Did You Feel It?
A 5.8 magnitude earthquake with it's epicenter in Virginia rattled folks here in New England just before 2PM...did you feel it? I happened to be in the car driving to work and had no idea! It's pretty remarkable that we were able to feel the quake this far away but we did for a couple of reasons. One was that it was a shallow quake meaning that it was near the earth's surface and energy didn't disperse deep in the crust. But most importantly, the composition of the East Coast ground is mostly bedrock...like cement...and energy released from an earthquake can travel farther than thru the ground on the West Coast which is much more porous.
Now to Irene...a little dry air poked into the center this afternoon and weakened the system ever so slightly but she seems to be overcoming that now and flaring back up with some impressive thunderstorm growth...the next advisory may show this, if not then the one after that. Irene is near the Turks & Caicos and through our WeatherBug Network has produced a wind gust of 107mph at Turtle Cove Marina. Irene will still likely become a major hurricane (CAT 3 or greater) as it approaches the SE US late in the week. The official track continues to nudge East...now making a landfall near the Outer Banks of North Carolina...then hugs the East Coast and remains a hurricane near Atlantic City, NJ early Sunday. If this track and intensity from the Hurricane Center holds, and judging by the Spaghetti Charts and upper level winds, or lack there of, we should be dealing with Tropical Storm or maybe even minimal Hurricane conditions later Sunday. This means that flooding rain would be possible, damaging wind gusts with numerous power outages and perhaps some structural damage and storm surge for south-facing harbors and inlets especially. Is this set in stone...obviously no, the storm is still 5 days away and shifts can happen and likely will but at this point I have to throw the worst case scenarios out there. If you have marine interests you probably already have a plan...if you don't make one...you may need to exercise it.
