2008 hurricane season DVD

[hurricanetrack]

Greetings and Happy New Year to all.

I have finished the 2008 hurricane season DVD- titled "Tracking the Hurricanes: 2008". It is the 3rd in our series which includes 2004 and 2005. We did not have enough material to do a 2006 or 2007 edition- which no one is complaining about I am sure.

The DVD chronicles the hurricane season from my team's point of view in relation to our field work mostly. We begin with TS Cristobal on the Outer Banks of NC and then move on to Dolly in Mexico- as shot by colleague Tim Millar. We missed out on Edouard but pick up with Fay, Gustav, Hanna and Ike.

The Gustav chapter is pretty good and features Mike Watkins and myself working to place our remote camera units and our 5 meter wind tower out in the elements. It is very tough to "chase hurricanes" in Louisiana but we managed to spread ourselves from New Orleans to New Iberia- mostly by virtue of the remote camera units. We captured a huge sign getting blown over from the camera we had on our wind tower- it did not take much wind to do it.

Next up is the Ike chapter. This is by far the most compelling. Mike Watkins joined me for this mission and we worked extremely hard to make the mission a success. Our cameras worked perfect and we captured some really unique and valuable video- valuable in terms of the science we can extract from it. Using fixed cameras that record for many hours at a time is a great way to see patterns and other things that you cannot detect in real time.

The Ike chapter also shows the conditions inside the 11th floor of the San Luis hotel in Galveston. The noise from the wind was incredible. That is something we will never forget.

I end the chapter with a return trip to Texas in October where I document the damage from Port Arthur south and west to Galveston - including the devastation along the Bolivar peninsula.

The program utilizes a lot of time lapse which I find to be an effective tool. I am quite proud of the production and invite you to take a look at a teaser clip that I have posted on Youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zygJhRKqjW0

The DVD contains video and reports from Jesse Bass, Mike Watkins, Tim Millar and me.

[margiek]

The clip is very well done, with good editing, continuity, use of music and narration. The cut you selected was long enough to pique interest, and it was a good choice to stop just before Ike's landfall. I'll send a pm with some more detailed feedback.

It is too bad the clip at Bauer Street didn't do a 360-degree turn, to show the homes right at the water's edge on that narrow strip of land backed by swampy estuary and the bay. I recognised the location right away as being the inlet next to where the much-publicized "Last House Standing" is located.

[HURAKAN]

I have the 2004 & 2005 DVDs. Very interested in the 2008 DVD also. Count me in!

[hurricanetrack]

Could someone move this out of the active storms area? I goofed. It should be in the general talkin' tropics area. Thanks!

[Category 5]

Got my copy. Great job as always Mark.

Cool bonus features too.

[hurricanetrack]

I obviously want to promote the DVD as it helps with funding our work. But perhaps as important, I wish to gain feed back from people about the production as well as the content. Looking deeper in to that meaning, I hope that people realize that the 2008 hurricane season was very, very destructive and deadly. Granted, I could not be in Haiti or Cuba for the lashings they took over and over again, but most of those tropical cyclones, the ones that affected the Greater Antilles so severely, ended up along U.S. coastlines. The impact of Ike was severe- with storm surge flooding more real estate than did Katrina. Think about it- from at least Freeport, TX all the way over to the Mississippi coast, Ike flooded with storm surge.

In Texas, that surge penetrated far inland- 10s of miles in some cases. The highway (73) between Port Arthur and Winnie was submerged almost its entire length- if not the whole thing. Look on a map- that's a long way inland from the Gulf.

The Bolivar peninsula is in shambles though not the totality of destruction that we saw after Katrina along the Mississippi coast- but close enough.

Most Americans, I think, have no clue as to how bad the hurricane season really was. Why? Perhaps 2005 set the bar- perhaps a little too high. The DVD addresses this in a subtle way- without making it a political piece or one that scorns people for not paying more attention to their own country. I hope that the people who buy the DVD get a sense of not only what it's like to personally track down these hurricanes and study them, but also what their real effects are to people, the land and our perception of a region when it is all over and the national news crews go home. Any feed back is welcomed now and over the coming months.

[Category 5]

The production and content were great. I think it gives the viewer a real understanding of all the hard work you guys put in during your missions. I like how the film doesn't focus solely on the storm ravaging the coast, but it focuses on the aftermath as well, really giving those who may have never personally experienced a hurricane a good idea on how dangerous and painfully destructive they can be. Also I like how you bring the human element into it. The segment with Mark Garcia and that man who made the "snowshoes" to get to his home give people an appreciation of what these victims are going through. I think your narration is very helpful to those who aren't exactly hurricane savvy, and does a very good job explaining what we're seeing. Also the fact that you show footage from all the stages of the storm from the preparation to the aftermath gives you the feeling that you're watching the storm first hand almost.

[Jason Foster]

Mark:

If you said a comp. copy I can review it and give you some air time on my new Mogulus iTV station, and an official review on my blog.

Jason Foster
Weather Warrior Media
http://www.theweatherwarrior.com