Hurricane fatigue set in, so I’m horrified to admit now that I haven’t followed the latest developments on Hurricane Rita. Until I heard this morning that it had been upgraded to a Category 5 storm, headed directly towards Houston. That’s where my Ammi lives!!
Several desperate phone calls later, Ammi intrepidly reports from my sister’s place in California:
They evacuated people from Galvaston and Corpus Christi. And they told people living near the coast, or near the bayous to leave. For everyone else, they kept saying not to panic…but if you can leave, go. But not to panic..it was really confusing.
Rita was downgraded to a Katrina-level Category 4 a few hours ago:
The National Hurricane Centre said the path of Rita, with top winds dropping slightly to 265 kph and is now a Category 4 storm, had shifted toward the north. It appeared to be headed toward Galveston and Houston…forecast to hit Texas as no less than a Category 3 storm with winds of up to 209 kph.
1.3 million Texans told to evacuate…Bumper-to-bumper traffic jams filled the region’s highways. Area stores were scrambling to keep supplies on the shelves while gas stations with fuel to sell dwindled to a precious few.
Maj. Gen. Charles Rodriguez of the Texas National Guard told CNN they have 3,500 troops on the ground and expect to have 5,000 by Friday evening and Saturday morning.[link]
Lessons learned:
Along the Gulf Coast, federal, state and local officials heeded the bitter lessons of Katrina: Hundreds of buses were dispatched to evacuate the poor. Hospital and nursing home patients were cleared out. And truckloads of water, ice and ready-made meals as well as rescue and medical teams were put on standby. [link]
But still confusion:
Houston Mayor Bill White said passengers should plan for waits of at least four hours at airports because of the failure of Transportation Security Administration employees to show up for work…At William P. Hobby Airport, some airline employees said only two TSA screeners were at work this morning.[link]
My mom asks us to pray for those who couldn’t leave. And please don’t forget to donate to the Red Cross.
Update: Officials STILL can’t get it right:
As many as 2.5 million people jammed evacuation routes on Thursday, creating colossal 100-mile-long traffic jams that left many people stranded and out of gas…[Mayor] White and the top official in Harris County, Judge Robert Eckels, admitted that their plans had not anticipated the volume of traffic. They maintained that they had not urged such a widespread evacuation, although only a day earlier they invoked the specter of Hurricane Katrina, and told residents that the “time for waiting was over.”
Officials also made matters worse for themselves by announcing at one point that they would use inbound lanes on one highway to ease the outbound crush, only to abort the plan later, saying it was impractical…
Noting the difficulty medical examiners have had in identifying the dead from Hurricane Katrina, [LA Gov. Kathleen] Blanco offered morbid advice to those who refuse to evacuate. “Perhaps they should write their Social Security numbers on their arms in indelible ink.” [link]
What the hell is wrong with these people! Why on earth weren’t they reviewing evacuation plans for Houston the minute things went to hell in New Orleans? My mom lives near a bayou and the roads flood whenever a storm hits. She even had to bail out of her car once. Houstonians, please share your worries and concerns in the comments. We will keep you in our thoughts and prayers.
