I was surprised tonight when the Hurricane Center’s 2100Z (5:00 PM EDT) advisory came out and Rita was still a tropical storm. The difference between 70 and 75 mph is minimal when it comes to a storm’s fury, but the word hurricane has much more weight to it than tropical storm.
I suppose the question should be, should the Hurricane Center fudge the truth (aka: lie) in the pursuit of a more useful forecast.
All 75 mph winds are not equal. Key West is a very vulnerable spot.
I suspect when the late night advisory comes out, Rita will have reached hurricane strength. Wouldn’t it have been better to have gotten six more hours of impetus for people to board up and bug out?
Would lying here have been so bad?