Watch Page for Hurricane Rita

The purpose of this page is to provide some resources for tracking Hurricane Rita. The first part contains information for the general public, including links and resources to official sources of information. The rest of the information is quite technical, and includes some links that I find interesting for watching the various aspects of the storm.

Links in green are pages and resources that I have created and maintain.

Official Warning Information

•     National Hurricane Center 

•     National Weather Service

•     Local NWS Offices of areas that may be affected

  •     Houston/Galveston, TX

  •     Corpus Christi, TX

  •     Lake Charles, LA

  •     New Orleans, LA

  •     Brownsville, TX

  •     Miami, FL

  •     Key West, FL

Alternate Warning Information

•       Interactive Weather Information Network    use the text option if you have a slow connection

General Information about Landfall Hazards

•     Hurricane Maps and Evacuation Info from the Texas Department of Public Safety

•     Galveston County Office of Emergency Management

•     Harris County Office of Emergency Management  

•    

•     Louisiana Evacuation Routes and contraflow instructions     from the Louisiana State Police 

•     Florida County Surge Maps and Evacuation Routes    from www.FloridaDisaster.org

•     Inland Wind Model And The Maximum Envelope Of Winds (MEOW)   

•     Other Hazard Maps (for the entire nation)

Media Reports

AP Breaking News (from Tampa Bay Online)

Technical Information

Aircraft Reconnaissance Data

•     NHC/TPC Aircraft Recon

•     Most recent vortex message                                             

•     All vortex reports for Rita         (also updates every 30 minutes)

•     Recon data archive                          (updates every 30 minutes on the hour and half hour) 

Model Guidance

•      Model Guidance Products             Plots of storm track and intensity from various numerical models and forecast aids

•      Experimental forecast Tropical Cyclone Genesis Potential Fields     Model fields from various global and hurricane models -- from Florida State University

HRD Research Products

•     Wind Field Analyses

•     Current Hurricane Data Sets

Satellite Imagery and Derived Products

•     NHC Satellite Page

•     NRL Monterey Tropical Cyclone Page  

•     CIMSS Tropical Cyclone Page

  •     CIMSS Shear Analysis    Shear Tendency

  •     Objective Dvorak Intensity Estimates for Rita        AODT Time series

  •     UW-CIMSS AMSU Homepage   

•     Satellite Imagery Viewers from NASA GHCC

•     RAMSDIS Online

  •     Tropical RAMSDIS Online

  •     Rapid Scan Operations

•     MODIS Image Gallery of Recent Storms

Radar Imagery

•     Radar data page of NCAR-RAP Real-Time Weather Page

•     National Weather Service Radar Page

  • Slidell, LA (KLIX) Radar Loop

  • Lake Charles, LA (KLCH) Radar Loop            Extended BR Loop from Weathertap (Subscription required)

  • Houston/Galveston (KHGX) Radar Loop         Extended BR Loop from Weathertap (Subscription required)

  • Corpus Christi, TX (KCRP) Radar Loop

  • Miami, FL (KAMX) Radar Loop

  • Key West, FL (KBYX) Radar Loop

•     Cuban Radars

•     Mexican Radars

Ocean Heat Content and Current Sea Surface Temperatures

•     JHU/APL AVHRR Home Page                           

•     Maximum Potential Intensity           

•     Tropical Cyclone Heat Potential

  •     Atlantic Basin Overview   

  •     Gulf of Mexico

  •     Caribbean

   

•      NRL Real Time Ocean Environment - MODAS

  •     North Atlantic Basin   

    •     Sea Surface Temperature        Anomaly

     

  •     Gulf of Mexico   

    •     Sea Surface Temperature        Anomaly

    •     Temperature at 50 m           

Surface Observations

•     Surface Observations from the Texas Gulf Coast (UCAR-RAP)

•     Surface Observations for Central Gulf Coast (UCAR/RAP)

•     Surface Observations for Florida (UCAR/RAP)

•     CO-OPS Storm Surge Live Web Site

•     NOAA Buoy Observations for the Texas Area   

•     NOAA Buoy Observations for the Florida Area

The following surface observations courtesy of the RAP-UCAR Weather page. Use the map below to find the ICAO identifiers.

•     Enter 4-letter ICAO identifier(s):
  
  most recent only past 1 hour past 2 hours past 3 hours past 4 hours past 5 hours past 6 hours past 12 hours past 18 hours past 24 hours past 30 hours past 36 hours last 42 hours past 48 hours past 54 hours past 60 hours
  Raw   Translated
    

News and tips from the media

•     MSN Money - 10 after-the-disaster do's and don'ts
•     MSN Money - Would Your Home Survive a Natural Disaster