Although the latest forecast has Tropical Storm Isaac fading to the western Gulf of Mexico, most meteorologists aren't ready to say that Tampa is out of the woods — the storm could still remain big enough to bring inclement weather to the Bay area during the Republican National Convention.
But don't tell that to Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn, who looked positively giddy during a short interview with MSNBC's Tamron Hall on Thursday afternoon.
"We couldn't be more excited," said the Mayor, going into his now familiar recitation of how this is "Tampa's time to shine."
But Hall quickly brought Buckhorn back to his now infamous comment that he wouldn't hesitate to call off the convention — not that it's his call alone.
"That was a hypothetical question involving a much more serious storm than what we're looking at right now," Buckhorn told Hall. "I mean if you had a Cat 3 or Cat 5 storm, I think everyone would come to the same conclusion. But that's not the situation we find ourselves in right now. This storm looks as though it is going to be heading off to the Gulf of Mexico. We may have one day of some rain and some wind, but a Category 1 storm 100 miles off the coast of Tampa is really not a cause for a lot of concern."
This article appears in Aug 23-29, 2012.