Former Tropical Storm Francine strengthened to a hurricane southwest of Louisiana on Tuesday evening.\u00a0 At 11:00 p.m. EDT on Tuesday the center of Hurricane Francine was located at latitude 26.4\u00b0N and longitude 94.3\u00b0W which put the center about 295 miles (475 km) southwest of Morgan City, Louisiana.\u00a0 Francine was moving toward the northeast at 10 m.p.h. (16 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 85 m.p.h. (135 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 100 m.p.h. (160 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 979 mb.<\/p>\n
A Hurricane Warning is in effect for the portion of the coast from the Vermilion\/Cameron Line to Grand Isle, Louisiana<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n A Hurricane Watch is in effect for New Orleans, Lake Pontchartrain and Lake Maurepas.<\/span><\/p>\n A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for the portion of the coast from Sabine Pass to the Vermilion\/Cameron Line, Louisiana.\u00a0 A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for the portion of the coast from Grand Isle, Louisiana to the Alabama\/Florida border.\u00a0 The Tropical Storm Warning includes New Orleans, Lake Pontchartrain and Lake Maurepas.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Reconnaissance aircraft from the U.S. Air Force Reserve and NOAA found that former Tropical Storm Francine had intensified to a hurricane on Tuesday evening.\u00a0 An eye with a diameter of 15 miles (24 km) was at the center of Hurricane Francine.\u00a0 The eye was surrounded by a ring of thunderstorms and the strongest winds were occurring in that ring of storms.\u00a0 Bands of showers and thunderstorms were revolving around the core of Francine’s circulation.\u00a0 Storms near the core generated upper level divergence that pumped more mass away from the hurricane.\u00a0 The removal of more mass caused the surface pressure to decrease more rapidly.<\/p>\n The strongest winds were occurring in the eastern side of Hurricane Francine.\u00a0 Winds to hurricane force extended out 35 miles (55 km) in the eastern side of Francine’s circulation.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extended out 115 miles (185 km) from the center of Hurricane Francine.<\/p>\n Hurricane Francine will move through an environment very favorable for intensification during the next 18 hours.\u00a0 Francine will move over water where the Sea Surface Temperatures are near 30\u00b0C.\u00a0 It will move under the middle of an upper level ridge over the western Gulf of Mexico.\u00a0 The upper level winds are weak near the middle of the ridge and there will be little vertical wind shear.\u00a0 Hurricane Francine will intensify during the next 18 hours.\u00a0 Francine could intensify rapidly at times now that there is an inner core.<\/p>\n Hurricane Francine will move between a high pressure system that extends from the western Atlantic Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico and an upper level trough over the South Central U.S,\u00a0 The high pressure system and the upper level trough will steer Francine toward the northeast during the next 24 hours.\u00a0 On its anticipated track, the center of Hurricane Francine will make landfall on the southeast coast of Louisiana late on Wednesday afternoon.<\/p>\n Hurricane Francine will bring strong winds and heavy rain to Louisiana. \u00a0 Francine will be capable of causing serious damage.\u00a0\u00a0 Widespread outages of electricity are likely.\u00a0 Heavy rain is likely to cause flash floods.\u00a0 Hurricane Francine will also drop heavy rain over parts of Mississippi, South Alabama and Northwest Florida as it moves inland.<\/p>\n Flood Watches are in effect for parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, South Alabama and Northwest Florida.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Hurricane Francine could cause a storm surge of up to 10 feet (3 meters) along parts of the coast of Louisiana.<\/p>\n A Storm Surge Warning is in effect for the portion of the coast from Cameron, Louisiana to the Mississippi\/Alabama border.\u00a0 The Storm Surge Warning includes Vermilion Bay, Lake Pontchartrain and Lake Maurepas.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n A Storm Surge Watch is in effect for the portion of the coast from the Mississippi\/Alabama border to the Alabama\/Florida border.\u00a0 The Storm Surge Watch includes Mobile Bay.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Former Tropical Storm Francine strengthened to a hurricane southwest of Louisiana on Tuesday evening.\u00a0 At 11:00 p.m. EDT on Tuesday the center of Hurricane Francine was located at latitude 26.4\u00b0N and longitude 94.3\u00b0W which put the center about 295 miles (475 km) southwest of Morgan City, Louisiana.\u00a0 Francine was moving toward the northeast at 10 […]<\/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":[154,156,384,2175,51,3704,2050,3709,2269,1213,113,493,3710,1214,716,2678,3708],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21079"}],"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=21079"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21079\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21082,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21079\/revisions\/21082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}