Piers destroyed, bay flooding almost all the way to the seawall, basement of convention center presently filing with water, several fires reported across the area, masonry walls have been knocked over by the winds and shattered. Several hotels report the loss of roof integrity, emergency mangers are not planning on meeting until noon today to even begin to assess the damage. All of the emergency vehicles are presently stored in the convention center floor and will likely not be leaving until daybreak at the soonest - the back half of the eyewall should be impacting Galveston in about an hour and a half, maybe a bit sooner, as the radar profiles indicate a northward motion right now - which could keep Galveston in high winds far longer than expected.
Further flooding from the bay is expected as the backhalf of the eyewall impacts them, likely resulting in as much damage as the high winds that are expected.
I'm trolling the Internet for blogs. I'll let you know if I find anything.
Meanwhile, there's this from the Houston Chronicle..
Smiley N. Pool Chronicle
Stranded Galveston residents call in vain for help
As Hurricane Ike pushed a swelling surge onto Galveston Island this morning, many of the estimated 23,000 Galveston residents who ignored a mandatory evacuation order phoned for rescues to no avail because emergency workers were called off the streets, officials said.
Help wasn't expected until after dangerous storm conditions subsided.
"We don't know what we're going to find tomorrow," said the city's mayor, Lyda Ann Thomas. "We hope we'll find that the people who didn't leave here are alive and well."
City Manager Steve LeBlanc went so far as to ask the media not to photograph "certain things" in the aftermath, referring to the possibility of dead bodies.
