Thursday 5AM Weather Update: Storm surge potential remains following Francine, rain subsides

You know, guys, so many people waking up this morning uh impacted from Francine without power. Uh Some have flooding issues, others. Well, they're in shelters because they're still recovering from hurricane Ida which was three years ago. Uh Let's start with a live view this morning. This is a live view from our West Bank camera overlooking portions of, I believe this is the West Bank and out here is parts of uptown, but you could see there, there is still a little bit of light rain over parts of the area this morning. But for the most part, we are done with the heavy rain, no flooding in the forecast. We do still have tropical storm warnings for a large part of the area. The metro, the river parishes all the way down into Lafoe, uh and the North Shore in Mississippi all under that tropical storm warning as we are still seeing occasionally some strong wind gusts. Now, that's where the center of Francine is as a 4 a.m. this morning, that advisory showing that the storm is moving at 12 MPH. So what happened here was the storm was moving inland and it started to slow down, do some wobbles. That's why flooding was so bad right here in the metro and then heavy rain moved on shore, um, on the north shore during the overnight hours and now we've got the rain out of here. So all that rain is really on the outskirts of our area and we are done with anything that's gonna cause us. More problems. Still, some water standing, still, not good conditions to be out on the roads though. Here's the track of it taking it up through Jackson, Mississippi today into Memphis. You can see that rain is all on the north side of the system that will continue to lift to the north and uh on out of here, winds are still gusty. We're gusting to 33 and slide L 32 at the lakefront 26 and Kenner finally seeing some relief down here at the Bayou Parishes, but Leo was just standing outside and you could hear those winds still whipping around every now and then, but certainly not anywhere near uh what we saw yesterday as Francine blew through. Now, the storm, it is still producing some wind surge or some storm surge. Thanks to those winds right now, you can see our coastal areas, big improvements, no major surge anymore, just some minor inundation, but the north shore here 4 to 6 ft is still a possibility through this morning, 4 to 6 ft in Bay Saint Louis to Biloxi and then 3 to 5 ft over in Jackson County. I was just looking at some of our latest numbers here. The lake has about 3 to 4 ft of storm surge in it right now. Now Bay Saint Louis has about 4 to 5 ft. But the good news is we've already gotten the high tide in some locations. So it's as high as it's gonna be and it will start to drop off. So high tide is happening this morning, low tide will happen later on this afternoon. Uh Not good weather to be out on the boat just yet. If you do wanna try to get that boat back into the dock or you're trying to get it out on the water or get your maybe traps. I know a lot of people were pulling those up in Saint Bernard the other day. Probably not good conditions today. It's still a bit choppy with those strong winds and we still have seas up to 11 to 10 ft for our buoys. That's at least what they're recording out here in the Gulf waters right now. Eventually though we'll start to see these calmer waters like you see off the Texas coast. Our calmer waters will start to build in as we head into the end of the week. By the way, the rivers are all rising on the north shore. No surprise there. Right now. The only river that's expected to be in a moderate flood stage that's the highest level right now that we've got is the Bogalay, the T Pahoa river, the Bogota and the Cheta are expected to rise. They are in flood stage and they will crest later on today. So today and tomorrow rivers will be swollen. They should all begin to decrease into the weekend here. And the great news is the weekend forecast is looking quite phenomenal for what we've gotten and what we've had so few showers possible today, breezy at times tomorrow and Saturday, that low humidity is coming in behind France scene. So it will really start to feel quite nice. We'll have those temperatures in the upper eighties in the afternoon. So it will be warm if you don't have power. But those overnight hours, if you can open up the windows, I think you'll have a little bit of a breeze coming in, especially tonight and the humidity is low enough that it won't be miserable. We're not talking about heat index numbers staying in the nineties through the overnight hours and then next week, much of the same. No big weather in the forecast to watch out for our marine forecast. Once again, today is not gonna be the best weather, especially this morning this afternoon. Those winds will still settle some. You can see our seas will remain choppy though and the lakes will remain choppy. And then as we get into Friday, much improved, uh, west winds at 5 to 10 knots that is not a bad deal at all. And you've got smooth conditions on the lake on Friday. So should be ok whether to get things back to normal for our boaters. Your high tide once again is this morning, that's when our surge will be highest right now across the Mississippi coast and on the north shore and then your low tide that's gonna happen as we head into the afternoon and into the evening, it is 456 not wanting a lot of people to be out there on the roads, but we know some of you have to, let's get a check of what Josh for do is tracking right now as we're dealing with the fallout and clean up from Francine. Our biggest issue, Causeway bridge is still closed due to high winds. Lakeshore drive also closed for high water between west end and Doman. Also seeing widespread flooding out in Kenner definitely want to stay off the roads. In that scenario. You really can't get on the roads through much of K at the moment. And we're looking also at some street flooding still closing. Uh typical low places, the Carrollton I 10 underpass and the I 10 off ramp eastbound, going to doin neutral ground parking goes until 6 p.m. tonight. Also widespread power outage over 300,000 customers without power that's affecting a lot of traffic signals. So that on top of the debris out on the road, you want to stay away from them all RT A bus, street car and ferry service suspended. But if you have to be out, I 10, all the interstates and river crossings are moving fine.