Rita Update + Oil Rig Cam

RITA UPDATE: 00Z Wednesday (8 p.m. Tuesday): Buoy SANF1 (CURRENT | ARCHIVED) recently reported a gust of 79 mph as it passed through the eyewall. Also the government's National Hurricane Center reports: "AN UNOFFICIAL REPORT FROM A HAM RADIO OPERATOR INDICATED SUSTAINED WINDS OF 75 MPH WITH GUSTS TO 102 MPH WERE MEASURED BY WIND EQUIPMENT IN THE KEY WEST AREA."

The NHC also says: "RITA WILL PASS CLOSE ENOUGH FOR THE NORTHERN PORTION OF THE EYEWALL TO MOVE OVER OR JUST SOUTH OF THE DRY TORTUGAS." That means that we'll be seeing some action soon on DRYF1 (CURRENT | ARCHIVED), the buoy near the Dry Tortugas (see previous blog postings on them). In fact at 8 p.m. it's already gusting to 64 mph with pressure plummeting.

I have to give credit to Carl for stumbling onto this one: One of the oil rigs in the Gulf (that just happens to be in the path of Hurricane Rita) has a webcam running on it. Can you believe that? Below is a sample image, click on it to see the real thing.

Interestingly enough, it isn't the only one. There's an oil rig cam off the shore of the U.K.. There used to be one here off the coast of Maine but it doesn't appear to be working anymore.

Equally as hard and expensive to operate, but much less likely to be found in the path of a hurricane, are the more popular Cruise Ship Bridge Cams.

I'm a huge weather cam / webcam fan, always have been. It probably comes from running one of the first personal cams on the net back in '95 and having run weather cams at my house for 8 years.

I think there should be a weather camera on every corner.

This year I even ran an experimental wireless (PDA) cam in the car on vacation and a wireless laptop cam while I was on vacation. I've even envisioned a Cat Cam and a Hat Cam (as of yet, I haven't had time to work on them).