Hurricane discussion; Red flags are flying!

[s/v Faith]

These tracks just keep looking worse and worse for CJ & Laura.  Now it is supposed to be a cat III or mayeb even cat IV.  :o



  Hope it keeps shifting west / south,  You guys are in our prayers.

[CharlieJ]

Well it HAD been shifting south til today. Now it's got us bore sighted. I've been working all day packing stuff away- trimmed some tree limbs away from the house, stowed all the outside furniture, strapped  down the propane tank. In the morning we'll start boarding up and Thursday AM we'll put Tehani out on three anchors and lots of chain/rode, stripped of canvas, etc. We'll pull the engine also  and us that on the inflatable to get home. Then probably bail outta here on Thursday night before the rush.

This one could be a bad one!! But hey- it's only the third time we've had to bail in 17 years. And the other two times we had clean misses.

[Shipscarver]

Let's just hope the next one isn't LBJ "I Went All The Way With LBJ."
Be safe folks!

[CapnK]

CJ - Do I have y'alls location pinpointed properly on the image below?

I sure hope he passes well to the south, and at a lesser strength than the current forecast calls for. Doesn't look like he'll be less than a Cat3 though, huh? Maybe enough southing will keep y'alls house and Tehani out of the stronger winds. Try not to worry - y'all are too close to taking off - she has to make it through. She is looking as forward to it as y'all are. :)

[AdriftAtSea]

Now, now, that ain't exactly stormpulse's fault... Ike seems to like you...

I HATE Storm pulse!!!

Because they have the durned thing centered on us. Right between Port O'Conner and Freeport. Port O'Conner is us.

I'll be beginning to board up things tomorrow, and get Tehani ready to move out to anchor, gas up vehicles and get some extra. Might miss, might not- gotta get started now. 

[CharlieJ]

Yep Kurt- that would be us. On the south side of the top part of that bay system. That's Matagorda/Lavaca bays.

Laura has Tehani stripped as of last night, except for the engine, mainsail and boom. We'll be taking her out to a small bay across from us on Thursday and anchoring her off. I have a pair of 20H Danforths and quite a bit of chain to go with the extra rodes. Plus her normal anchor and it's 75 feet of chain. Should have some protection form the north and east which is where we figure the heaviest winds will come from.

I'll tow our big inflatable ans swap Tehani's outboard to that when we get there. Use that to lay out anchors and get us back here. Put the boom below and bring the sail home with us. And hope. Soon as she's anchored and we're here we'll bug out -try to beat the mass exodus Friday morning.

I cleared everything off outside yesterday, trimmed some limbs that might have brushed the house, etc.

Today we'll be boarding up the house and packing the stuff we DON"T want to lose for sure, to take with us.

We keep hoping it'll move faster and go in further south. The further south it moves, the less we'll get. Right now, we'll be on the dirty side. We could get a BIG surge. Of course also if it moves way north, then we escape that dirty side. I guess we'll know on Saturday.

[newt]

I looked at the models, looks like it is headed straight for you CJ. Keep us informed and bug out early!

[CapnK]

Good call to wait 'til Thursday to pick a spot, since the models and forecasts keep bumping N. Maybe just maybe y'all will get the (relatively) lucky west side of the eye, and that will affect where she'll be best anchored for maximum protection... I looked at Google maps today to see what you had around there. It all looks really flat, and without much in the way of even trees to act as a windbreak. What's the depth in that bay?

Crossing my fingers for you all (CJ, L, T, & T), burning joss sticks, keeping y'all in my prayers. Basically, everything I can do short of sacrificing a CrewDog, ;) trying to get Ike to move away...

You've got my cell #, if you are out of touch but want to pass on a message to sailFarers and/or the TSBB'ers, feel free to call anytime, OK?

BTW - where are you going to evacuate to?

[CharlieJ]

Flat? did you say flat? Hey if your dog runs away over here you can see him for three days ;D

Keller bay is where we'll go. Not many trees but at least we can get in within a half mile of shore on the north, east and south sides. Which is where the winds will most likely be from. I'll lay out as much rode as I can get out- doesn't do any good in the locker. We'll most likely start out in 8 feet. Of course a tide surge will give us more. I'd like 10 feet, but I don't think that'll happen.

[CapnK]

Flat? did you say flat? Hey if your dog runs away over here you can see him for three days ;D

LOL!!!  :D Good one!

Was looking at the latest satellite animation, and noticed that, even all the way over here, we are under the extreme edge of the outflow, just a bit. The CoC seems to be about 50 miles closer to y'all, than it is to me. Sure hoping that all you get from this is another 'near miss' story. :)

PS - I meant where in Tx will you and L go? I know it will be inland at least a little ways...

[CharlieJ]

Oh- to Laura's folks place above I-10 Northwest of Houston. If that gets to looking like it's gonna get rough, we'll head on further up to our family place above Livingston or to my son's place in College Station. But I imagine we'll be fine at her folks farm. No storm surge there ;D

[CapnK]

I'm writing this post I would think for most everyone here:

To the whole family: CJ & L, Traveler and Tehani -

Keep this in mind:

You won't be going through this alone; neither before, during, or even after the storm.

You can be assured of that.

We are and will be keeping you in our hearts and thoughts, and will be standing by, ready to 'get on deck' at any time, to help y'all in whatever way is needed, in whatever way we can.

In the hope that knowing this might serve to ease your worries a bit...

CapnK and the CrewDogs (...and, I'd bet, pretty much the whole sailFar community. :) )

[s/v Faith]

Absolutely.

I'm writing this post I would think for most everyone here:

To the whole family: CJ & L, Traveler and Tehani -

Keep this in mind:

You won't be going through this alone; neither before, during, or even after the storm.

You can be assured of that.

We are and will be keeping you in our hearts and thoughts, and will be standing by, ready to 'get on deck' at any time, to help y'all in whatever way is needed, in whatever way we can.

In the hope that knowing this might serve to ease your worries a bit...

CapnK and the CrewDogs (...and, I'd bet, pretty much the whole sailFar community. :) )

[Captain Smollett]

And let's not forget all of our other Texas area members...Grime is one that comes to mind but I know there are others.

[Godot]

I always get a knot in my stomach when I hear about major hurricanes.  Best of luck to everyone in Ike's path.

[Shipscarver]

As CapnK said,

You won't be going through this alone; neither before, during, or even after the storm.
You can be assured of that.

Count me in too.

I hope all goes well.
As an aside, I was supprised today. We are way to the side of the storm, but our high tide here in Tampa Bay was as high as I can remember. Several residential areas in St. Petersburg had 2-3 foot of sea water in the streets. No heavy rains, just extra-high tide.

[Shipscarver]

I just caught the forecast:  100+ MPH winds and a 20 foot tidal centered on Galveston due in at Midnight (plus or minus 2 hours) Friday night. They are giving an unprecedented warning, "those who do not evacuate will face certain death," for Galveston Island and environs.  . I have never heard that warning before, and I have lived through hurricanes and trop storms for almost seven decades.
CharlieJ (et al.) - Get the HELP out of there!

[CharlieJ]

Grime had the bus out of  POC yesterday morning. They were prepping to haul Miss Froggie then as we were leaving aboard Tehani.

Tehani is safely anchored out in the center of a small bay with 4 anchors and some 250 feet of rode (or more) on each. Two of those anchors are from my 35 foot trimaran, so are well overkill for Tehani- which is good. Looking good for our area- seems the storm is turning and we'll (hopefully) not be in the dirty side.

We are safely up NW of Houston at Laura's folks place. We may lose power but we have two motor homes here both with generators and we have the kerosene stove from Tehani along.

[CharlieJ]

We are seeing live feeds from Galveston helicopters. Waves are already breaking over the 17 foot tall seawall. At each end where the seawall ends, houses already have waves breaking under them.

They are now stating that the entire island will be flooded. The WHOLE island! This storm is going to be a disaster for Galveston. Surfside, sw of Galveston is flooding. I suspect everything between Port O'Conner and Port Arthur will have flooding to some extent POrt O'Conner is down where we live. I doubt it'll bother our house or my shop now that the storm has moved further east.

This is a MASSIVE sucker though and is going to cause BILLIONS in damage.

I'll post from here as I can.

[AdriftAtSea]

Charlie-

Take care of yourself, and thanks for keeping us updated.  It sounds like you have Tehani as well protected as anything can be given the conditions down there.