The Weather Channel says the hurricane hunter recon aircraft confirm what the radar is saying, that the south and southwest side of the eyewall is “a bit ragged.”

Frankly, I don’t think this is really a 155 mph hurricane anymore. I could be wrong — and remember, I’m not a metereologist, just an amateur hurricane buff — but I really think this thing is weaker than the NHC is saying. (Naturally, they don’t want people to let down their guard.) The last-minute weakening processes that we all hoped for are indeed happening. Dry air, shear, eyewall replacement… whatever it is, some factors have conspired to disrupt Katrina’s circulation. Hopefully that trend will continue — remember, the eyewall has several more hours before it reaches heavily populated areas, so if the weakening trend continues, that would be excellent news, in terms of the amount of wind damage that will occur. It will still be severe, but not the kind of catastrophic, Andrew-type, everything-gets-flattened damage that the NWS described earlier today. (By way of comparison, here’s what Andrew looked like on radar when it hit.)

However, the bigger concern here is the flooding of New Orleans, and from everything I’ve read, even a Category 3 hurricane would be enough to top the levees. Moreover, the weakening of the west side of the storm won’t help with that, because it’s the easterly winds ahead of the storm — on the east side — that will do most of the work in flooding Lake Pontchartrain. So unless the experts who studies these scenarios are wrong, I think New Orleans is still going to flood.

Again, this is just one amateur weather buff’s opinion, and I could be wrong.

The Hurricane Center is now saying that the eye is moving due north. If that holds, it looks like the downtown area of New Orleans would maybe be hit by the far western side of the eyewall, depending on exactly how wide the eyewall is (of which I am not certain). A north-northeasterly turn would really help.

Again, remember, the winds and rain around the eyewall are undoubtedly more severe than they appear on radar right now. I believe that the radar has trouble penetrating the eyewall, and it has generally been my experience that hurricanes often don’t look as impressive on radar as they really are.

Latest radar here.

The storm surge at Grand Isle is spiking rapidly, and the Lake Pontchartrain levels are also continuing to rapidly rise (see also here).

N.O. Pundit muses:

There is a Schrodinger’s Cat quality to watching the spinning red ball: does the New Orleans that I know even exist right now, hours before landfall? Surely the buildings are there right now and the people who remained are fine right now. But in a sense, some of those buildings have already fallen and some of those people have already met tragedy. Indeterminacy tonight, determinacy tomorrow.

I am in a stunned fog: resigned not that my life will change in the morning, but that my life has already changed. Perhaps a little, perhaps a lot. But even if I have a relatively intact house to return to, there will be friends who don’t, and there may be friends who aren’t.

Commingled with my resignation is an optimism and resilience. Whatever happens, well, happens. Wherever my starting point happens to be tomorrow is just that: a starting point. Not without pain, not without tears, not without doubts. A fine place to take a step forward.

Yes, I am praying and hoping for miracle, a weakening, an Eastern deviation, and that may yet come. Do you believe in miracles? I do.

In other news, here’s a picture of people packed inside the Superdome:

Wow… the west side of the storm really does look very ragged all of a sudden.

Is that a patch of dry air? Caused by the counter-clockwise flow blowing off the land perhaps? This could help New Orleans at least a bit, if it holds (and if the satellite picture is representative of the wind speeds at the surface)… though I’m suspecting the city will still flood, as the storm surge is coming in from the east, where the storm still looks very strong… so I don’t want to get people’s hopes up, but this is at least a sliver of hope.

UPDATE: Yup, dry air. Check out the water vapor view:

Here’s the latest view. How deeply entrained into the circulation that patch of dry air gets could be crucial. Remember, New Orleans figures to be (probably) on the left-hand side of the eye.

UPDATE: As as 2:00 AM, Katrina is down to Category 4, with 155 mph sustained winds. That’s the very top end of Category 4 status. But could it be lower? We’re waiting on new data from recon plane.

The Weather Channel guys says there is “erosion of the cloud cover on the western side of the storm… but the radar not really reflecting that.”

Here’s another water vapor view:

Again, don’t get your hopes up. This hurricane is still going to be a very, very big problem.

A college-football blogger, “Anonymous Sportaholic,” who also happens to be a doctor, is stuck in New Orleans, staying behind to care for those who cannot leave. (Hat tip: CFR.)

The New York Times has a slideshow of good pictures of yesterday’s preparations and evacuations, including this dramatic shot of a deserted French Quarter on quite possibly its last evening of existence as we’ve known it:

As of 1:00 AM, Katrina’s eye is 75 miles south-southwest of the mouth of the Mississippi River, and 135 miles south-southeast of New Orleans. A wind gust of 101 mph has been reported at Southwest Pass, LA.

The eye is now becoming visible on the short-range radar from New Orleans.

It’s probably not a good idea to refer to the people in the Superdome as being “in the same boat.” Just saying.

I’ve moved most of today’s posts onto Page 2, so that the homepage will load faster as I continue hurricane-blogging through the night. (Automatic archiving is not working because of the in-limbo status of my blog.)

They’re already getting 90 mph wind gusts in New Orleans, according to WWL.

Reading what Dr. Jeff Masters and Steve Gregory are saying, it sounds like Katrina has probably weakened to a Category 4 hurricane, though it hasn’t officially been downgraded. That’s good news, but New Orleans is going to be devastated either way, as well as whoever is in the path of the eye and particularly the right-front quadrant.

This tidal gauge, located on a bayou attached to Lake Pontchartrain (map here), appears to have live data, updated every 12 minutes or so. In addition to the water level, it shows the wind speed and barometric pressure, which are rapidly increasing and decreasing, respectively.

There are still people on the roads. They’re talking on WWL about what to do if you’re stuck on the highway — under what circumstances you should “ditch your car” and under what circumstances you shouldn’t, whether you should seek shelter at a random building off the nearest exit, etc.

This is damn mayor’s fault.

P.S. Also, there is a disturbing amount of price gouging going on, apparently.

There are between 26,000 and 30,000 people at the Superdome, according to what sounds like a well-sourced report on WWL’s live streaming video feed.

Incidentally, I’ve updated the links to the feeds from both WWL and WDSU.

As of 9:00 PM, the water level in Lake Pontchartrain was rising steeply.

I guess the gauge has shut down now, or something. This gauge appears to have some more recent data, possibly even live… I’m not sure.