Hurricane Ike Night of Horror Approaches

UPDATE: 11:30 PM and the eyewall is moving through Galveston... probably will be daylight before we'll really know what happened... media reports being added to "J's Breaking Weather News" at right. Of greatest concern this hour: 20,000 people stayed on Galveston Island. If the storm is as bad as advertised, we'll have massive fatalities. If it is not as bad as advertised, we'll be hard pressed to get people to evacuate anywhere ever again.

Reports from buoys & coastal stations still not much over 70 knots... water levels as high as 10 feet up as far away as Louisiana, and also in Galveston.

UPDATE: Buoy / coastal winds and waves not all that impressive this evening, correct me if I'm wrong. The storm looks solid on radar, still disorganized on satellite. It is now almost a Category 3. It's starting to get dark, so media reports tonight during landfall will be few and far between,especially after power fails. I will continue to update "J's Breaking Weather News" at right when the media say something interesting, and I'll continue to upload raw video at right as well. Various screencaps from AccuWeather.com RadarPlus as the storm approaches below; click here to browse and archive of high-res shots from today.

LIVE SATELLITE OF "IKE" (PREMIUM | PRO) | RADAR (PREMIUM | PRO) | BUOY/SHIP OBS

ORIGINAL REPORT: AccuWeather On-Location Video now available at right. The waves, surge and damage continues in the Galveston area of the Texas Coast. I am uploading new raw videos to the right and monitoring local and national news to report "J's Breaking Weather News" which you can see on your right. Here's a RadarPlus shot from 3:30 PM as Ike starts to appear on the northeast Texas radars.