Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Yep, in Westlake, La. which stands for west side of "Lake" Charles. I will give "blow by blow" (pun). Have spent the last 2 days getting things in order and stowed. Built this house after Rita and it has all the code required clips but this will be first test. We are secluded with only Sam Houston Park as our across river neighbor so no houses or neighbors. We lost 80% of our forest in Rita. Main house is on the bluff 25' MSL with a generator and have 3 familys here for the night. We have structures in the flood plain and will post some pics as it unfolds. Gonna' be a long night. Moderator, move to the lounge if needed but S/SS is my peeps. What is odd, we are in a bird sanctuary and not a bird anywhere. Also at daybreak the rain frogs were singing. Current conditions is breezy, hot and a ghost town. Stephen Hebert aka Spyphish aka PANHEMIC. See you at Indy LOL

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Don't wait to long to get your *** out of there. I'm sure you are well insured but you don't want your wife getting your life insurance quite yet.
Good luck and stay safe.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Physh,
The birds know the drill. Stay safe our friend.
Frank

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

That was quick, first baby feeder, BOOM transformer behind shop blew. Big generator fired as designed. So we have power. We are 28 miles inland but this surge is going to hurt a lot of people south of us. Eyewall in my driveway scary.....SLH

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Stephen, do what you need to do and get out before it all comes crashing down on you. Keep all you friends and family safe. Let things happen that are going to happen and see what is left afterward. Hopefully you won't loose much. We will all say prayers for the people in your area.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Best wishes to you and all down there, reports show the surges to be worse than Katrina. Stay safe!!

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Just talked to my friend Quincy Procell in Orange,TX , probably 30 miles west of you. He stated that at this point leaving is not possible because of traffic. He and his wife are in their 70's and are going to need to ride it out. Crossing my fingers for all in the path

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

National Weather Service just called the storm surge unsurvivable if you're in an evacuation area . Up to 20 feet.Good luck.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Best of luck. Hang on it will be a long night. Sounds like you are well prepared. Good Job. Most don't understand that you have to leave days in advance to one of these storms. You cant wait until the day of the storm to try and bug out. No fuel and the roads are plugged with traffic. Better to hunker down and ride it out in a safe place. I just saw the storm has been upgraded to a Cat 4 storm. That is wicked.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Best wishes, good luck and prayers. Now while we don't have flood experience, we do have too much experience as far as losing power, even in nothing wind/rain storms. If you want to try and save some generator fuel, get some blankets, and old timee clothes pins and cover refrigerators and freezers as well as you can.. If you don't need to run it in daylight, about 4 hours is a safe bet.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Good point Mike. I had forgotten that either you leave very early or you just hang on and hope and pray that you make it.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Be well Stephen, as I watch the news tonight I’m thinking of you and yours.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Well folks, I blinked, 10 peeps including 4 grandchildren ages 8 to 17 do not need a night like what I believe is coming as I type. We fled to French Quarters and are all safe. Please pray for those less fortunate as it will be a long dangerous night. We live on the Calcasieu River and have a round roof house that dont like wind. Lots of assets in the flood plain. Before leaving, I went to get 2.5 gals of chainsaw gas and 2 familys looked to be stressed and struggling. Topped 'em off and said good luck. Americans need to pull together. LAWD 2020 Thanks, will not make Indy But have a fast stick car if someone is up to wheeling. Phish

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Skip Loeffler contacted Frito with a nice hard luck award ($$) for an SS/AH car. Hope I don't have to send it to you.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Stay safe Phish and good luck to all down in the bayou.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Stay Safe.. My son lives in Erath. that is pretty close to Larry Meaux .
Hope Larry makes it OK.. My son and his wife (local gal) evacuated north about 30 miles and at a 35Ft MSL.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Eye went right up the driveway. That was hours of bashing from the NE. Probably took out the shop doors. Now it will be hours from SW. That will get the barn and house garage doors. Nice and quite in NOLA. Will get an update as wind allows if Boyd made it thru the night. Keep praying for those who stayed. Stephen

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Report from Boyd who cut his way for 3/4 mile.

GOOD: House, and guest house standing, minor damage. Surge minimal. Race rig & house fine, car barn fine, generator running, blue car still ready for Indy.

BAD: No trees standing except a dead oak, floating boat house roof in pool, boat beached on floating dock remains (totalled), AC units blown off pads, race shop doors and adjoining shed gone. Now a shelter in place chemical leak. Glad we left. That boat house was professionally built with wind brace etc. Data shows 137MPH for hours and we are at the end of a NE/SW river straight-away.

I will take it, get some pics when we can go back

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Great to hear Phish, could have been far worse. The predicted 20 foot storm surge didn’t occur, thank God for that.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Happy everyone's ok!

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Praying for y'all

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

So when the eye of the storm hits the shore, and it is spinning counterclockwise is the storm surge higher on the east side of the eye ? As you said it looks like Lake Charles was in the center of the path. Concerned for friends in Orange TX, slightly west of you. Glad your family is ok

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Yes Dave, the storm surge is higher on the east side of the eye. The front right quadrant of a hurricane is where the strongest winds are.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Storm surge is also relevant to location and geography as well. As Bill stated above the upper right hand quadrant of a hurricane is always the strongest part of the storm and will also contain multiple tornadoes. In our situation where I live our rivers flow east towards the sounds and even if the center passes just to our east it is devastating because the rotation blows all the water from the sounds up the rivers and floods the inland areas. In Florence a couple years ago the eye came from the east and passed south of us and we had the greatest surge of my lifetime, our river house had 10 feet of water under it and the highest I had ever seen was 64 inches.
I hope all my Bayou buddies are safe we've been praying for you all!

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Thanks for the info. Coincidentally James, my brother owns a home near you in Cedar Island, right down the road from the ferry. I understand how it works there, he told me there was less damage from the last one at his place then over by where you are. Good luck to all

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

We were lucky down here. Marco just fell apart, and Laura went to Phish instead of us. We still have wind and rain coming in. In that same track Rita went in 2005 and did lots of damage. By far the worst was Audrey in 1957. My ex brother in law's family lived close to the coast. He lost 6 people when the surge (still don't k now how high) blew the house apart, killed his mother and father, sister and her husband and two others that were riding out the storm there. Never recovered any bodies. Exact path as Laura. Never know what these storms might bring. For Katrina a friend of mine had a large helicopter facility at the mouth of the river. It had a 26 ft roof to park 19 passenger helicopters to service large rigs in the gulf. Found lots of dead fish on the roof. And it looks like Laura might go to Bowling Green.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Here in North Louisiana, we got some wind & rain. LOTS of trees down. LOTS of power lines down. Power not expected to be restored for several days.

The bucket truck guys will be busy for quite a while in this storm's trail of destruction.

My nephew had lots of damage to his place, near Lake Charles. He brought his family up here, which was a REAL good move. A friend of his rode it out & sent him pics of what's left of his stuff. They could have been injured, or worse, had they stayed home.

He said at least he'll get to use the high priced insurance he's been paying for. I suppose living close to an ocean is nice, until a storm comes. I love Cajun music & food, but don't like their hurricanes.

I remember the 1st time I ever heard of Cameron, LA. I was in grammar school, when a big hurricane came thru.

http://hurricanescience.net/history/.../1950s/audrey/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurric...20the%20region.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Adger, Bourgeois talked to Larry Meaux today and all is fine.

Greg

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Wow Dave, it's a small world isn't it! Your brother is at the end of the world down there. You talk about a real quiet place, Cedar Island is it!

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Phish...Glad to hear You and Family are OK . Jake and Elwood knew it was 972 miles to Indy, they had a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it was dark out and they were wearing sunglasses. So they Hit it. Take care...MB.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Curios ? to those that live in the effected areas. How do you feel about the predictions vs the outcome? Are the meteorologists close? Do you thik they have a handle on predicting the forecast?

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Well. they said this one would come inland near Cameron, as a cat 4, then go North thru North LA & Ark, then turn toward the Northeast.

Looks like that's exactly what it did.

They were talkin about possible 15-20' storm surge. Said that may have happened to the East of where the eye came in, but that was marshland where they didn't have measuring equipment. So, I suppose nobody will ever know how high the storm surge was, in that area.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Depends on how you interpret what is said. And, how much you are willing to gamble. Who's to say???

Here in the Houston area, the local news was predicting tons of wind, rain, flooding, and recommended evacuation. A lot of the population took them up on it, and left town. Can't say as I blame them, but we got very little wind or rain. The flip side is, not leaving and the storm hits farther west up the Texas coast and takes out Galveston and the Houston area.

To answer your question: I, personally, think they over dramatize it, but as your Momma taught you - it's better to be safe than sorry.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

We are Houston as well (east side) we prepared for the worst and prayed for the best. We stayed as well barely got any rain nor wind on our side. We did flee when Rita came in, that has been the only storm since 1965 that we have left for, all others we rode out. Keep Generators operable, plenty of non parishable food, a ton of drinking water. Prayers to Spyfhish for a quick cleanup and glad that he and his family are okay.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Bob for the most part the last 10 or 15 years has been a big improvement. Alot of the time they are pretty dead on within the l2 or 3 day range of landfall. My rule of thumb the last few years has been if Jim Cantore shows up within 30 miles of my house I'm getting the hell out of here!

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

As Forrest Gump said, God showed up. He told me to leave and we did. My builder gets a case of wine. Built house right after Rita which was a big thunderstorm compared to this, he put every nail in every HC clip slot. 1 panel of standing seam round roof flapped. House is auwsome. Rest of stuff done!!!! And then Gump said "Thats my boat" Some before after stuff

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Moreaux. Westlake is worse than Lake Charles. LOTS of damage!!! Phish needs a shoe

The fastest AH car on the planet is safe and sound!!!!!! 161.11

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

So on a brighter note Stephen, just think how much beer it is gonna take to put everything back together. So sorry for all the damage but at least everyone is still there and intact. Oh and we just now got some of the lingering rain bands from Laura here in Houston.

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Nothing runs like a Trane!!!! I cant post the pic right now but 2 of the AC units blew off their pads, 1 laid on it side. STILL COOLING!!!! We stood it and wiggled back in place. Amazing. Hade a crane free whats left of the boat and lift boat house Monday. Westlake, La. is leveled!! We are blessed to have a home operating. BUT my blue race car is not in the trailer??? Phish

Re: Live from Indy; I mean LAURA
 

Pray for the people over here. I toured the area for the first time. Disaster ain't the word. We need a new word. 16 deaths, half from improper use of a generator. I say months before power. Lake Charles water plant taken out, no water for weeks. I sent all my family to other relatives out of the area. The bright side plenty of firewood. Phish