Margie,

I was not going to say it, but I will anyway, there was nothing to keep Rita from intesnifying like she did as well as kATRIna, that is RITA inside her. I said yesterday that I expected Rita to be a CAT4 by 48 HRS, well it has been only 24 HRS. I my memory serves me right, it was you who commented that there was no way the Rita would gather strength like she did due to the fact that the SST's were too low. Well, the water temps being reported all over the Gulf are well above 86 degrees. Hopefully for Texas Rita will start to diminish prior to landfall, but I don't see it in the forecast. It is never what you want to report, due to what Katrina left behind. There is no way knowing what she is going to do, and again, if the ridge slides east and weakens, then N.O is not out of the woods yet, only till Rita crosses that Longitude.

Rita's letters being inside of Katrina has nothing to do with its intensity. The sea surface temperatures are still warm, but they are not everything. That's what myself and many others, including Margie, have been looking at to try to diagnose the future intensity of the storm. Just because Katrina did one thing does not mean that Rita will do the same. -Clark