Hurricane Irene continues tracking north. Currently, it's a Category 2 and could strengthen to a Category 3 later today. It's still expected to impact much of the East Coast over the weekend. And, it's a very powerful and very big storm. As noted below, It's "maximum sustained winds are near 110 MPH."
The latest update from the National Hurricane Center was just issued at 8 AM (and, yes, it's published in all CAPS):
AT 800 AM EDT...1200 UTC...THE CENTER OF HURRICANE IRENE WAS LOCATED NEAR LATITUDE 30.0 NORTH...LONGITUDE 77.3 WEST. IRENE IS MOVING TOWARD THE NORTH NEAR 14 MPH...22 KM/H...AND THIS MOTION IS EXPECTED TO CONTINUE DURING THE NEXT 24 HOURS. A GRADUAL TURN TOWARD THE NORTH-NORTHEAST SHOULD BEGIN THEREAFTER. ON THE FORECAST TRACK...THE CORE OF THE HURRICANE WILL PASS WELL OFF THE COAST OF NORTHEASTERN FLORIDA TODAY...APPROACH THE COAST OF NORTH CAROLINA TONIGHT...AND PASS NEAR OR OVER THE NORTH CAROLINA COAST SATURDAY. THE HURRICANE IS FORECAST TO MOVE NEAR OR OVER THE MID-ATLANTIC COAST SATURDAY NIGHT.The NHC also issued the latest projected track, as of 8 AM ET:
MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS ARE NEAR 110 MPH...175 KM/H...WITH HIGHER GUSTS. IRENE IS A CATEGORY TWO HURRICANE ON THE SAFFIR-SIMPSON HURRICANE WIND SCALE. SOME RE-INTENSIFICATION IS POSSIBLE TODAY...AND IRENE IS EXPECTED TO BE NEAR THE THRESHOLD BETWEEN CATEGORY TWO AND THREE AS IT REACHES THE NORTH CAROLINA COAST.
IRENE IS A LARGE TROPICAL CYCLONE. HURRICANE FORCE WINDS EXTEND OUTWARD UP TO 90 MILES...150 KM...FROM THE CENTER...AND TROPICAL STORM FORCE WINDS EXTEND OUTWARD UP TO 290 MILES...465 KM.
The red areas are under a hurricane warning. Purple indicates a hurricane watch. As of now, Philadelphia has a warning. NYC is under a watch.
DC is under a "Tropical Storm Warning." (that's indicated in blue on the map.)
Nate Silver looks at just how severe the economic impact could be -- multibillion dollars severe:
Apart from the inevitable loss of life in the most densely populated part of the country, history suggests that the economic damage could run into the tens of billions of dollars, depending on the severity of the storm and how close it came to the city. Unlikely but theoretically plausible scenarios could have the damage entering the realm of the costliest natural disasters of all time, and perhaps being large enough to have a materially negative effect on the United States’ gross domestic product.Check out his charts.
Tropical cyclones in and around New York City and the Northeastern United States are fairly rare but not unprecedented. Using a relatively conservative set of criteria, I identify 20 storms since 1900 that have made landfall north of the Mason-Dixon Line with tropical storm force winds (at least 39 miles per hour) or higher, 12 of which made a direct hit on either Long Island or New Jersey.
