Hurricane Claudette

Pre-Landfall 3 | Summary
Posting Date: July 15, 2003, 8:00:00 AM

Hurricane Claudette, the first hurricane of the 2003 Atlantic hurricane season, is expected to make landfall along the Texas coastline in the next few hours, in the area near Port O'Connor and Palacios, Texas. As of 9 a.m. EDT, Tuesday, July 15, 2003, Claudette was positioned about 45 miles (72 km) east of Port O'Connor, Texas. The storm was moving toward the west at nearly 11 mph (18 kph). Current maximum sustained winds remain near 75 mph (121 kph) with higher gusts. Minimum central pressure is estimated at 982 mb. Hurricane force winds extend outward up to 30 miles (48 km) from the center and tropical storm force winds extend about 140 miles (225 km.) According to the National Hurricane Center, the storm could still strengthen slightly before landfall. A hurricane warning remains in effect for the Texas coast from Baffin Bay to San Louis Pass. Using the most recent information about the meteorological parameters of this storm, the AIR tropical cyclone modeling team has run more than 200 scenarios representing a variety of assumptions about the storm's future track and intensity. Because the most likely landfall location is along a relatively sparsely populated section of the coast, expected losses are lower than those projected yesterday. It is important to note, however, that there is still considerable uncertainty surrounding the actual parameters of this storm. CATRADER(r) and CLASIC/2(tm) clients can now view wind speed and loss maps on the Scenarios page of this web site. In addition, event sets representing the full range of simulated scenarios are available for download. AIR will continue to monitor this storm and will post additional information after landfall.

Pre-Landfall 3 | Downloads
Posting Date: July 15, 2003, 8:00:00 AM