Posted on 09/12/2008 11:29:13 PM PDT by NautiNurse
The eyewall of Hurricane Ike crossed Galveston Island in the early hours of Saturday morning. Reports indicate as many as 20,000 residents of Galveston Island chose not to evacuate as storm surge engulfed the island. The Freeport Chief of Police reported as many as 2000 residents did not evacuate as flood waters swamped coastal communities. There are widespread reports of power outages and coastal flooding throughout the Texas/Louisiana region. The U.S. Coast Guard received hundreds of calls Friday afternoon to rescue people stranded by flood waters along the barrier islands and Galveston Bay communities.
Multiple fires broke out in the Greater Houston area fueled by strong winds. Fire fighting efforts were hampered by flood waters. Brennan's Restaurant, a landmark in Houston, burned to the ground. A 584-foot freighter crippled in the Gulf of Mexico and its crew of 22 survived the storm after The U.S. Coast Guard was forced to abort rescue efforts Friday afternoon due to foul weather
Gulf Coast wholesale gasoline prices jumped to nearly $5 a gallon over fears that water and wind damage could keep the facilities closed for days or longer. Oil companies had shut down 97.5 percent of production in the Gulf of Mexico by Friday morning and were battening down refineries and petrochemical plants in an area that accounts for one-fifth of U.S. refining capacity.
Exxon Mobil reported evacuating workers from its Gulf Coast offshore platforms and onshore facilities in the anticipated path of Ike, shutting down daily production of about 36,000 barrels of oil and 270 million cubic feet of gas..
Public Advisory Updated every 3 hours
Discussion Updated every 6 hours
Buoy data: Western Gulf of Mexico
Houston/Galveston Long Range Radar
Corpus Christi Long Range Radar
Brownsville Long Range Radar
Lake Charles Long Range Radar
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Additional Resources:
Navy Tropical Cyclone
Storm Pulse Very cool site
KHOU Houston
ABC 13 News Houston
FOX News Houston
KPLC Lake Charles
KFDM 6 Beaumont/Port Arthur
KKBMT 12 Beaumont
KRIS-TV Corpus Christi
KZTV Corpus Christi
Brazoria County Emergency Management
Galveston County Emergency Management
Chambers Country Emergency Management
Liberty County Emergency Management
| Category | Wind Speed | Barometric Pressure | Storm Surge | Damage Potential |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tropical Depression |
< 39 mph < 34 kts |
Minimal | ||
| Tropical Storm |
39 - 73 mph 34 - 63 kts |
Minimal | ||
| Hurricane 1 (Weak) |
74 - 95 mph 64 - 82 kts |
28.94" or more 980.02 mb or more |
4.0' - 5.0' 1.2 m - 1.5 m |
Minimal damage to vegetation |
| Hurricane 2 (Moderate) |
96 - 110 mph 83 - 95 kts |
28.50" - 28.93" 965.12 mb - 979.68 mb |
6.0' - 8.0' 1.8 m - 2.4 m |
Moderate damage to houses |
| Hurricane 3 (Strong) |
111 - 130 mph 96 - 112 kts |
27.91" - 28.49" 945.14 mb - 964.78 mb |
9.0' - 12.0' 2.7 m - 3.7 m |
Extensive damage to small buildings |
| Hurricane 4 (Very strong) |
131 - 155 mph 113 - 135 kts |
27.17" - 27.90" 920.08 mb - 944.80 mb |
13.0' - 18.0' 3.9 m - 5.5 m |
Extreme structural damage |
| Hurricane 5 (Devastating) |
Greater than 155 mph Greater than 135 kts |
Less than 27.17" Less than 920.08 mb |
Greater than 18.0' Greater than 5.5m |
Catastrophic building failures possible |
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Previous Threads:
Hurricane Ike Live Thread III
Hurricane Ike Live Thread II
Hurricane Ike Live Thread I
TS Hanna, Hurricane Ike & TS Josephine [Other than that, the tropics are calm]
Tropical Storms Hanna, Ike and Josephine, TD Gustav (Other than that, the tropics are calm)
[chuckles] Yup, he’s a Texan.
Contrast that to all the whiny Louisianans in New Orleans after Katrina.
Texas is going to be okay. :D
I believe they were from San Antonio. I saw Blackhawks headed out of there on the news this morning.
I’m thinking they might use soldiers from Hood for stuff in Houston and north of there.
I saw 4 Black Hawks fly over on Friday. Looked like they were traveling from Ft. Hood to the coast. I’m just north of Austin.
ST, I have a niece who lives in Galveston and evacuated. Her next door neighbor, an elderly, stuborn, widower decided to stay. She was flodding in her single story home and retreated to my nieces home yesterday afternoon. No word on how she fared. Am cautiously optomistic because the flooding wasn’t as severe as they predicted.
If you see any Chinooks, it might be my nephew. Wave hello!
Yes, there was hype. Yes, we were very concerned when we heard learned officials say these people who stayed in Galveston faced certain death. Who knows how many people were saved because of this "hype"?
If people had remained in the beach side dwellings that were completely demolished, they would have died. No question about it. Did they listen to the "hype"?
The eye of the storm gave some the opportunity to relocate to safer positions. They under-estimated Mother Nature.
But then, it's a small miracle no more were killed that we know of so far. We're not red-faced over the "hype". We are thankful that it wasn't as bad as it could have been.
Hype? Ask those who stayed behind in Galveston if they would still ride out the storm in the next major Hurricane? Wanna bet what their answer will be?
sw
I saw on the news earlier a woman in an upstairs apartment that stayed. She had her head on her arms on the balcony and looked worn out. The reporter asked her how it went last night. he said she told him “it wasn’t that bad”
Here we go again. Just because you don't use search engines and exercise standard research of the literature methods doesn't mean it isn't so.
As in every catastrophe, priority #1 is search and rescue. In this case, there were thousands of 911 calls during the storm. Many were due to rising water where people sheltered in, rather than evacuate. In one case, there were 45-50 people in a building. Others were ones and twos calling 911 for rescue. There were multiple dwelling fires.
After search and rescue has been exhausted, then recovery of the deceased is the priority.
Search and rescue/recovery efforts will take days to complete due to flooding and the vast expanse of area to cover.
Why do you insist everything is hype, when someone who uses the handle "Old Professor" doesn't use due diligence with research?
American Medical Response Co, a private company, has dispatched a fleet of ambulances from around the country from as far away as Los Angeles, some of which are already there in Galveston waiting to haul off patients from UTMB Galveston as well as any rescuees.
KHOU’s studio generator has gone offline, so their studio is offline - the Galveston field reporters are now taking over the air until they go back online.
Excellent point. If only people that understand that concept could run things everywhere, we might be able to get back to rugged independence and self reliance in this country!
I found it had far better coverage, with minimal hype, that all the others.
I did flip to Fox once, just in time to catch Whoraldo being taken out by a wave. :)
I’d heard that that and “It could have been worse.” is a common reaction by those that weren’t forced to displace during the storm.
I think the collective memory of 1900 is still with us. It could have been worse - and in 1900 it was.
Those were the people with the store owner, right? Has anyone heard anything about how they fared? I believe he said the store was 3 stories.
Among those rescued was Wesley Moore, 53, a landscaper who got off the chopper wearing noting but a sheet wrapped around his waist.
"I was going to stay over there like I always done. Thirty years, never had anything like this," Moore said. "When the storm surge came in, it started taking out the front row of houses, and it was like a domino effect."
Shortly after midnight, he said, a huge wave slammed another house into his. The floor buckled, the door busted in "and I couldn't get out of there fast enough." Moore said.
"I swam, I treaded water. I found a tree and I just stayed there." He said his pants snagged on a branch and he lost them together with his identification, drivers license and all his keys. "Since then I been buck naked," he said.
Connie Travis, 53, of Dallas, was also plucked from rising waters of Crystal Beach by a Coast Guard helicopter, along with her husband, Doug, and son, Mattew Nez. They were taken to emergency shelter in Texas City.
"The whole island is under water," Travis said of the peninsula where Crystal Beach is located. "It's total destruction. Everything that was on the ground is washed away."
The Travises, who went to Crystal Beach to board up their house, which sits on stilts, stayed too long and were trapped by rising water around noon on Friday. At one point, the storm surge slammed a nearby house into theirs.
As the nightmare dragged on, another son told her by text message that he had alerted the Coast Guard. "They know you're there," the son messaged. "They're coming to get you.
http://www.usatoday.com/weather/hurricane/2008-09-13-hurricane-ike-texas_N.htm
That's a really good question. What really steers the storms is the jet stream. I don't know if Ike is going to destroy the frontal line or not. There's not usually much mixing of cold and warm air at the fronts so that seems unlikely.
The cold air is denser than the warm and will push underneath it, as it always does, so in a way, the front will steer Ike by preventing it from going north at the surface, the jet stream will take care of the steering aloft.
The lifting that the cold air will provide to that huge, wet, warm air mass will wring a lot of moisture out of it. The difference in temperature and moisture between the two air masses is what provides the fuel for the severe thunderstorms and tornadoes. That's part of the reason I suspect there's so much in the way of tornado warnings. The front could do it alone, and so could Ike, but together, I think it'll increase the risk.
I guess we need to continue to pray for the safety of those in Ike's path. There's still the potential for a lot of death due to tornadoes.
The jet stream map here shows the storm being pushed a little south as it nears NY. It could be that that will lift by Mon.
Brings to mind that old saying...the best two days for a boat owner are the day you buy it, and the day you get rid of it (in most cases, the latter means selling the vessel)...
National Weather Online.com (apparently AP?) has a video of Galveston’s damage here:
http://headlines.nationalweatheronline.com/2008/09/galveston-clean.html
posted a little after 8 p.m. central time
“The city was spared major damage, with a few exceptions.” Some businesses on Seawall Blvd look pretty bad.
Yeah, that was worth watching. I was hoping that (as someone else put it) a 120mph-wind-borne starfish could come along and clock him upside the head. :D
Nothing official yet, really
they’re still trying to do simple search and rescue of the most obvious
Some of the rescued have said “Crystal Beach is gone . Bolivar is gone.” Another town, too
Convinced many of those who stayed with them went with the town. I mean, really convinced. NOTHING official, though - all anecdotal.
Some of the old timers are pretty stout. Wife’s grandmother evac’ed for the first time, because she’s in a nursing home now, not out of choice. She’s 98.
Will put her in my prayers.
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