If you think this sounds like the plot of a cold-war era spy flick, well, you’re not wrong…
A mysterious 12-foot Soviet buoy washed ashore on Dania Beach in southern Florida following Hurricane Irma, the Sun Sentinel reports, mystifying authorities who have struggled to explain where it came from, or how it ended up in Florida.
Their best guess: The buoy was knocked loose by Irma and floated the 350 miles from Cuba to Florida.
As the Sun Sentinel notes, the buoy looks like it belongs in a James Bond movie. “?????????????? ????” - which the Library of Congress says is Russian for Hydrometrical Service of the USSR - is painted in black on its side.
The first word is an abbreviation for “Gidrometricheskaia,” which means “water-measuring,” like an instrument that measures water temperature, movement and depth, he said. Some Russian-language experts translate it as “Hydrometeorological,” referring to a branch of meteorology involving the study of water in the atmosphere.
Workers at Dr. Von D. Mizell-Eula Johnson State Park pulled the buoy off the beach just days after Hurricane Irma swept through town. It almost immediately drew the attention of the Coast Guard, which tried to seize the buoy from the park.
According to the Sun Sentinel, Bill Moore, the park’s maintenance mechanic, spotted the buoy at the same time as the Coast Guard. He told the paper that his first thought was “You don’t find that too often.”
Officials from an administrative Coast Guard building located right next to the park tried to seize the buoy, but Moore retrieved it before they could take it. The buoy was too heavy to budge, so Moore tied a rope around it and with a skid-steer loader dragged it up the embankment and then brought it to the office’s parking lot.
“They tried to confiscate it.”
Robert Molleda, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, said the buoy could have come from Cuba, given the geographical proximity.
“In Irma, the storm came from the south-southeast. And in a storm like that, something could get dislodged,” he said. “It could go adrift and easily wind up in Florida.”
Since the buoy showed up, strange things have been happening at the park, according to one employee. At one point, a group of men claiming to work for the Navy investigative team came to inspect the buoy and offered to haul it away, but never returned.
“I said, ‘leave your business card,’” but the men left — without leaving a card — and haven’t returned.
We expect that it will be appended to the Russia collusion narrative by Monday.
The National Weather Service reported that a crane has collapsed in Miami as strong wind from Hurricane Irma blows in. The weather service’s Miami office said in a Tweet that one of its employees witnessed the crane boom and counterweight collapse in downtown Miami. The employee captured video of the collapse.
The crane fell onto a high-rise building that"s under construction. It"s in a bayfront area filled with hotels and high-rise condo and office buildings, near AmericanAirlines Arena. According to AP, Miami-Dade County Director of Communications Mike Hernandez said emergency personnel couldn"t immediately respond to the scene because of high winds. Authorities urged people to avoid the area after the Sunday morning collapse. It wasn"t clear if there were any injuries. Miami City Manager Daniel Alfonso said the approximately two-dozen other cranes in the city are still upright and built to withstand significant wind gusts.
The cranes were thought to be able to withstand the direct hit of a Category 4 hurricane, however, Irma"s winds in Miami are just at the Category 1 level. About 25 cranes remained up before the storm approached South Florida.
It wasn’t immediately clear if the collapse caused damage or injuries.
The boom of the crane snapped off and is currently still connected to the tower, but is hanging off the side of the building. "All we care about is the safety of everyone right now," the building"s developer, PMG, said in a statement. "We will have a crew over to secure the crane as soon as the weather permits."
As reported previously, the cranes have been a concern even though construction sites across Irma’s potential path in Florida were locked down to remove or secure building materials, tools and debris that could be flung by Irma’s winds.
But the horizontal arms of the tall tower cranes remained loose despite the potential danger of collapse. According to city officials, it would have taken about two weeks to move the cranes and there wasn’t enough time.
With just hours left until landfall, sometime on Sunday morning, Hurricane Irma is edging ever closer to Florida and has started to batter the state with Hurricane force winds as millions brace for the impact of the most powerful Atlantic storm in a decade.
According to ABC and AP, the National Weather Service measured a 74-mph gust in the Florida Keys on Saturday night, marking the beginning of hurricane-force winds that forecasters say will steadily intensify in the coming hours.
As of about 10 p.m. Saturday, Irma was 100 miles southeast of Key West with sustained winds of 125 mph. It was moving west, and is expected to turn north and head up the western coast of Florida, making landfall on Sunday.
Hurricane Irma approached Florida, Sept. 9, 2017.
A live feed tracking the hurricane is shown below, courtesy of ABC:
The National Hurricane Center on Friday cautioned that Irma"s winds would likely be strong enough to uproot trees, bring down power poles and rip off the roofs and some exterior walls of well-built frame homes. "Obviously Hurricane Irma continues to be a threat that is going to devastate the United States," Brock Long, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), said at a press conference Friday morning. "We"re going to have a couple rough days."
Several counties and cities in south Florida have issued a curfew as the storm draws near. Broward County set a curfew for 4 p.m. Saturday and said no unauthorized vehicles will be allowed on the roads. Charlotte County and the City of Miami Beach will enter one later tonight. Palm Beach County has issued a curfew to prevent looting and other criminal activity as the storm approaches, according to a press release. The curfew goes into effect Saturday at 3 p.m. It is unclear when it will be lifted.
Some 10,000 flights have been cancelled in anticipation of Irma, about 7,000 of them in Florida alone.
Florida Gov. Rick Scott called the storm unprecedented. "This is a life-threatening situation," Florida Gov. Rick Scott said Saturday. "Our state has never seen anything like it." The governor stressed the dangers of what he called a "deadly, deadly, deadly storm surge."
President Trump tweeted a video from a Cabinet meeting Saturday, telling people to "get out of" Irma"s way. "Property is replaceable but lives are not. and safety has to come first. Don"t worry about it, get out of its way," Trump said.
Meteorologists from ABC News are forecasting storm surges of 10 feet in Tampa and Sarasota, and 10 to 15 feet from Fort Myers to Naples. Somewhat lower storm surges of 3 to 6 feet may occur from Miami to Key Largo. Winds were already picking up in Florida early Saturday, with gusts between 40 and 60 mph, as the following clip shows:
Hurricane-force winds with gusts over 115 mph are possible in the Keys by daybreak Sunday. More tornadoes are also likely and a tornado watch was issued Saturday for southern Florida.
According to ABC, Florida state residents should anticipate days-long power outages, FEMA said. Ahead of Irma"s arrival in the Sunshine State, the last flights departed Friday night from Miami International Airport and Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. Miami"s airport officially remains open, while Fort Lauderdale"s airport is closed for Saturday and Sunday. Meanwhile, many ATM machines across southwest Florida were out of cash by late Friday night after people stocked up in case Hurricane Irma causes power outages that make debit and credit card transactions impossible, the Associated Press reported.
Meanwhile, as millions evacuate, Germain Arena, a large shelter between Naples and Fort Myers along Florida"s west coast, is already at capacity Saturday as hundreds of people were in line waiting to get in. Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos A. Giménez said Saturday morning about 25,000 residents are sheltered in Miami-Dade alone, a number he called "unprecedented in our history."
Traffic streaming out of Florida creeps along northbound Interstate 75 after a vehicle accident in Lake Park, Ga., Sept. 6, 2017.
"We must remain vigilant," Giménez said. "The storm will still strengthen ... and we will be impacted."
In what spokesman Michael Hernandez describes as "the biggest evacuation in history," Miami-Dade has expanded its mandatory evacuations orders to Zone C, forcing over 650,000 to leave Florida in a "traffic nightmare" as Cat-5 Hurricane Irma bears down.
The expansion now covers Zone B, which encompasses Brickell, Miami’s downtown area and South-Dade, including parts of Cutler Bay, Florida City and Homestead. Evacuation orders also touch Zone C, which includes parts of Coral Gables, South Miami, Miami Shores and North Miami Beach.
More than 650,000 residents are reportedly subject to the mandatory evacuation order – that’s up from the 200,000 who were asked to leave to areas outside of evacuation Zones A and B, Wednesday.
"There was no gas and it"s gridlock. People are stranded on the sides of the highway," she said.
"It"s 92 degrees out and little kids are out on the grass on the side of the road. No one can help them."
Irma"s eventual path and Florida"s fate depends on when and how sharp the powerful hurricane takes a right turn, National Weather Service Director Louis Uccellini said.
"It has become more likely that Irma will make landfall in southern Florida as a dangerous major hurricane," the Hurricane Center said in a forecast discussion Thursday afternoon.
The last Category 5 storm to hit Florida was Andrew in 1992. Its winds topped 165 mph (265 kph), killing 65 people and inflicting $26 billion in damage. It was at the time the most expensive natural disaster in U.S. history.
U.S. Air Force Reserve weather officer Maj. Jeremy DeHart flew through the eye of Irma at 10,000 feet Wednesday and through Hurricane Harvey just before it hit Texas last month.
He said Irma"s intensity set it apart from other storms.
"Spectacular is the word that keeps coming to mind. Pictures don"t do it justice. Satellite images can"t do it justice," DeHart said.
Scientists have confirmed what one renowned weather forecaster has suspected for days: Hurricane Harvey was a “1-in-1,000-year flood.”
That’s according to researchers at the University of Wisconsin’s Space Science and Engineering Center, who claim there is nothing in the historical record that rivals the devastation resulting from the flooding in southwest Texas, which has forced more than 30,000 Texans into temporary shelters.
“There is nothing in the historical record that rivals this, according to Shane Hubbard, the Wisconsin researcher who made and mapped this calculation. “In looking at many of these events [in the United States], I’ve never seen anything of this magnitude or size,” he said. “This is something that hasn’t happened in our modern era of observations.”
Of course, one reason for this might be that the modern urban environment is covered in concrete and asphalt, which makes it impossible for floodwater to absorb into the ground, exacerbating the disaster.
Hubbard’s calculations, which he shared with the Washington Post, only accentuate the massive scale of the flooding.
At least 20 inches of rain fell over an area (nearly 29,000 square miles) larger than 10 states, including West Virginia and Maryland (by a factor of more than two).
At least 30 inches of rain fell over an area (more than 11,000 square miles) equivalent to Maryland’s size.
To that, we’d like to add the nearly 52 inches of rain recorded by the National Weather Service in Cedar Bayou, Texas, which broke the continental U.S. record.
Making matters worse, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) has just updated its forecast for what it is now referring to as a "rapidly intensifying" Category 2 hurricane in the Eastern Atlantic Ocean. Some models see the storm making landfall in Florida, while others see it landing somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico, meaning that another powerful storm could ravage Texas just two weeks after Hurricane Harvey, leaving locals little time to recover.
Emergency workers and rescue crews in Houston have been overwhelmed overnight with calls for water rescues, having responded to “hundreds” as of early Sunday, the Houston Chronicle is reporting, as Harvey, the most powerful storm to hit the state in more than 50 years, roared inland. According to the Houston newspaper, five people are now reported dead in Houston as Tropical Storm Harvey has dumped up to 30 inches of rain.
“It’s catastrophic, unprecedented, epic — whatever adjective you want to use,” Patrick Blood, a National Weather Service meteorologist, told the Chronicle. “It’s pretty horrible right now.” The newspaper reported the weather service said five people have died in the Houston area in unconfirmed flood-related deaths.
As the Statesman puts it: "It was supposed to be bad. It wasn’t supposed to be this bad."
A tweet from executive weather producer at the Weather Channel, Matthew Sitkowski, summarized the situation best: "surreal."
Underscoring the severity of the storm, moments ago president Trump tweeted "Wow - Now experts are calling #Harvey a once in 500 year flood! We have an all out effort going, and going well!"
Wow - Now experts are calling #Harvey a once in 500 year flood! We have an all out effort going, and going well!
In its latest bulletin, the National Weather Service similarly did not mince words, saying this morning that "catastrophic flooding is ongoing with flash flood emergencies in effect. The threat for continued additional, catastrophic, unprecedented and life threatening flooding continues today and into next week with periods of heavy rain from bands coming off the Gulf. Flash Flood Watches and Warnings are currently in effect for all of southeast Texas."
NWS computer models show continued rounds of thunderstorms spawned by Harvey, which has been downgraded from a hurricane to tropical storm. Blood said the Houston area can expect at least an additional 15 to 25 inches over the next few days.
Thunderstorms pummeled this city overnight Saturday as Tropical Storm Harvey stalled out again, dropping more nearly two feet of rain in some residential neighborhoods, which triggered widespread flooding that is already blamed for five deaths. To the south, it was even worse. More than two feet of rain fell at the National Weather Center’s Houston office in League City, about 30 miles south of Houston proper. Emergency responders turned swamped freeway overpasses into ramps to launch rescue boats, Houston Chronicle reporter Dug Begley tweeted early Sunday morning.
Texas governor Greg Abbott told Fox News that damage from Harvey will be in the billions of dollars statewide. President Donald Trump took to Twitter this morning to say, “I will be going to Texas as soon as that trip can be made without causing disruption. The focus must be life and safety.”
Some neighborhoods have been hit with more than 15 inches of rain, the Chronicle reported, forcing some residents to flee to their attics, especially along Interstate 45 between downtown and Clear Lake, including parts of Pasadena. One resident described seeing a woman’s body floating in the streets during a flash flood in the same western part of the city. The flash floods were several feet high, the resident told local TV station abc13.
A mobile park is destroyed in the Coast Bend area on Saturday in Port Aransas, Texas
According to Reuters, Houston’s William P. Hobby Airport canceled all inbound and outbound flights early on Sunday due to standing water on the runway. The airport said its arrivals area was flooded, and the National Weather Service issued a flash flood alert for the surrounding area. Authorities have urged residents to stay off the streets of Houston and other southeast Texas cities as rain falling at up to 5 inches per hour flooded roads and major intersections.
The storm has killed at least two people and Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez said on Twitter the death toll could rise, with his deputies responding to reports of a deceased woman and child inside a submerged vehicle on Interstate 10 near Houston.
On Friday night, a man died in a house fire in the town of Rockport, 30 miles (48 km) north of Corpus Christi. Another dozen people in the area suffered injuries including broken bones, another official said.
The Harris County Joint Information center said first responders were conducting hundreds of rescues early on Sunday morning.
Gonzalez’ Twitter feed was inundated by residents asking for help. The sheriff could only tell some of them that crews were doing the best they can. “All agencies care but everyone simply operating at maximum capacity,” he tweeted at one point.
Some in Houston have climbing into attics to flee rising flood waters, the Houston Chronicle also reported . “Have reports of people getting into attic to escape flood waters,” tweeted Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo, Austin’s previous police chief. “Do not do so unless you have an ax or means to break through onto your roof.” Those reports were coming from areas along Interstate 45 between downtown Houston and Clear Lake, the Chronicle reported.
Early Sunday, sheriff Gonzalez tweeted that there were reports of several submerged vehicles on Interstate 10 at Lathrop and added that, while it was unconfirmed, crews were investigating reports that one of the vehicles possibly had a deceased woman and child inside.
Harvey slammed into Texas late Friday as a Category 4 hurricane with winds of 130 miles per hour (210 km per hour), making it the strongest storm to hit the state since 1961. It has since lingered over the state, dumping amounts of rain that threaten to break the record established nearly 40 years ago when Alvin, Texas, was deluged by 43 inches of rain in 24 hours from July 24-25, 1979.
The storm has ripped off roofs, snapped trees, triggered tornadoes and flash floods and had cut off power to nearly 230,000 people on Saturday night. Houston police officials said officers were evacuating two flooded apartment complexes. Oil and gas production was largely halted in the state, prompting price hikes at the pumps.
“There are a number of stranded people on our streets, calling 911, exhausting needed resources. You can help by staying off the streets,” Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said on Twitter.
Officials here have reported performing at least 1,000 high-water rescues with thousands more needed as homes were inundated by the water. The 911 system here was so overwhelmed that officials begged Houstonians to only use it if they were in immediate danger.
The weather forecast shows no reprieve in sight for this city and county of 4.5 million people. Rain, including more torrential downpours, remains in the forecast for the rest of today.
* * *
Even though Harvey was downgraded to a tropical storm on Saturday, it is expected to lash Texas for days as it heads inland, according to the National Hurricane Center (NHC), which described the forecast for the state as potentially “catastrophic.” The coastal town of Rockport took a direct hit from the storm, leaving streets flooded and strewn with power lines and debris on Saturday. A dozen recreational vehicles were flipped over on a sales lot, one blown into the middle of the street. A convoy of military vehicles arrived in the Rockport area on Saturday to help in the recovery efforts, and town officials announced an overnight curfew for residents.
Daylight shows the devastation in Rockport and surrounding areas of southeast Texas,
“It was terrible,” resident Joel Valdez, 57, told Reuters. The storm ripped part of the roof from his trailer home at around 4 a.m., he said as he sat in a Jeep with windows smashed by the storm. “I could feel the whole house move.”
Before the storm hit, Rockport’s mayor told anyone staying behind to write their names on their arms for identification in case of death or injury. A high school, hotel, senior housing complex and other buildings suffered structural damage.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott said he was activating 1,800 members of the military to help with the statewide cleanup, while 1,000 people would conduct search-and-rescue operations. The Texas Department of Criminal Justice said it was forced to evacuate about 4,500 inmates from three state prisons near the Brazos River because of rising water.
A destroyed apartment complex in Rockport, TX
Meanwhile, the U.S. Coast Guard said it had rescued 20 people from distressed vessels on Saturday, and was monitoring two Carnival Corp cruise ships carrying thousands of people stranded in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico. Authorities warned of the potentially life-threatening impact of heavy rains between Houston and Corpus Christi over the next several days, with the latest forecast saying Harvey could loop back toward the Gulf of Mexico coast before turning north again on Tuesday.
"This rain will lead to a prolonged, dangerous, and potentially catastrophic flooding event well into next week," the National Weather Service said.
In a Sunday morning tweetstorm, instead of taking shots at his political opponents, president Trump assured people on the ground that government support is on the ground: "Many people are now saying that this is the worst storm/hurricane they have ever seen. Good news is that we have great talent on the ground." He added that "I will be going to Texas as soon as that trip can be made without causing disruption. The focus must be life and safety."
I will be going to Texas as soon as that trip can be made without causing disruption. The focus must be life and safety.
In what may be his most vocal complaint aimed at the Republican party since the Trump presidential victory, prominent conservative voice Matt Drudge on Tuesday accused the GOP of "lying" about wanting tax cuts, and asked to "get his vote back."
BTW, Republicans lied about wanting tax cuts. Can we get our votes back?
Delays surrounding the repeal of Obamacare, which as Goldman earlier said will likely be postponed by several months if not longer following the controversial CBO report, will asure significant delays with the implementation of Trump tax cuts. Furthermore, the Republican healthcare plan would repeal most of ObamaCare"s taxes: a prospect that looks increasingly distant. Earlier this month, the Joint Committee on Taxation released estimates showing the repeal and delay of many of ObamaCare"s taxes in the GOP healthcare plan would result in more than $500 billion in lost federal revenue.
The Trump team"s reform plan "will reduce the tax rate on our companies so they can compete and thrive anywhere and with anyone," the president said during an address to a joint session of Congress. He also said the plan "will provide massive tax relief for the middle class."
In a separate tweet, Drudge also questioned the National Weather Service in light of Tuesday"s snowstorm.
"Lots of misses piling up. Overreaction by govts, bad forecasting very troubling trend!" he tweeted adding that "Trump should clear out climate hysterics from NWS. All storms grossly exaggerated. National Guard called for 3 inches? JFK closed? Laughable."
What is going on with National Weather Service? Lots of misses piling up. Overreaction by govts, bad forecasting very troubling trend!!
US carriers have grounded 1,796 flights today, and 3,384 tomorrow - numbers which keep constantly rising - as Winter Storm Stella approaches the U.S. Northeast, according to FlightAware.com.
Chicago is bearing the largest share of Monday"s cancellations, while Tuesday"s disruptions are hitting hardest from Washington to Boston including the New York City area, AP adds. The major airlines are waiving ticket-change fees that range up to $200 for customers who want to change their travel plans. Restrictions vary by airline.
Southwest has canceled more than 300 flights for Monday and nearly another 900 scheduled for Tuesday, according to FlightAware. American Airlines and its American Eagle contractor Envoy Air together had canceled more than 300 flights Monday and 700 on Tuesday. JetBlue Airways, with major operations in Boston and New York, had already canceled more than 600 flights scheduled for Tuesday, FlightAware said.
The weather system may dump as much as 20 inches (51 centimeters) of snow from Connecticut to Long Island, including New York City, according to the National Weather Service. A deep freeze is poised to linger in the Northeast after the storm passes, sending Boston’s low to 14 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 10 Celsius) on March 16, 17 below average, AccuWeather Inc. data show
Meanwhile, as the blizzard bears down on the Eastern Seaboard, natural gas futures rose to one-month highs on speculation that demand for the heating fuel will surge during the storm, shrinking a supply glut, Bloomberg reports.
The late-winter cold blast is giving gas bulls a break after a warm start to the season sent the market plunging to an eight-month low earlier in the year. While gas stockpiles are still above normal for this time of year, frigid conditions could erode the surplus and stave off another price collapse before the summer.
“It’s not just tomorrow’s storm, but the forecast going out to late March that should be supportive for prices,” said Bob Yawger, director of the futures division at Mizuho Securities USA in New York. “But we’re coming to the end of the season, and storage is pretty healthy.”
While gas futures for April delivery rose 1.2%, to $3.044 per mmBTU at after earlier reaching $3.089, the highest since Feb. 10, gas is still down 18 percent this year, the worst performer among major commodities. However, a look at spot prices for NYC nat gas shows a much bigger spike, which is to be expected as the region will be most affected by the coming weather.
Of course, once the weather system passes later this week, expect a similar and just as sharp drop in prices.
Update: according to an update posted moments ago by the Nevada Weather Service in Reno, the Flash Flood Warning has been canceled as the water has receded in the Dayton Retention Pond and it is no longer expected to fail.
4:25 PM UPDATE: Lyon County Emergency Management - water has receded in the Dayton Retention Pond and it is no longer expected to fail. pic.twitter.com/IetvjiH3AH
It appears another damn dam is failing. After earlier issuing a flash flood warning, Reno Weather Service warned residents "This is not a drill" as County Emergency Managers noted a Dam Retention Pond is full and overflowing into drainages.
