Breaking News Night

Wow... lots of exciting news coming from the Depression Channel (CNN) this evening.. For starters they have been tracking Hurricane Rita which is now a Category 5 hurricane. At this moment is the third strongest storm ever recorded. It picked up speed before passing by Cuba and entered the main open area of the Gulf of Mexico at Category 2. It then quickly hit Category 5. Computer tracking modules have it hitting shore somewhere near Galvaston Texas by late Friday night or early Saturday morning. Evacuees from Katrina in Houston are being evacuated again as is most everyone from the Texas Gulf Coast right through to western Louisianna. New Orleans is bracing for residual rain and potential flooding that could break the broken levees. Galveston itself is almost completely evacuated and like New Orleans is also partly below sea level and risks being flooded if not wiped out by this massive storm.

Ok if all that wasn't enough a Jet Blue A320 took off from Long Beach heading for New York at around 4pm EST and ran into mechanical problems right after lifting off the ground. The front nose gear somehow turned 90 degrees to one side leaving the front wheel section facing sideways. The pilots were unable to straighten it out. I sat with CNN and watched them follow the plane circle for an hour or so (it had been circling already for an hour before I joined in... Clem called and told me to turn on the TV to see what was happening). They had pilots and other experts discussing options and potential outcomes. All in all they handled it quite well. It was just an incident with no real threat to anyone's life. There was the risk of a nose gear collapse on landing and the threat of injuries from people jumping down the escape chutes if they needed to be deployed... and another risk of fire or injury should the plane have had a genuine belly landing with all the landing gear retracted...

Some pics from airliners.net & my aviation.net (best one is the last one on the list)

http://myaviation.net/?pid=00453678

http://myaviation.net/?pid=00452851

http://www.airliners.net/open.file/926275/L/

http://www.airliners.net/open.file/926274/L/

Ok a Category 5 hurricane is barreling towards Texas meanwhile a Jet Blue A320 was circling with bad landing gear setting the viewers up for a spectacular smoke and sparks landing when..... suddenly a tornado touched down in Minneapolis. People on the ground there confirmed seeing a tornado heading towards the downtown area.. Paula Zahn said in 30 years she's never seen anything like this... one breaking story after another.

Well all is good with two of the stories. The tornado so far hasn't turned into anything serious. At least they haven't shown any evidence of destruction or any video of damage. The tornado warning was lifted and they more or less sidelined the story. The Jet Blue Airbus came to a pretty spectacular landing. The pilots skillfully came in keeping the nose high and only setting it down late as it touched down the runway. The nose gear now completely sideways started smoking and slowly shredding then catching fire leaving a blaze of fire that ran right back underneith the fuselage. Eventually the tires ripped off but the nose gear held strong and the plane came to a complete and safe stop. There was no need for an emergency evacuation. Congrats to the flight crew for that. They did an excellent job and everyone now has a pretty good story to tell. I have to admit my heart was pumping when the plane touched down at LAX. It was quite spectacular I must admit!

As for Rita...yikes! It looks like the type of storm that might just create a Category 6 level for hurricanes. It has a very tight eye and is massive in size. 266 kph winds have been recorded. There's a high pressure that's keeping it south in the Gulf which may help New Orleans but poor Texas looks like it will be hit very hard. At least this time around they are learning from Katrina's mistakes and if anything good comes out of this the three levels of Government have a chance to redeem themselves for the mess in Louisianna, Mississippi and Alabama. People were bussed out. Pets went with them and names were recorded who went on what bus and where. Priority was put on hospitals and nursing homes and in Galveston it was a mandatory evacuation. There are emergency vehicules with relief already lined up ready to be sent in and the Federal Government has issued a state of emergency for the region already in preparation for massive destruction. So 100% better than last time at this stage of the storm.

Just a couple more interesting points I picked up this evening. The USA's worst natural disaster was a hurricane that hit Galveston in 1900. 8-9000 people died. The city was totally destroyed. Film images from back then showed awful death and devestation. It was then the second wealthiest city in the USA after New York but never recovered that title from that storm onwards. Also the worse year for hurricanes was 1933 if I recall correctly. 21 major hurricanes ripped through the Caribbean that year. This year there have been 17 and it's only half way through. They are expecting to match 1933 or become the worse year ever for hurricanes in the Caribbean. Global warming I guess is starting to take it's toll. I'm curious to see what type of winter we are going to have.

So quite the night for news and excitement...