Hurricane Harbor: Updated. 180 MPH Winds MILTON CAT 5 Near Yucatan - Landfall as a Major Hurricane.... Supposed to Weaken Some Before Landfall. Prepare NOW, Evacuate If You Are Told ... Hunker Down If Not. Do NOT Focus on the Cone... Focus on the DOME of WATER Coming at The Whole Zone In and NEAR the Cone!

Major Hurricane at Landfall!

Moves FASTER after Landfall to Atlantic.

NHC shows 145 MPH before landfall.

Major Hurricane.

Strong Major Hurricane.

Top end of Cone has Homosassa Springs in it.

Many Floridians know that area well.

To the South... Cape Coral.

Cone goes down past Cape Coral.

Note From Port St. Lucie to Titusville...

...all those cities are in the Cone.

Orlando is in the Cone.

Disney is closing.

South Florida getting heavy rains now.

That area will move offshore.

As Milton moves towards Florida.

Please keep reading.

Prayers that shear is stronger.

The stronger winds at Landfall are ...

Milton stronger and shear not so strong.

It's a very bad scenario, a kind of worst case scenario, and the only thing I can do is to tell you to please follow all evacuation orders and information to protect your life and your property.... if you are in the Cone and in a Zone that requires evacuation. You don't have to evacuate to Atlanta, you have to drive inland. Please read the blog below explaining the dangers of flooding, storm surge and this particularly bad set up as it will have rained for days and many rivers, lakes and streets, shopping center parking lots are already flooded. They flood easily in Broward County but flooding is already occuring in low lying places in Ft. Lauderdale area and Miami. Far from Milton there will be high winds and flooding rains. It's a state wide event, except for the Panhandle.

As for WIND damage, as Milton exceeded all expectations of Major Hurricane Strength now at 180 MPH with gusts higher.....you have to wonder what else did the models not see coming. I say that with great respect for NHC and they have done an awesome, difficult job and they will make any changes at 11 PM that they feel are necessary. Your job is to follow information for your location and to stay on top of any late breaking changes.

Looks like a creature ... like a bird.

Not a happy one.

Purple Cane.

Cat 5 Milton down by the Yucatan!

Adding in here the updated statement.

CATEGORY 5 NOW

160 MPH Winds!

Keep reading.

Wrote blog knowing it would be Cat 5

Was a done deal and the only big question now...

How high do the winds go today?

Focus on what you need to do.

Forecast intensified it.

Forecast says winds will wind down.

Do what you gotta do today!

Written at 11 AM...

Bottomline Forecast to be a CAT 5

Good news, relatively.....

It weakens before landfall.

As per NHC Forecast.

NHC is always conservative....

They forecast 165 MPH Winds.

CATEGORY 5

Is that intense of what...

...take a minute watch it.

Remember NHC said it would intensify.

Looked weak, weird but NHC said..

it would be a strong Major Hurricane.

Impressive we can predict, forecast this...

Let's look at Cone.

Iconic Cone above.

Interactive Cone below.

Going wide above.

Narrowing in below.

Close in

Clearwater to the North.

Tampa Bay in the Middle.

Sarasota to the South.

Always expect wiggles in the Cone.

North/South...

Each day closer to true track.

And, hurricanes are want to surprise.

Even tho we know so much.

Remember that.

Rely on the Cone...

...but expect surprises.

Prepare for the Worst.

Hope for the Best.

Wind Forecast above.

You don't need to evacuate in green areas above.

IF in evacuation zone in purple above yes.

Pay attn to local weather officials.

NWS NHC

Below a different map.

Different colors for different maps.

7 Day Rain Totals.

Most of Florida.

Note orientation of direction.

SW to NE

Sharp cut off in Panhandle.

You can see the track in the colors.

My own thoughts on Cone is that the Cone looks good. I put the "line in the Cone" up to show you any variations or let's say deviations in direction from the previous Cone. Note the line in the middle of the Cone wiggles up and down in direction depending on short term movement of Milton and with regard to each new model run that comes in that infers a possible pull to the North or South and yes it could thread the needle of Tampa Bay if their luck runs out. Even IF it pulls North towards Clearwater or South to Sarasota Tampa Bay gets a punch of destructive wind and devastating storm surge that'll leave nightmares in the memories of those who lived there when Milton made landfall. My ancestors had lifelong memories of the 1921 Tampa Bay Cat 4 October Hurricane that made landfall actually in Tarpon Springs near Tampa.

Once Milton begins moving more to the ENE vs the ESE or East I'll breathe a little bit better regarding family in South Florida but I do trust the NHC forecast (again it's fine tuned every 6 hours) as they have been stellar this hurricane season with a bevy of landfalling hurricanes rare to see in any one given year.

Data at top.

My thoughts and concerns at bottom.

Note while Milton is down in the BOC.

Milton is not alone.

Milton has a friend leading him....

Like an ugly pimple that developed on the NE side.

Milton last night.

Milton's "pimple" grew into a blob.

Then there's the remnants form the blob..

..that's been raining on Florida for days.

To the far right of Milton & it's "friend"

This means all the moisture, rain has been pummeling areas from Miami to the Florida Keys to Cuba and all across the state of Florida annoyingly while people try to either board up their homes to hunker down or get out of town and then evacuate on a clogged, congested highway Northbound. That means that Florida isn't starting this journey at zero on it's way to a ten, but because of the heavy rain that's been falling for days it will start it's journey at a 6 or a 7 on it's way to 10. I hope that makes sense. It's already raining, wet ground makes trees and structures fall faster than they may have otherwise. It makes everything worse with regard to water rise, flooding and as I said the Water that's hard to run from...

Current radar.

Not from Milton but from the blob hovering there.

Leading Milton there...til the trough grabs it.

Makes the watery misery worse.

Milton obvious near the Yucatan.

Messy wet blob to the right close to Florida.

I know, how much more complex can this get?

A look at the models below.

(yes I see the blue line at bottom)

(ps NHC seems it too!!)

Things that need to be said.

My thoughts, carefully worded.

My message needs to be clear here.

I'm concerned on water rise...storm surge.

Flooding from Milton itself.

Low lying areas that flood WILL flood.

Areas near areas that flood may flood.

If you have a house low on one step (terrazzo)

Get sandbags for anywhere you can.

Even if you don't need to evacute.

Cover windows.

Do what you gotta do!

Wind in EYE and Eye Wall BAD

Winds will spread wide...

....as Milton weakens.

And many far from the eye will get WINDS

Strong winds, not Cat 5 winds..

Even SFL has concerns on wind.

Because Milton forecast to go wide.

Now a red sports car...

...later a huge wide low on highway.

If NHC forecast verifies.

More on that later.

Thanks for taking the time to read.

This is as serious a situation as it gets.

At 7 AM during the SPECIAL ADVISORY raised the winds to 150 MPH while it was still going ESE at 8 MPH, that's not exactly a "crawl" and even short term movement extrapolated over time makes small changes in Cone on various advisories. And, as it feels other steering currents some favorable to intensifying and eventually towards lower it's intensity ...........it really doesn't matter when it comes to storm surge if you are in the cone or near the cone on the West Coast of Florida. At 11 AM they raised the winds to 155 MPH. This was a done deal the moment the NHC pulled the cord and put out a "special advisory" for rapid Intensification so not surprised it's 155 MPH ...getting stronger as I type on it's way to Cat 5. Beryl a Cat 5 and Milton a Cat 5 like bookends, and the Hurricane Season is far from over. Lord only knows what November will bring....................

Understand WIND speeds are slow to rise when the barometer drops often, and eventually as they did today they jumped up to mind blowng 150 MPH wind speed as a strong Category 4 (near Cat 5) on the "special" 7 AM advisory. But, storm surge, water rise...the "dome" of water being pushed all the way from the Bay of Campeche towards landfall on the Florida West Coast doesn't correspond as quickly. As any boater knows when water swells, surges and rides en mass across a wide area and is shoved very horribly across all the beaches along the Florida West Coast .............even those beaches not inside the Cone anymore. So I don't wanna hear "but the cone" because the CONE follows the EYE...the WINDS in the center of the Cone adjacent to the eye. When we are talking about a huge, intense hurricane that has traveled far with high water and storm surging such as Matthew, Sandy, Mitch, Florence even though the wind damages do not seem as bad the water is the story and it's played out across an area way wider than the eye.

Naples Station with trucks in it flooded in Ian.

Far to the South of the landfall.

Storm surge, water damage and destruction as we saw in Ian slammed into Naples to the South of landfall. There aren't many big cities outside of the Tampa area on the West Coast as there are marshes, swamps, bays and lots of little beautiful "Keys" aka Islands covered with beautiful homes and restaurants that look out on the usually tranquil waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Sarasota, Bradenton are two vs the beautiful Siesta Key with it's pristine white beaches, but not large metropolitan areas. Retirement communities, and places where young families live for a peaceful place to raise their children in concert with the natural wonders that abound. But when a hurricane races towards those beautiful places everything and I do mean everything changes. Such as my concern this morning for Milton, the islands and beachfront homes on the West Coast and even to a degree Southwest Coast of Florida. AFTER it crosses Florida it'll pound the beaches on the NE coast of Florida with strong onshore winds that'll cause destructive damage to the beaches and any homes, hotels and businesses directly on those beaches.

The waters of the Gulf of Mexico will be a mean fighting machine attacking every home, structure and the beachline in the stunning white sand of places such as Siesta Key and could do to it what Helene did to Anna Maria Island to the North another delicate, ecosystem covered with beach front homes on a narrow barrier island. Note homes built to high standards still stand with many damages hard to see to the naked eye, but they are often standing next to demolished homes and everything covered in sand much like mud covers streets in the mountains of NC from Helene. It's a long clean up to get back to normal and for some it's a deadly mess that kills loved ones who rode out the hurricane hoping they'd be okay.

Where it makes "landfall" exactly and who gets the most of the "eye" is only important for Storm Chasers so if you live anywhere near it's path along the water or in an area that is prone to flooding it will most likely flood and there will be waves on top of those flooding waters smashing, battering anything in it's way.

Sorry but not sorry I have to tell you this.........because you want honesty from me and this is what I'm saying is important to remember. You can hide from the wind in a bathtub with a mattress over you but it's harder to run from the water if you live at the water's edge and you do not evacuate.

Watch the eye, watch the line in the eye down the middle as a guidance to see which way the wind is blowing and if there's a trend North or South for the Cone, but it's not about the center of the Cone IF you live on the water or near the water as the water will ignore which way the Cone goes by miles and pound a huge area on either side of the "especially" to the right of the cone as usually it's stronger there when it comes on shore.

Nuff said on Storm Surge and associated water level rise along the length and breadth of the Florida West Coast, SW Coast....again remember Naples flooded and their fire engines cut off from being able to help far to the South of the landfall of Ian.

Do what you got to do.

My Daddy used to stay that.

"do what you gotta do"

Good advice.

This does not mean evacuate nervously from Miami or Key Largo because you see a huge Cat 4 or Cat 5 Hurricane in the GOM moving to the right be it ESE or East or NE and your neighbor said not to trust the NHC. The NHC is very good ....especially in the 3 day and the 5 day...and Milton is set to make landfall near that 3 day mark so take it to the bank and don't live in denial that it'll go to Cuba or suddenly up towards the Big Bend and again it's about the dome of water being pushed and shoved across the miles towards your favorite beach near wherever the eye makes landfall and IF you get the eye that's a whole 'norther story as what goes inland when the eye hits at landfall will come back at you like a battering ram that backs up over it's target for a second hit.

I'll update later in the day. I just wanted to really get this point across as the whole the West Coast of Florida is filled with beautiful little communities at the water's edge with a nearby restaurant, antique store and a few sounvenier stores as well as little food trucks that look like Tiki Huts that serve shaved ice on hot summer days when the beach sand is hot and even the breeze is way too balmy.