Hurricane Laura rapidly intensified into a major hurricane during the overnight hours.\u00a0 At 8:00 a.m. EDT on Wednesday the center of Hurricane Laura was located at latitude 26.4\u00b0N and longitude 91.4\u00b0W which put it about 280 miles (450 km) south-southeast of Lake Charles, Louisiana.\u00a0 Laura was moving toward the northwest at 15 m.p.h. (24 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 115 m.p.h. (185 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 140 m.p.h. (225 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 963 mb.<\/p>\n
A Hurricane Warning was in effect for the portion of the coast from San Luis, Pass, Texas to Intracoastal City, Lousiana.\u00a0 Tropical Storm Warnings were in effect for the portions of the coast from Sargent, Texas to San Luis Pass and from Intracoastal City to the Mouth of the Mississippi River.<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Hurricane Laura strengthened rapidly over the warm water in the Central Gulf of Mexico during the overnight hours.\u00a0 An eye with a diameter of 30 miles (50 km) formed at the center of Laura.\u00a0 A ring of strong thunderstorms surrounded the eye and the strongest winds were occurring in that ring of storms.\u00a0 Bands of showers and thunderstorms were revolving around the core of Hurricane Laura.\u00a0\u00a0 Storms near the core were generating strong upper level divergence which was pumping large quantities of mass away from the hurricane in all directions.\u00a0 The removal of mass allowed the surface pressure to decrease quickly, which caused Laura to rapidly intensify.<\/p>\n The size of the circulation around Hurricane Laura also increased during the overnight hours.\u00a0 Winds to hurricane force extended out 70 miles (110 km) from the center of circulation).\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extended out 175 miles (280 km) from the center.\u00a0 The Hurricane Intensity Index (HII) for Hurricane Laura was 20.6.\u00a0 The Hurricane Size Index (HSI) was 19.1 and the Hurricane Wind Intensity Size Index (HWISI) was 39.7.\u00a0 Hurricane Laura was capable of causing widespread major damage.<\/p>\n Hurricane Laura will continue to move through an environment favorable for intensification today.\u00a0 Laura will move over water where the Sea Surface Temperature is near 30\u00b0C.\u00a0 It will move through a region where the upper level winds are weak and there will little vertical wind shear.\u00a0 Hurricane Laura could strengthen to Category 4 on the Saffir-Simpson Scale.\u00a0 When Hurricane Laura approaches the coast it will get closer to an upper level trough over Texas and Oklahoma.\u00a0 The trough will produce southwesterly winds which will blow toward the top of Laura.\u00a0 Those winds will cause some vertical wind shear and Hurricane Laura could start to weaken just before it makes landfall.<\/p>\n Hurricane Laura will move around the western end of a subtropical high pressure system that extends from the Atlantic Ocean over the Gulf of Mexico.\u00a0 Laura will move toward the north-northwest as it approaches the western end of the high.\u00a0 On its anticipated track Hurricane Laura will make landfall near the border between Louisiana and Texas tonight.<\/p>\n Hurricane Laura will be capable of causing major damage over western Louisiana and eastern Texas.\u00a0 Strong winds could cause widespread power outages.\u00a0 Wind blowing water toward the coast will cause a storm surge of 10 to 15 feet (3 to 5 meters) near and to the east of where the center makes landfall.\u00a0 Laura will drop locally heavy rain when it moves inland and flash floods could occur in some locations.<\/p>\n The wind speed in Hurricane Laura will be similar to the winds in Hurricane Harvey when Harvery made landfall on the coast of Texas in 2017.\u00a0 Laura will be bigger than Harvey was.\u00a0 The winds in Hurricane Laura could be stronger than the winds were in Hurricane Rita when Rita hit the same area in 2005.\u00a0 However, Rita had intensified to Category 5 on the Saffir-Simpson Scale, but it was weakening when it made landfall.\u00a0 Laura will not be as big as Rita was in 2005.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hurricane Laura rapidly intensified into a major hurricane during the overnight hours.\u00a0 At 8:00 a.m. EDT on Wednesday the center of Hurricane Laura was located at latitude 26.4\u00b0N and longitude 91.4\u00b0W which put it about 280 miles (450 km) south-southeast of Lake Charles, Louisiana.\u00a0 Laura was moving toward the northwest at 15 m.p.h. (24 km\/h).\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2],"tags":[528,527,1681,791,2170,650,1775,2160,113,112],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10194"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10194"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10194\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10195,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10194\/revisions\/10195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}