiful scent. It was sort of my welcome to life in Raleigh where occasionally a distant band comes through from a storm down near the coast I discovered the heavenly scent of the magnoila blooms that I fell deeply in love with that begin our venture into our Carolina Summer. Some years they bloom early, other years late and once in a while on time and depending on how hot it is they last longer or they they begin to burn up around the edges turning brown too fast sadly in a too hot, too early July heatwave but I stay in Raleigh every year that time of year just for the Magnoilas. Then generally deeper into July and August I go South to Miami to escape the heat and hayfever that also arrives in the South this timne of year when the cicadas sing way too loudly.

I watched the coverage on multiple feeds sharing images and tweets with my kids who live in various cities around the country but all know what a hurricane is and know watching the power of a Category 4 outweighs the value of sleep at a regular bedtime and it was nice to talk to my son in Seattle who always has the best data, model displays as he created models when he was at Iowa State and my son the architect who watches from the perspective of which shelters are stronger for storm chasers and my daughter who was 7 months old in the eye of Andrew in awe of the storm hoping everyone in it's track was safe and fully informed. My best friend who had eye surgery the day before was healing and able to see well and was watching TWC feed sending me messages. Life seemed sort of normal for our family, without the adrenaline of fear that my kids in Miami were in a Cat 4 but just watching a Cat 4 online with them instead. TWC did it's thing well, glass shattered falling like firecrackers caught in the light in the black night as everyone ran for cover; yeah that happens when you stand outside in a hurricane under a sign... real storm chasers don't do that they chose their location very carefully to make sure that doesn't happen but it does make for great drama and a visual gone wild.

2:35 am. In the eye of #Hurricane #LAURA in Sulphur #Louisiana. Deep, meditative calm. ❤ pic.twitter.com/OFoJPYf1iv
— Josh Morgerman (@iCyclone) August 27, 2020

Sometimes it's the little things that catch your attention or the lack of things and that's why I posted the video above from Josh's tweet he tweeted online from the eye of the storm. He tweeted it to share but not sure if anyone who has not been through a Major Hurricane can understand what he is really showing. After the raging storm, with noises all about you that sound almost like battleground noises with bombs exploding somewhere, art deco colors in the sky as transformers blow loudly, metal debris clanging in the wind as if a muscian is playing some odd instrument he crafted during the height of a storm and the song should be called WindChimes Gone Wild. The roar of the hurricane, the piercing whistling you hear especially through pine needles and metal no longer perfectly attached to a building and then the eye descends on you and really it feels as if it is descending down and spreading out around you and the noise begins to dim and diasppear and if it's a real eye, a fully closed eye then the stars come out, everything is quiet in the middle of the night except for the sound of crickets. You are in the middle of a Major Hurricane and it's so quiet you can hear crickets. And, that is what it is like to be in the eye of a hurricane! It's a bit addictive I will admit it and after the storm is gone, despite the damage and the debris there's this little voice inside you that says "wow, I want to do that again" but the hurricane has moved on.

Adding in the reality of what real chasers do so don't send them a message during the storm if you can share their footage, the answer is no. They share what they want you to see for free in short snippets on Twitter and then they put their footage into a creative product that they sell. It's a creative product, they are creating for you a product that shows the whole story not just in bits in pieces of one wild video. Yet of all the snippets of video he tweeted this one hit me the most, not because he's dark and serious but a bit playful and poetic but because this is the reality of an eye. This was not his most violent hurricane, but perhaps having lived near by the last month or so it felt a bit more personal to him as he has had a chance to attune to the mindset of living on the edge of the Gulf of Mexico, watching storms at night and knowing any day a hurricane may blow your way.

I'm going to be offline today watching coverage on TWC and doing some things I didn't do the last few days and taking a rest from being online nonstop and updating the blog. I will tell you there is a wave out by Africa with currently low chances of development but they may go up later in the week. It's far away and we are still watching Laura.

Also mentioning this because it's true the new guy at TWC named Tevin Wooten was excellent with Hurricane Laura. Nice to see new young people coming up doing great work.

https://www.weloveweather.tv/introducing-tevin-wooten/