It is amazing what the high winds can do. Talked to my brother briefly this weekend and he told me that when they were getting the really high sustained winds from (most likely the eyewall or just to the east of) Katrina, that he saw a large roof lift off of a BP gas station and then fly along as if it was a rock being skipped on a pond. Afterwards when he was in the westernmost part of the county he saw a lot of evidence of extreme winds, really odd things.

Roofs seem to be constructed so that they stay in one piece. I saw many roofs from the NOAA images that had been pushed just past the debris line, from houses the surge had demolished.

Also - in Gov Barbour's recent speech to the state legislature, he spoke of 35 foot storm surge from Katrina. Anyone hear any official numbers to support anything over 30 feet?