.... prolly. At the moment, Isaac has all the pieces in place; winds are high enough, pressure at the center is low enough, and all that. But, the storm is not organized with an eye and nicely formed bands. I imagine that the folks in the Hurricane Prediction Center are annoyed. I suspect they will declare Isaac a Hurricane within a few hours.
There are two big news items to know about. First, Isaac is physically large and wet, and will cause many inches of rain to fall on places that will then flood severely. Second, the center line of the hurricane's track may go right over New Orleans, which means that the "right punch" of the storm will pass over Lake Pontchatrain. This significantly increases the potential severity of flooding.
New Orleans is shutting down. Fights are now being cancelled at the airport, evacuations have been going on for a while, the flood gates at various levies are being shut as I write this. City and state officials are confident that the levy system is up to snuff and there will be no breaking or breaching of these flood-stopping structures.
Just because Isaac's center seems to be bearing down on NOLA does not mean that other places are not in trouble. If I was Mississippi, I'd be worried.
So far I've not seen any reporters falling into the Landfall Fallacy, but on the other hand, I've not been watching the news much. Huxley and I have been busy with other things. Let me know if you see any examples!
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