Finally, time for an update. Isaac first came ashore at the mouth of the Mississippi river which is about 80 miles Southeast of here. That put us on the West side of the storm which is usually weaker than the East side. Tuesday was uneventful with intermittent rain and North wind increasing to about 30 MPH by nightfall. The power went off at 11 PM with winds gusting to about 60 MPH so we went to bed. The house survived 120 MPH gusts in hurricane Gustav 4 years ago without any significant damage, so sleeping was better than staying up all night worrying. About 5:30 AM a sound like giant flapping wings woke us up. It was the greenhouse plastic film flapping in the wind which i estimate was 80 MPH. The wooden strips that were holding down the plastic were pulled out by the pressure under the plastic. The roof film separated from the peak of the roof. but never pulled away completely. It still looks almost normal but will have to be replaced. After that the wind dissipated. When I got the generator running and the TV on we found out that we were in the eye of the storm. Isaac was not a well formed hurricane. The eye was very large( about 40 miles) and not clear of clouds. There was misty rain and light winds until late Wednesday afternoon when the wind picked up and intermittent showers resumed. By then the storm had diminished to 50-60 MPH. By Thursday the center had moved to the center of the state and the wind was not a problem anymore but the rain showers remained. We had about 10 inches of rain total for three days. The only other damage was a couple of holes made by branches that fell on the old minnow greenhouse that has been remodeled as a seedling nursery. There are two videos of the wind and rain. The second one is very short, but shows a stronger wind gust. The pics are of the deck ponds during the eye of the storm with lots of shredded leaves, but the lilies still blooming. Those ponds are turning black now because of the leaves. There are no Koi or Goldfish in those ponds, only Paradise Gouramis and wild Sailfin Mollies and they seem to be ok for now. I got a call from work on Wednesday night that the power plant had shut down and they were requesting that any available electricians report to work. I went in to work on Thursday afternoon after the power had come on here and the danger was over. We restored power to the plant on Friday. Today was the first day that I worked only an 8 hour day since then.
We were very fortunate that the storm didn't come in 50 miles to the West or it would have been much worse for us. One of the electricians I work with had 18 inches of water in his house and had to be rescued. Both of his vehicles were flooded.
