Sunday notes

It was a beautifully sunny day in Stornoway with hardly a cloud in the sky. The temperature reached 11C, but is close to freezing at the moment. It is November and the nights are getting cold. Had a quiet day, watching television and mostly being on the Net only to post the updates on Hurricane Ida.

If you are worried about Hurricane Ida, please keep a very close eye on the forecasts. The storm will approach the northern Gulf Coast last Monday / early Tuesday, but will be in the process of turning into a non-tropical area of low pressure. The forecasters are having one heck of a job with the predictions. Rainfall will probably the worst problem, as up to 8 inches could fall in the eastern Tennessee Valley and the southern Appalachian Mountains.

Remembrance Sunday today - Armistice Day will be on Wednesday. It will be 91 years since the guns fell silent at the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month of the year 1918. As you may remember, I keep a website, listing the Fallen from the Isle of Lewis. I am preparing a publication of that information in book form, which I hope to go live with on Wednesday. Part of the proceeds of any sales will go to the Royal British Legion in Stornoway.

Hurricane update - 8 November

Hurricane Ida is currently approaching Cancun in the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico, with winds near its core of 90 to 110 mph. The storm will strengthen a little more, but by tomorrow, atmospheric conditions will deteriorate. Ida is expected to head north towards New Orleans, but be barely at hurricane strength upon nearing that city on Tuesday. This system is not expected to make landfall on the mainland of the United States, but instead turn into a non-tropical depression, but still with stormforce winds (force 10 to 11 on the Beaufort scale).

Follow the NHC output for 3 hourly updates.

Sunday 8 November

Remembrance Sunday. As I type, a service of Remembrance is underway up at the Lewis War Memorial. The 1,300 men lost in the First World War and more than 400 in the Second World War will be remembered. All the war dead of the United Kingdom are remembered today, up and down the land. It was said on TV this morning that the line of those, fallen in war service, would stretch from Edinburgh to London, a good 400 miles.

More later.