Posted on 09/22/2005 8:37:41 PM PDT by xjcsa
HOUSTON (Reuters) - A mass evacuation ahead of Hurricane Rita became its own disaster on Thursday as traffic backed up for at least 100 miles when a million people tried to flee the Texas coast.
Tempers flared in the 97 degree Fahrenheit (36 Celsius) heat at the few gas stations that still had gas, overheated cars lined the freeways and trips that normally take 15 minutes stretched into hours.
Texas officials called for evacuation of the Houston area, including the city of Galveston, on Wednesday as Rita, now a Category 4 storm with 150 mile per hour (241.4-kph) winds, took aim from the Gulf of Mexico.
In the exodus that ensued, cars moved so slowly on Interstate 45, the main road to Dallas 240 miles north, that people had time to get out of their cars, walk to nearby stores, wait in long lines at restrooms and return to vehicles that had not moved.
Evacuee Peggy Hill told a local television station she had been on the road 20 hours, departing from League City 10 miles southeast of Houston and had not yet gotten across the nation's fourth largest city.
"I was finally able to get from Beltway 8 to Highway 290, so now we're on the 290 parking lot instead of the Beltway 8 parking lot," she said.
John Griffin, 37, Houston, his wife and two young daughters turned back to Houston after several hours on the road trying to move away from the coast.
"It's an absolute nightmare," he said. "I'm worried about the storm, but you have to pick your poison -- stay and deal with wind and rain here or get out on the road and deal with what are already catastrophic conditions on the highway. I've never seen anything like this."
Ella Corder told the Houston Chronicle in a call from her cell phone she had gone just five miles in 12 hours.
"All I want to do is go home," she said tearfully. "Can't anyone get me out of here?"
State highway officials at midday on Thursday finally shut down inbound traffic on Interstate 45 and opened all lanes to cars headed out, saying that logistical problems had prevented them from doing it before.
But traffic was so hopelessly backed up, the highways continued to be choked.
"This was not in the plan," Harris County Judge Robert Eckels said in a news conference.
Shannon Myatt, a Reuters sales executive, got caught in the traffic trying to the get the airport -- where travelers had to wait hours to get on to planes -- and said her taxi had gone 1/8 of a mile in 1 1/2 hours.
"We can't figure out why it's not moving at all," she said.
Myatt said people who did not get out and go to bathrooms in nearby stores were urinating in whatever they could find in their cars.
"They're peeing in cups and throwing it out the window. We just saw somebody do that," she said.
Officials offered no quick fixes, but said they would provide free gasoline to people who ran out of gas while waiting in the traffic.
(Additional reporting by Matt Daily and Mark Babineck)
TXDOT controls the Interstate Hwy's NOT the mayor of Houston.
So it must be all bush's fault.
Good point, but does the mayor or New Orleans control the Interstate Highways around New Orleans?
Sounds almost as bad as my daily commute to Boston.
No, it's not a failure. Having 800+ people killed in New Orleans was a failure.
I was in New Orleans, I got out, all of my family and friends got out and none of us needed the President, governor, mayor or dog catcher to save us.
Wow, please stay safe!
"I see that all of the freeways are clogged but no one is saying anything about all of the highways and backroads out of town. I suspect that all of the smart people are sneaking away on the gravel roads and not telling anyone about it"
I heard a lady Texan on Rush yesterday who said people with GPS systems were all avoiding the highways and taking back roads out. Then she went on to say, how she can't wait for the MSM to get hold of that info, so they can add it to the list of "How rich/white are always favored"
No kidding, any of these clowns ever driven I-95 around VA/DC during quitin' time??!!
I heard the New Orleans Highways were slow too during early evacuation. It was a crawl even with counterflows.
Any information about that?
It's insane.
Just about every mile of highway used for evacuating has parallel access roads.
The reason authorities stated for not setting up contra-flow immediately was to allow buses and emergency vehicles to make return trips.
But that could have been done using the access road on the inbound side, freeing up the highway portion for evacuating traffic.
It's a damn good thing Rita isn't going to be a direct hit on Houston - we are seeing that Houston, and Texas, didn't have their act together for a major evacuation.
What in the world was Peggy Hill doing in Houston? One only hopes that she had left Arlen to substitute teach espanol for a day or so.
Go home, Peggy Hill! Bobby and Hank need you. (And Bill is a mess without you!)
About time I get a reply that mentions Peggy. By the way, did your brother ever make it into the Blue Man Group?
It is official. Common Sense is dead.
Excellent points. I'm going to put together a small trailer, and leave it in my garage. I'm going to stock it with jerry cans full of gas, so we wouldn't run out, and all of our camping and survival gear, so we don't have to scramble to put it together. Just store it on the trailer, and be ready to roll.
It would be a hopeless nightmare trying to evac LA and San Diego up over the mountains. Worse than Houston-Austin by far. The highways decrease in lanes as they head up through the high passes. Talk about natural bottlenecks!
And those who make it to the top and down will run out of gas in the middle of "Death Valley" level deserts, where every drop of drinking water and gasoline will already be gone.
Thanks for asking.
Actually, it's my brother-in-law who is trying to make it into the Blue Man Group.
I'm not sure what's become of him. Of late, I've been focusing my attention of my son, his cousin, and, of course, my highly disfunctional parents -- especially Mom, who is a mess.
And, to top it all off, I'm beginning to doubt my own sanity.
I keep hearing Ron Howard's voice at the oddest times.
PistolPaknMama
Wow, please stay safe!
According to NOAA, Rita is at 27.4° north, 91.9° west. Downtown Corpus Christi is about 27.8° north. The Coriolis force causes hurricanes to steer to the northwest in the northern hemisphere. Once the eye of a storm passes my latitude, there is practically zero chance of it hitting my location. 
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