Wind gusts pick up as Hurricane Francine makes landfall in Louisiana

AccuWeather

AccuWeather's Tony Laubach reported live amid intense winds on the northern side of Francine's eyewall in Houma, Louisiana, on Sept. 11.

Transcript

00:00Francine is making landfall, has started to make landfall in southwest Paratarabon Parish,

00:07and the rain and wind continues to pick up.

00:11All right, let's get the latest from AccuWeather meteorologist Tony Laubach, who is in Houma, Louisiana.

00:19Boy, things are really starting to pick up now here looking at the radar.

00:22You have the leading edge now, Tony, of the front eyewall coming in.

00:28It's going to get very bad here very quick, and there you go right on cue.

00:33Yeah, and I've got to tell you, Bernie, it's been a slow burn all day,

00:38and then within the last about, say, 90 minutes, we've started to really see those winds pick up.

00:43And we're on the northern edge of the eyewall here in Houma.

00:46We did not go a little bit further south.

00:48We know that there are several other small little communities down that way,

00:51but those roads are very, very, very low to the ground with water very near it,

00:55so we didn't want to get cut off by any of the flooding

00:57that might be happening down that far south.

00:59So we're here in Houma.

01:00You see the trees behind me blowing.

01:02We're seeing winds right now gusting probably in the 60-mile-per-hour range

01:06and some of the stronger gusts, but we've seen those more frequently over the last 15 minutes.

01:11The winds are pretty good at sustain, but again, we're seeing those gusts really starting to pick up.

01:16Haven't seen much in the way of any significant damage as of this point.

01:19We've been driving around pretty much between here and Morgan City.

01:23Mainly the damage we've seen so far has really been tree branches, just small tree debris kind of stuff.

01:30We haven't seen anything significant yet.

01:32But again, we're really going to be starting to see the winds really picking up here.

01:36We know we had some of those gusts offshore well over 100 miles per hour.

01:41We could be looking at winds close to that as far north as U.S. 90 here again.

01:46But Morgan City to Houma, these are going to be the areas that we're going to be watching here

01:50over the next hour, maybe two hours here.

01:53We still are a little bit further north of where we're expecting landfall to be.

01:57So that eyewall, again, is a pretty thick area.

02:00And you hear that wind right now blowing in my face here.

02:03We are fortunately seeing that coming in as we are speaking right about now.

02:07Again, that eyewall is going to work its way up slowly.

02:10So we're expecting these conditions probably to linger, I'd say, between now and about 5 o'clock central time.

02:16And we're going to see those winds, again, continue to increase.

02:19It's going to be the gusts.

02:21That's going to be the thing that's going to be dealing with here.

02:23We're going to be seeing them get stronger, and we're going to be seeing them get more frequent

02:27as the winds continue to build.

02:29Now, the good news here in Houma, we are a little bit further inland.

02:32So that may weaken some of the higher gusts that we've seen offshore,

02:36some of the higher gusts that we're going to see right near shore.

02:39So we may not be looking at winds in the triple-digit range here.

02:43But, again, that storm is moving pretty quickly.

02:45Francine moving pretty quickly.

02:47It's going to weaken as it moves inland, but it's going to be moving pretty quickly inland.

02:51So how much weaker those winds are going to be as we get into the northern and eastern parts of that eyewall

02:56are going to remain to be seen.

02:58But, again, folks in Morgan City, you're going to be on the northern side of this.

03:01The eye is likely to pass pretty close, if not over Morgan City.

03:05Here in Houma, we are worried about maybe being in the eastern eyewall for the duration of the event here.

03:11If the eye can kind of sneak in, we'll get that calming period before the southern end of that works its way in.

03:15And, again, been watching a lot of those buoys offshore, those wind speeds offshore.

03:19Again, some of those are punching up 70, 80 miles per hour-plus, even on the south side of this thing,

03:25as it continues to work its way up.

03:27So, again, we're dealing with those periodic gusts.

03:30We've had occasional police officers around the street, again, just making sure most of the residents are in.

03:35We haven't seen much of anybody out except for emergency personnel and other storm chasers.

03:39That's about it.

03:41Most everybody else hunkered down, if they are even here at all.

03:44We are in a big box store here.

03:46We've got plenty of kind of a shopping center, strip mall.

03:48There is no activity whatsoever.

03:50Everybody has hunkered down, and it is going to be pretty much getting worse before it gets better.

03:54Again, we are getting into the northern side of the eyewall here in Houma.

03:57Those winds, again, gusting occasionally up to 60.

04:00We expect that to continue in earnest over the next hour to 90 minutes

04:04before things start to calm down a little bit as the eye approaches.

04:07But, again, here in Houma, Bernie, we could be talking about being on the eastern side of that eyewall for a good duration of this.

04:13Folks in Morgan City are going to be dealing with the eye of that coming up here within the next hour as well.

04:18We are going to continue to monitor conditions.

04:20We are going to be watching for damage.

04:22We haven't seen any power outages yet.

04:24Power is still on in our immediate area, so there is some good news there.

04:26Hopefully, here, we can hold fort pretty good for the next hour to two hours here

04:31as the worst of this starts to work its way in.

04:34Tony, I listen. If you can hear me, I do want to let you know,

04:37as we've been forecasting for the last 24 hours, we do have now a Category 2 hurricane.

04:43You are in the northern eyewall, and you will be in the center of that eyewall,

04:48I'd say, within the next two hours or so.

04:51I would project that is going to happen around 6 o'clock local time.

04:54Batten down the hatches, my friend.

04:56You are going to be right in the middle of Hurricane Francine.

04:59Tony, thanks for the update.

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