Hurricane Irma

[DiamondHands]

Man I love being part of the Tesla family- learn something new with every thread

Thanks so much to ALL, really appreciate the points of view.

After much thought, I'm thinking of hauling my family out to ATL this afternoon as well, might as well get a vacation out of the next few days. Plus, having a couple of toddlers myself, wife and I are thinking it's a good idea to split. We also hear the Georgia Aquarium is nice

Cheers to all, prayers and best wishes to my peeps in Irma's path.

 

[ccdisce]

Man I love being part of the Tesla family- learn something new with every thread

Thanks so much to ALL, really appreciate the points of view.

After much thought, I'm thinking of hauling my family out to ATL this afternoon as well, might as well get a vacation out of the next few days. Plus, having a couple of toddlers myself, wife and I are thinking it's a good idea to split. We also hear the Georgia Aquarium is nice

Cheers to all, prayers and best wishes to my peeps in Irma's path.

Come on up.

I was down in Key West getting ready to go fish around the Ft Jeff area when Andrew decided to make run for S Miami, so the fishing trip were cancelled and we beat a hasty retreat up the Keys. The Kendall -Cutler area roads were moving slowly around Home Depot stores where folks were buying supplies to board up their homes. My relatives in that area had already evacuated to north Miami so I headed back to Atlanta.

Superchargers and Destination Chargers are available at the SC in Decatur just of the East side of the ring road I285 and W on Hwy78.

The Georgia Aquarium should be fine, Fernbank Museum should be also, Atlanta Botanical Gardens, Coco Cola museum, Stone Mountain Park and the Crafts Village.

 

[Zero CO2]

Super Storm Sandy was not even a hurricane by the time it hit NY/NJ... barely tropical storm force winds ,however, tremendous destruction and we had no electric power or gasoline for over a week ....a direct hit is not required for damage to be significant ....if Irma stalls like Harvey watch out ! better safe than sorry

 

[ChrgdTeCHick]

Is MIA-ATL the only option? What about evacuating early but stopping mid way, say Jax? We're in Jax which tends to be safer because it's an inward curve in FL so the storms tend to hit below or above us. Either way, we prepare every time. This is the most powerful one ever recorded in the Atlantic, could be the next one that directly hits Jax in over a century.

I would give the advice of a plan A and plan B. Head up towards Jax and stay here or closer to the superchargers (St Aug or Brunswick) for a night or two as plan A. If the storm continues to move towards all of FL, then go to plan B and head towards ATL.

Schools are closed in N-FL starting tomorrow afternoon until at least Monday, possibly closed Tuesday. Unlikely that even if N-FL is the furthest north they go and the storm stays in FL, that they can safely make it back to MIA to be at work Tuesday morning. If it turns, then the drive back is shorter making Tuesday work more likely.

 

[KarenRei]

In case anyone's curious, the ensembles have moved back west. This is, by the way, the reason why the NHC never moves the cone that much in a single update - the models can sometimes do a whole windshield-wiper thing Left, right, left, right...

GFS 12z:

ECMWF 12z:

 

[KarenRei]

Oh, and in case anyone is curious as to roughly how large / powerful this storm will be as it approaches Florida, HWRF is the best model for that. A sample run:

To convert knots to mph multiply by 1,15. The purple-red boundary is the boundary between tropical storm and hurricane-force winds.

 

[KarenRei]

Oh, one more: if you're curious as to how much rainfall you can expect it to drop in a 24-hour period (don't focus on the specific track, since we don't know that yet):

The further north it goes, the less the 24-hour precipitation will be (regardless of whether it moves over land or not), as it will speed up as it moves north, and thus stay over a given area for a shorter period of time.

Rain in the Okeechobee's watershed is supposed to yield 3-4 feet of lake height for every foot of rain. Current height is 13.68 feet. So a direct pass over the lake and its watershed with ~18 inches of rain should put add 4,5-6 feet, aka 18,18-20,68 feet. The record is 18.77 feet. Any behavior of the levee over this height is unknown. According to the Army Corps of Engineers, at 21 feet, breaches should be expected.

That said... given the track uncertainty... the rainfall uncertainty... the inflow uncertainty... and the levee uncertainty.... the odds of such an event should be quite low. Worth watching nonetheless. Also, a levee breach at Okeechobee isn't as serious of an event as the levee breaches in New Orleans; it primarily is expected to flood over sugar plantations, and flooding in populated areas wouldn't be very deep.

 

[DiamondHands]

We're on the road!!

I've seen 3 Teslas thus far on 95N between Palm Beach and Ft. Pierce. Having seen looooong lines at the rest area gas stations we passed, I wonder if there will be a line at the Ft. Drum supercharger.

 

[DiamondHands]

The Georgia Aquarium should be fine, Fernbank Museum should be also, Atlanta Botanical Gardens, Coco Cola museum, Stone Mountain Park and the Crafts Village.

Thanks for the tips, we'll be taking the kiddos to all those stops.

 

[ToddS]

Keep everyone posted on the Supercharger availability.

IF we go (which we will decide on Friday), it will likely be west to the Tampa area. I get that we will still feel the affects, but I think that going north (at least until you can get over to the Panhandle) is just having the storm chase us. Again, just my opinion (so save your breath).

 

[DiamondHands]

Northbound entrance to the Ft. Drum rest area, where the supercharger is.

It took us about 5 minutes to get in, after which it was smooth sailing. Fortunately, the charging stalls weren't full, there were two other Teslas already parked when we got there.

 

[ls7corvete]

Howdy friends,

Hope all of you fare well in the coming days.

A colleague of mine, Tesla owner, intends on driving her family from Miami to Atlanta in order to escape the (possible) worst of Irma. She's asking what I would do, and I'm not sure how to advise her.

She'll need to return to work next Tuesday, meaning she'll need to head back on Monday. Assuming a cat 5 hits parts of Florida, I have no idea how to guesstimate how quickly the supercharger network would be brought back online if the grid were to go down anywhere along her route.

Any thoughts?

Thanks

To answer your questions...since this tread has focused on when to evacuate instead of directly answering..lol

I think she should be pretty safe coming back, even with crowding and power outages. She can always drive down the West coast of FL as well, we have many charging stations on this side as well, a slight detour though.

 

[nativewolf]

If it stays on the atlantic side then tampa would make sense.

 

[ToddS]

View attachment 246174
Northbound entrance to the Ft. Drum rest area, where the supercharger is.

It took us about 5 minutes to get in, after which it was smooth sailing. Fortunately, the charging stalls weren't full, there were two other Teslas already parked when we got there.

Tesla owners should have their own lane. LOL

 

[ToddS]

If it stays on the atlantic side then tampa would make sense.

Exactly! If you had asked me yesterday, the west coast of Florida would have been the LAST place I wanted to be. But that is the way these things go.

 

[nativewolf]

Right, there is a 250 mile band or something and in FL that means east or west coast. I think sitting tight til friday and hopping the other way makes as much sense as anything. FL is such a long narrow state that the drive out fo the state is just horrendous in best of times.

Besides which north of tampa there is like 1 krispy kreme until you get to Tallahassee, I mean how can you do an evacuation road trip with just 1 Krispy Kreme? I ask you where is the humanity in that....

 

[DiamondHands]

Right, there is a 250 mile band or something and in FL that means east or west coast. I think sitting tight til friday and hopping the other way makes as much sense as anything. FL is such a long narrow state that the drive out fo the state is just horrendous in best of times.

Besides which north of tampa there is like 1 krispy kreme until you get to Tallahassee, I mean how can you do an evacuation road trip with just 1 Krispy Kreme? I ask you where is the humanity in that....

lol
You'll never guess where the crumbs on my shirt came from.

 

[nativewolf]

lol
You'll never guess where the crumbs on my shirt came from.

Exactly my point. People need a good donut when evacuating! Should be in the bill of rights but there was some disagreement about rights to just original or boston cremed and then the folks in RI started bringing up jelly filled and it just devolved from there. Jefferson finally just had to remove all the mentions of donuts altogether which, along with the something else I am forgetting right now, was his greatest failure.

 

[DiamondHands]

This just popped up!

 

[Racerx22b]

View attachment 246187
This just popped up!

It's a new hurricane avoidance system designed to enhance the biohazard mode.