While Barry is no longer a hurricane, the risk for major flooding will remain as up to two feet of rain is expected to inundate parts of the lower Mississippi Valley into Monday.

Officials performed swift water rescues on Saturday as storm surge flooding inundated the Louisiana coastline. Just east of where Barry made landfall, a tide gauge at Amerada Pass measured a storm surge of nearly 7 feet on Saturday afternoon.

Power outages are also mounting as strong winds howl, with more than 120,000 customers in Louisiana without power as of 4:30 p.m. CDT Saturday, according to PowerOutage.us. A gust of 66 mph whipped Dulac, which is located along the southeastern Louisiana coast, at midday Saturday.

The risks for storm surge flooding will gradually wane and wind damage will become more sporadic as Barry loses wind strength through the rest of the weekend. Barry is expected to become a tropical depression on Sunday, then a tropical rainstorm by Monday.

Regardless of the official designation on the Saffir-Simpson scale, AccuWeather declared Barry a level 2 storm on its RealImpact Scale for Hurricanes. The scale ranges from “Less than 1” to a 5, with 5 having the most severe impact.

“Our greatest concern is for torrential rain that would result in life-threatening flooding,” AccuWeather Hurricane Expert Dan Kottlowski said.

Lives and property will continue to be threatened as Barry unloads a swath of 8-18 inches of rain across eastern Louisiana, western and southern Mississippi and eastern Arkansas into Monday.

Rainfall rates can be as high as 2-4 inches per hour in some areas with an AccuWeather Local StormMax of 24 inches.

Isolated tornadoes and waterspouts can be produced east of Barry’s track through the weekend. Some of these may be wrapped in rain and difficult to see until they are already in the neighborhood.

These dangers may occur well away from the center of Barry, as was evident by the thunderstorms that were capable of producing tornadoes in southwestern Alabama on Saturday afternoon.

Streets, highways and low-lying areas are the first to take on water as torrential rain pours down. However, flooding will progress and expand as the storm moves slowly inland.

Residents in low-lying and flood-prone areas should be prepared to evacuate at a moment’s notice as waters may rapidly rise. More roads may become submerged and impassable, which may trap residents in these flood-prone areas.

Barry is soaking New Orleans after 6-10 inches of rain deluged the city, which is below sea level, and caused a flash flood emergency Wednesday. The pumps and elaborate drainage system could not keep up with rainfall rates of 2-3 inches per hour, resulting in serious street flooding and numerous high-water rescues.

With this storm, the amount of rain can overwhelm any city’s drainage system, let alone that of New Orleans.

Significant rises on the secondary rivers in the region are likely with the risk of major river flooding including the Pearl, Black, Tickfaw, Comite, Amite and Tchefuncte.

The Comite River near Baton Rouge, Louisiana, is expected to crest near record-high levels early next week.

Some secondary rivers, such as the Atchafalaya, generally do not contribute to the flow on the Mississippi in the delta region, but rather take water away from the main stem.

However, as heavy rain falls immediately over the lower part of the main stem of the Mississippi, a rise of a few feet can occur on that waterway.

The Mississippi River may crest one or two more times in the days and even weeks after Barry as the torrential rain falling during the storm will be followed by all the runoff draining downstream.

It is possible that the lower Mississippi River may not recede below flood stage until the end of the summer, further prolonging what is already the longest flood event on record at Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

The river rose above flood stage on Jan. 6 and has not dropped below that mark since.

Water levels on the lower Mississippi River remain high from spring flooding that was still flowing downstream from the middle and upper part of the basin.

In comparison, the level on the Mississippi River prior to the arrival of Hurricane Katrina was 2 feet. On Thursday morning, the river level was just above 16 feet. Flooding in New Orleans during Katrina occurred primarily as levees failed as a storm surge caused waters to rise in Lake Pontchartrain.

With Barry, heavy rain that falls directly on New Orleans poses the greatest threat for flooding in the city than the threat for levee breaches.

Earlier Friday, NWS hydrologists expected the Mississippi River at New Orleans to surge to near 19 feet. However, in a stroke of good news for locals, by Friday evening, they revised that forecast and now believe the Mississippi River will crest around 17 feet. Earlier in the week, hydrologists called for a 20-foot crest.

Levees in New Orleans are between 20 and 25 feet high at different points along the river, according to what Ricky Boyett, the spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers in the New Orleans District, told The New York Times.

J. David Rogers, the lead author of a definitive 2015 study on the canal wall failures and catastrophic flooding of New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, told AccuWeather in an interview that new levees installed in 2011 will provide the city with much better protection from major flooding.

“It’s a much more robust defense system that they have today with probably a 100-fold better site characterization than they had going into Katrina,” Rogers said. “You can’t even compare pre-Katrina to post-Katrina; it’s like comparing a biplane to a 747.”

The heavy rain will gradually ease across the lower Mississippi Valley Monday into Tuesday as Barry focuses on the Ohio Valley.

While there can be an isolated shower or thunderstorm that briefly forces those working outdoors to seek shelter, drier weather will be welcome along the central Gulf Coast next week, starting on Tuesday.

However, humid and seasonably hot weather will put those engaging in storm cleanup operations or without power at risk for heat-related illnesses. It may take days or even weeks for power to be fully restored across the region.

AccuWeather RealFeel® Temperatures can approach or exceed 100 F daily next week during the midday and afternoon hours. There will be little relief at night when these values may not drop below the 80s.

Download the free AccuWeather app to stay alert to any tropical advisories, watches, and warnings. Keep checking back for updates on AccuWeather.com and stay tuned to the AccuWeather Network on DirecTV, Frontier and Verizon Fios.

Source: https://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/tropical-storm-barry-strengthens-set-to-unload-feet-of-flooding-rain-along-the-gulf-coast/70008788

The post Barry continues to weaken but significant flood risk remains for lower Mississippi Valley first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

The post Gulf Coast prepares for tropical threat first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

In the environment of bogus media, lying through their teeth about nearly everything and everybody who supports the traditions of the United States, people, particularly conservatives are falling all over themselves to protect the reputations of law enforcement. At least the reputations of the 99.5% that “risk their lives every day to protect American citizens.” We’ve heard it over and again as the most blatant corruption imaginable seems to grip the nation’s top investigative and law enforcement agencies.

Some of us have our doubts, however. With the unabashed corruption in the top levels of the DoiJ, the CYA and the F I B (intentional) for a decade or two, who was doing the hiring and promoting and what were their criteria? It stands to reason that they were placing people they agreed with and agreed with them in critical leadership positions over a long period of time. This writer, for one, does not believe in the 99.5% theory. Given what we now know about the fabrication and framing of patriotic Americans for political purposes, it’s obvious that we’ve been living with corrupt players in the very top echelon of law enforcement for some time. If not for the election of Donald Trump, and his belated intervention in matters (because he was their number one target) this would have gone on indefinitely.

It may be contagious. Lately, we’re finding out about local law enforcement organizations run amok. A Tallahassee, Florida Sheriff has been caught repeatedly planting drugs and paraphernalia on innocent drivers. He manipulated his body-cam to conceal his activities but apparently didn’t do a good enough job to fool everybody. His department found several baggies of drugs and all kinds of paraphernalia hidden in the trunk of his police cruiser. About 100 cases have been overturned or dropped since the Sheriff was caught framing innocent people. The lady who blew the whistle had to leave her employment because of the frightening treatment she received from other officers after she outed one of their own.

East Los Angeles has a Sheriff’s “gang” wearing matching tattoos (skeleton with bandoleer, guns, wearing a sombrero) operating within the police department. An article in the L. A. Times shows that this police “gang” involves dozens if not hundreds of officers. These guys are accused of having attacked rookies in the department, and no one seems to know the full extent of their activities. But they are accused of mercilessly beating rookie officers, and none of them with matching ink are about to rat out the others. They’re also accused of corruption in the field if you can wrap your mind around that. The members claim it’s only a “brotherhood,” and not a gang.

If you can’t trust law enforcement, who can you trust? It is a question many have been asking in relation to the F I B and the department of injustice for the past two and a half years. The United States is courting a situation of a massive third world influx. The situation might be improving with Mexico’s cooperation in stemming the flow from central America, but we keep getting news of hundreds from the Congo, and now more from India waltzing across the border only to express their disdain and hatred for America and its citizens.

But one whole party calls openly to erase the border and get rid of the law enforcement agencies struggling with the onslaught of overcrowding at detention centers. The United States is such a “racist” nation that people from all over the world are risking life, limb and their children’s health and safety to get here. Attention-addicted congresspeople are screaming bloody murder and publicly bawling their eyes out about the horrible treatment of arrivals in detention centers. Maybe word will get out. We’re swamped and without resources to provide for everyone on earth, particularly aggressive foreigners that don’t much like us. It seems they’ve got plenty of representation in our government.

Iran tried to go on offense this week, but things didn’t go as planned. The whole world knows that an Iranian oil tanker was recently seized in the Mediterranean, having passed through the Straits of Gibraltar on its way to Syria. That would seem like a very long way around, to get from Iran to Syria, and it is. Apparently, Iran knew that they’d be busted if the tanker were to pass through the Suez Canal, so they went all the way around the southern tip of Africa, up through the Atlantic to Gibraltar, and into the Mediterranean Sea to get the load to Syria without suspicion. But that didn’t work. And since the British participated in the seizure of the Iranian oil tanker, the Iranians tried to get even.

Their gunboats swarmed a British oil tanker on its way through the storied Straits of Hormuz, attempting to take control of it. That’s when a British destroyer came on the scene, threatening to sink the swarming speedboats operated by the Iranian Republican Guard. They quickly broke off and ran away. The whole episode demonstrates that economic sanctions are taking their toll on the Iranian economy and Iran is going to great lengths to circumvent them.

As everyone knows, Iran has been boisterously announcing that they’re now in violation of the Obama/Kerry Iranian nuclear deal. You know, the one that included the nighttime arrival of pallets of shrink-wrapped billions in untraceable currency to Tehran. It seems those days are over and Iran is in a bind with a failing economy. Even the nations of Europe that have been doing profitable business with Iran are in a situation where they can no longer hide behind the nuclear “deal,” what with Iran constantly boasting about their blatant violations of the terms. Maybe it’s cause for relief that an American nuclear expert recently went on the record saying that Iran’s nuclear capabilities are extremely primitive and not an immediate concern. Let’s hope that’s right.

There are plenty of important matters to keep up with. The U. S. ladies’ soccer team is not one of them. You may have noticed that the lavender-haired team captain did one of her first interviews with Anderson Cooper on CNN. One commenter quipped that it had to be done in order to prove that they were indeed not the same person! What a perverse spectacle they made with their offensive celebrations. At least we have the comfort of knowing they won’t spawn a second generation of America-hating freaks. Thanks, “ladies.”

Southern California has suffered two major earthquakes over the past two weeks, a 6.4 followed by a powerful 7.1, matching the event that occurred February 9, 1971, a day I’ll not forget. California has done everything but secede from the United States. Let’s hope things don’t get any worse for the loyal citizens that remain in that rebellious region already reeling from a massive influx of foreigners and rampant homelessness in their streets. There is real concern that the street filth is bringing rats and wretched diseases into the established population. You know how the saying goes, “As goes California…” Let us hope not!

Say a prayer for those in New Orleans. They’ve already experienced terrible flooding, and with the onset of tropical depression Barry, it could get a lot worse.   

Mark

Source: http://www.intercontinentalcog.org/fridayupdates.php

The post Weekly Update by Mark Armstrong – 12 July 2019 first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.