On satellite, Hurricane Sandy appeared somewhat disheveled. Massive, but weakened, as if it was being pulled apart by the forces around it.

Along the New Jersey Shore, some were already dismissing it, vowing to ignore evacuation orders and ride it out. After all, Tropical Storm Irene wasn’t that bad.

Make no mistake: You have not seen a storm like this.

It is not Irene. It is not the Ash Wednesday Storm of 1962. It is not the Long Island Express hurricane of 1938.

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HURRICANE SANDY UPDATE



STATUS: Sandy remained a Category 1 hurricane as of 11 a.m. Sunday

STRENGTH: Maximum sustained winds of 75 mph; 951 mb pressure (stronger than it was last night)

LOCATION: Center of the storm was 250 miles southeast of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, and 575 miles south of New York City, as of 11 a.m. Sunday

SPEED & DIRECTION: Moving northeast at 14 mph

OUTLOOK: Sandy is expected to continue tracking northeast, parallel to the East Coast. Winds are expected to be near-hurricane force at landfall Monday night, and the hurricane is expected to bring life-threatening flooding from the storm surge along the mid-Atlantic coast.

Source: National Hurricane Center

These are some of the worst storms in state history, and forecasters say Sandy could beat them all.

"The message we’re trying to get out to people is, no matter how old they are, they’ve never seen this before," said Gary Szatkowski, meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service. "If they’re relying on past experiences, it is not going to serve them well. We want you to be out of harm’s way."

Sandy was a Category 1 hurricane last night, with winds of 75 miles per hour, churning north-northeast off the Georgia/South Carolina coast. Tropical storm-force winds were extending 450 miles from the center and expanding. Its cloud cover stretched from the Bahamas to Maine.

In the next 24 hours, it is forecast to be pulled back toward the coast by an approaching cold front, and rapidly intensify and expand before making a beeline for the New Jersey coast, eventually making landfall sometime Monday night, according to the most recent forecast guidance.

As it does, more than 60 million people will be in its path. Coastal flood records in New Jersey and Delaware could be shattered. Millions could lose power.

"This is going to be one of the worst storms in decades, perhaps a century, to come into the Mid-Atlantic states from the Southeast," said Henry Margusity, a senior meteorologist at Accuweather.

A VAST SCOPE

"Potential" is a key word in this forecast. The exact track and intensity of the storm as it nears the coast will be crucial to dictating where the most severe impacts occur. But Sandy is expected to affect a vast area — by Tuesday, tropical storm-force wind gusts could be felt as far west as Ohio — and with New Jersey firmly in its cross hairs, it is unlikely the state will avoid major impacts.

"We’re running out of options here," Szatkowski said. "At this point, we still know what being in the center of the bull’s-eye is like."

Sandy differs from most similar tropical systems or nor'easters New Jersey's storm-hardened residents are accustomed to dealing with, primarily because of its expected track and how it is evolving.



Most coastal storms, like Irene or a classic nor'easter, skirt across New Jersey or the immediate coastline heading northeast, often at a very quick pace. Sandy will slowly approach New Jersey from the east, potentially making a direct impact somewhere on the coast before heading inland.

Sandy also is transitioning from a tropical system to a midlatitude system, a different type of storm that draws on a different type of energy. Where tropical systems are tightly wound, storms reliant on very warm waters, midlatitude systems (a nor’easter, for example) can be expansive and thrive on energy created when warm and cold air masses collide, as is expected to occur as Sandy approaches.

If forecasts are correct, Sandy could explosively expand and deepen before it comes ashore in New Jersey. It is an extremely rare accumulation of events — one that is extremely challenging to forecast.

"That handoff, from a tropical system to a (midlatitude system), is key here," said David Robinson, the state climatologist at Rutgers University. "The devil is in the details, but those are some pretty important details."

RECORD FLOODING

Along the coast, from Delaware Bay along the entire Atlantic Coast to Raritan Bay, record-breaking tidal flooding is possible, Szatkowski said.

With a southern New Jersey landfall, as was forecast last night, storm surges along the Atlantic Coast could range from 4 to 6 feet, with 10-foot waves during Monday morning and evening’s high tides. The latter half of the range, when combined with high astronomical tides, would break records in most places and completely cut off access to the barrier islands. In the Raritan Bay, surges could reach 8 feet, he said, as water funnels itself into the smaller body of water, imperiling communities not accustomed to such unusually bad conditions.

"We should prepare for the worst-case scenario," said Phillip Orton, a research scientist at Steven Institute of technology who studies storm surge. "At that end, we’re looking at a 100- to 500-year flood. So, really, really bad."

The entire state could get tropical storm-force winds for more than 24 hours, beginning as early as Monday morning. Gusts could be higher than 75 miles per hour in some places. Such a consistent battering could easily bring down power lines and trees, and utility officials are warning residents to be prepared to be without power for days.

The National Weather Service said flash flooding is likely, but river flooding is something of a wild card. Current forecasts call for 2-6 inches of rain across the state, with heavier amounts in the south.

That could spare New Jersey from major river flooding experienced during Irene, but Robinson said the exact totals could be higher. "This is such an unusual breed of storm that you wonder if (those totals) will hold," he said.

Szatkowski knows the storm could be different from the forecast, that the vagaries of weather forecasting could ultimately prove that he and other forecasters feverishly examining data on Sandy are wrong. He’s fine with that, he says. In fact, he hopes he’s wrong.



Related coverage for Hurricane Sandy:

• New Jerseyans recalling Irene stock up on supplies, again, this time for Sandy

• VIDEO: JCP&L prepares for Hurricane Sandy's onslaught

• Hurricane Sandy update: Tolls suspended on northbound Parkway, westbound AC Expressway