Hurricane Water Vapor Loop Atlantic/East Coast
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Be prepared for this year's hurricane season.

Find states' emergency info, and where to get help for Louisiana, Mississippi , Texas, Florida, Alabama, South Caraolina, North Carolina.

VIEW WEB SITE Get info from NOAA hurricane center on storms.

What Would You Call It? What would you name a hurricane? Is your name on the official list? See more about the history of naming or check out memorable hurricanes.

What Are They? What are hurricanes, anyway? How do they form?

How to Survive: Find out what to do before, during and after a hurricane.

Been Struck? Has your area been declared a national disaster? Find out where to get
help and assistance.

More hurricane link Resources:
· Six to 10 Day Forecast in Your Area
· NOAA: National Hurricane Center
· Fed. Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
· Find Your Local Red Cross Chapter
· Water for Drinking and Cooking | More Tips

Disaster preparedness begins with each family and household having a plan. FEMA recommends that you have a ready-to-go emergency kit that will allow you to survive unaided for three days. A kit should include the following:

First aid kit (including prescription medicines)
Food and water for up to 72 hours
Extra clothing and blankets
Flashlights and extra batteries
The following supplies are recommended:

NOAA Weather Radio and extra batteries
Whistle to signal for help
A camp stove with extra fuel
Foldable ladders for second-story escape in a fire
Photocopies of credit and identification cards
Food and Water

In addition to an emergency kit, families should be prepared with up to three days of food and water for each member. Basic foods, like canned foods, dry foods, and other non-perishable items are best to have because if electricity goes out, they will still be edible. Here are some tips:

Keep foods on hand that everyone in your family will like to eat
Avoid foods that are high in fat and protein
Don't stock salty foods, since they will make you thirsty
The average person requires two quarts of drinking water per day. Some individuals, like children or nursing mothers, may require more. A gallon per day for each person in your family is the recommended amount, say American Red Cross officials. If you are running low on water, don't ration. To lessen the amount you need, reduce your activity.

Be Ready to Evacuate

Mobile homes and travel trailers are particularly vulnerable to severe weather because of their instability. Since hurricanes can trigger quickly forming tornadoes, residents should be prepared to leave at a moments notice.

A mobile home can overturn very easily even if precautions have been taken to tie down the unit. When a tornado warning is issued, take shelter in a building with a strong foundation. If shelter is not available, lie in ditch or low-lying area a safe distance away from the unit. Never stay inside a mobile home or travel trailer if a tornado warning has been issued.

Evacuation is a real possibility that your family might face if a natural disaster threatens your home. Every family should have an emergency plan that outlines what to do, how to communicate with family members when evacuating, and how the family should re-connect in case they get separated.

Know the location and best route for evacuation out of the area
Practice your emergency evacuation plan with your family
Heed local and state-issued evacuation orders
Be ready to leave at a moment's notice
"Natural disasters are unpredictable, but if you are prepared, you and your family will know how to deal with them when they happen," said Federal Coordinating Officer Michael Bolch.

To learn more on how to prepare your family for the upcoming hurricane season, visit www.ready.gov or call 800-BE-READY. Materials, including supply kit suggested supplies and family communication plan templates are available on the website. The website also provides information on how to prepare for all disasters, including man-made and other natural disasters.

April 6, 2006 — Hurricanes Dennis, Katrina, Rita, Stan and Wilma, all from the historic 2005 Atlantic hurricane season, were "retired" by an international hurricane committee of the World Meteorological Organization, which includes the NOAA National Hurricane Center, during their annual meeting in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Now retired, these five storms, part of last season's record-setting 27 named storms and 15 hurricanes, will not reappear on the list of potential storm names that is otherwise recycled every six years. (Click NOAA illustration for larger view of Hurricanes Dennis, Katrina, Rita and Wilma. Click here for high resolution version. Please credit “NOAA.”)

Dennis, Katrina, Rita, Stan and Wilma represent the type of devastating storm that is "retired" for causing a large loss of life and property. These names will not be used again for sensitivity reasons and to establish distinction within the scientific and legal communities.

For 2011, Dennis, Katrina, Rita, Stan and Wilma have been replaced with Don, Katia, Rina, Sean and Whitney, respectively.

Since tropical cyclones were first named in 1953, 67 names have been retired (the first being Carol and Hazel in 1954), and with a total of five, 2005 has the most retired storm names in a single season (previous record: four in 1955, 1995 and 2004).

A synopsis of the newly retired storms:

Dennis began its path of destruction in early July while passing between Jamaica and Haiti and then crossing Cuba with estimated top winds of 140 mph. After tracking north across the eastern Gulf of Mexico, Dennis came ashore on Santa Rosa Island, Fla., as a Category 3 hurricane on July 10 with top winds estimated at 120 mph. At least 54 deaths are directly or indirectly attributed to Dennis, including 15 in the U.S, most from within Florida.

Katrina became the costliest and one of the deadliest hurricanes in U.S. history with damage costs exceeding $50 billion and fatalities, directly and indirectly, topping 1,300. Katrina came ashore at Buras, La., as a Category 3 hurricane on August 29 with top winds estimated at 125 mph. Additionally, Katrina was a Category 1 hurricane when it first struck the U.S. near the Broward/Miami-Dade County line in Florida on August 24 after bringing tropical storm conditions to the northern Bahamas.

Rita made landfall in extreme southwestern Louisiana, near the Texas border, as a Category 3 hurricane with top winds of 115 mph on September 24. Rita reached Category 5 strength with top winds estimated at 180 mph over the central Gulf of Mexico, where it had the fourth-lowest central pressure on record (895 millibars) in the Atlantic Basin. Rita produced a significant storm surge that devastated coastal communities in southwestern Louisiana, and its wind, rain, and tornadoes caused fatalities and a wide swath of damage from eastern Texas to Alabama. Rita also produced storm surge flooding in parts of the Florida Keys as the storm's center passed between the Keys and Cuba en route to the Gulf Coast.

Stan, in combination with other weather features, produced torrential rainfall in Mexico and Central America where the combined death toll is estimated to be as high as 2,000. Stan first crossed Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula as a tropical storm, then moved southwest across the Bay of Campeche and hit as a Category 1 hurricane about 90 miles southeast of Veracruz, Mexico, on October 4.

Wilma was an extremely intense Category 5 hurricane over the northwestern Caribbean Sea with estimated tops winds of 185 mph and the all-time lowest central pressure (882 millibars) for an Atlantic Basin hurricane. A slow-moving Wilma devastated coastal areas of the northeastern Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico as a Category 4 hurricane. It later raced into South Florida—coming ashore near Cape Romano, Fla., at Category 3 intensity with top winds estimated at 120 mph on October 24—and inflicting extensive damage.

Names for the upcoming 2006 season, which begins June 1, include Alberto, Beryl, Chris, Debby, Ernesto, Florence, Gordon, Helene, Isaac, Joyce, Kirk, Leslie, Michael, Nadine, Oscar, Patty, Rafael, Sandy, Tony, Valerie, William. On this list Kirk replaces Keith, which was retired following its impact on Mexico and Belize in 2000.

NOAA, an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce, is dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through the prediction and research of weather and climate-related events and providing environmental stewardship of the nation's coastal and marine resources.

Through the emerging Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS), NOAA is working with its federal partners, 61 countries and the European Commission to develop a global network that is as integrated as the planet it observes, predicts and protects.

Worldwide Tropical Cyclone Names

Reason to Name Hurricanes
Experience shows that the use of short, distinctive names in written as well as spoken communications is quicker and less subject to error than the older, more cumbersome latitude-longitude identification methods. These advantages are especially important in exchanging detailed storm information between hundreds of widely scattered stations, coastal bases, and ships at sea.

The use of easily remembered names greatly reduces confusion when two or more tropical storms occur at the same time. For example, one hurricane can be moving slowly westward in the Gulf of Mexico, while at exactly the same time another hurricane can be moving rapidly northward along the Atlantic coast. In the past, confusion and false rumors have arisen when storm advisories broadcast from radio stations were mistaken for warnings concerning an entirely different storm located hundreds of miles away.

History of Hurricane Names
For several hundred years many hurricanes in the West Indies were named after the particular saint's day on which the hurricane occurred. Ivan R. Tannehill describes in his book "Hurricanes" the major tropical storms of recorded history and mentions many hurricanes named after saints. For example, there was "Hurricane Santa Ana" which struck Puerto Rico with exceptional violence on July 26, 1825, and "San Felipe" (the first) and "San Felipe" (the second) which hit Puerto Rico on September 13 in both 1876 and 1928.

Tannehill also tells of Clement Wragge, an Australian meteorologist who began giving women's names to tropical storms before the end of the l9th century.

An early example of the use of a woman's name for a storm was in the novel "Storm" by George R. Stewart, published by Random House in 1941, and since filmed by Walt Disney. During World War II this practice became widespread in weather map discussions among forecasters, especially Air Force and Navy meteorologists who plotted the movements of storms over the wide expanses of the Pacific Ocean.

In 1953, the United States abandoned a confusing two-year old plan to name storms by a phonetic alphabet (Able, Baker, Charlie) when a new, international phonetic alphabet was introduced. That year, the United States began using female names for storms.

The practice of naming hurricanes solely after women came to an end in 1978 when men's and women's names were included in the Eastern North Pacific storm lists. In 1979, male and female names were included in lists for the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico.

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NOAA/ National Weather Service
National Centers for Environmental Prediction
National Hurricane Center
Tropical Prediction Center
11691 SW 17th Street
Miami, Florida, 33165-2149 USA
nhcwebmaster@noaa.gov

The Saffir-Simpson
Hurricane Scale

The Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale is a 1-5 rating based on the hurricane's present intensity. This is used to give an estimate of the potential property damage and flooding expected along the coast from a hurricane landfall. Wind speed is the determining factor in the scale, as storm surge values are highly dependent on the slope of the continental shelf and the shape of the coastline, in the landfall region. Note that all winds are using the U.S. 1-minute average.

Category One Hurricane:
Winds 74-95 mph (64-82 kt or 119-153 km/hr). Storm surge generally 4-5 ft above normal. No real damage to building structures. Damage primarily to unanchored mobile homes, shrubbery, and trees. Some damage to poorly constructed signs. Also, some coastal road flooding and minor pier damage. Hurricane Lili of 2002 made landfall on the Louisiana coast as a Category One hurricane. Hurricane Gaston of 2004 was a Category One hurricane that made landfall along the central South Carolina coast.

Category Two Hurricane:
Winds 96-110 mph (83-95 kt or 154-177 km/hr). Storm surge generally 6-8 feet above normal. Some roofing material, door, and window damage of buildings. Considerable damage to shrubbery and trees with some trees blown down. Considerable damage to mobile homes, poorly constructed signs, and piers. Coastal and low-lying escape routes flood 2-4 hours before arrival of the hurricane center. Small craft in unprotected anchorages break moorings. Hurricane Frances of 2004 made landfall over the southern end of Hutchinson Island, Florida as a Category Two hurricane. Hurricane Isabel of 2003 made landfall near Drum Inlet on the Outer Banks of North Carolina as a Category 2 hurricane.

Category Three Hurricane:
Winds 111-130 mph (96-113 kt or 178-209 km/hr). Storm surge generally 9-12 ft above normal. Some structural damage to small residences and utility buildings with a minor amount of curtainwall failures. Damage to shrubbery and trees with foliage blown off trees and large trees blown down. Mobile homes and poorly constructed signs are destroyed. Low-lying escape routes are cut by rising water 3-5 hours before arrival of the center of the hurricane. Flooding near the coast destroys smaller structures with larger structures damaged by battering from floating debris. Terrain continuously lower than 5 ft above mean sea level may be flooded inland 8 miles (13 km) or more. Evacuation of low-lying residences with several blocks of the shoreline may be required. Hurricanes Jeanne and Ivan of 2004 were Category Three hurricanes when they made landfall in Florida and in Alabama, respectively.

Category Four Hurricane:
Winds 131-155 mph (114-135 kt or 210-249 km/hr). Storm surge generally 13-18 ft above normal. More extensive curtainwall failures with some complete roof structure failures on small residences. Shrubs, trees, and all signs are blown down. Complete destruction of mobile homes. Extensive damage to doors and windows. Low-lying escape routes may be cut by rising water 3-5 hours before arrival of the center of the hurricane. Major damage to lower floors of structures near the shore. Terrain lower than 10 ft above sea level may be flooded requiring massive evacuation of residential areas as far inland as 6 miles (10 km). Hurricane Charley of 2004 was a Category Four hurricane made landfall in Charlotte County, Florida with winds of 150 mph. Hurricane Dennis of 2005 struck the island of Cuba as a Category Four hurricane.

Category Five Hurricane:
Winds greater than 155 mph (135 kt or 249 km/hr). Storm surge generally greater than 18 ft above normal. Complete roof failure on many residences and industrial buildings. Some complete building failures with small utility buildings blown over or away. All shrubs, trees, and signs blown down. Complete destruction of mobile homes. Severe and extensive window and door damage. Low-lying escape routes are cut by rising water 3-5 hours before arrival of the center of the hurricane. Major damage to lower floors of all structures located less than 15 ft above sea level and within 500 yards of the shoreline. Massive evacuation of residential areas on low ground within 5-10 miles (8-16 km) of the shoreline may be required. Only 3 Category Five Hurricanes have made landfall in the United States since records began: The Labor Day Hurricane of 1935, Hurricane Camille (1969), and Hurricane Andrew in August, 1992. The 1935 Labor Day Hurricane struck the Florida Keys with a minimum pressure of 892 mb--the lowest pressure ever observed in the United States. Hurricane Camille struck the Mississippi Gulf Coast causing a 25-foot storm surge, which inundated Pass Christian. Hurricane Andrew of 1992 made landfall over southern Miami-Dade County, Florida causing 26.5 billion dollars in losses--the costliest hurricane on record. In addition, Hurricane Gilbert of 1988 was a Category Five hurricane at peak intensity and is the strongest Atlantic tropical cyclone on record with a minimum pressure of 888 mb.

NEW ORLEANS 2006 Emergency Preparedness Plan

In preparation for the 2006 Atlantic Storm Season, Mayor C. Ray Nagin's Office of Emergency Preparedness has developed a strategic plan for the management and evacuation of the citizens of New Orleans. Through detailed evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses of responses to past events across the nation, and the integration of the on the ground experiences of the mayor and his emergency team during the response and recovery to last years Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the city's new emergency plan focuses on the logistical how-to of moving citizens out of harm's way.

City Communication infrastructure is being upgraded and an emphasis is being placed on interoperability with government agencies and law enforcement across the region.

Mayor Nagin has named May hurricane preparedness month and urges residents to sit down with their families before the June 1 beginning of hurricane season to make their own emergency plan. A completed plan should include when and where family members should meet, where they should evacuate, and what they should bring, including money, food and health-related supplies. The city's technology office is working with Homeland Security and the Office of Emergency Preparedness on a new website to assist citizens with this crticial task.

"There will be no shelter of last resort," Nagin declared. "In the future, the Convention Center will be a staging point for evacuations, not a shelter, and Amtrak trains will also be used for evacuation purposes."

A critical component of any Emergency Preparedness Plan is how the evacuation of assisted needs citizens, such as the elderly and infirm, will be managed.

To this end, the city presents a new City Assisted Evacuation Plan (CAEP). The purpose of the CAEP is to help citizens who want to evacuate during an emergency, but lack the capability to self-evacuate. The CAEP is not intended to replace the individual’s personal responsibility in preparing their own evacuation. It is meant to be an evacuation method of last resort and only for those citizens who have no other means or, have physical limitations that prohibit self evacuation.