Those in Ike's path

[Lisa in Katy]

Hopefully your cousin in Kemah has evacuated. All roads there are under water. The winds here are only about 35 mph right now, but gusty. It is raining pretty heavy on the south side of Houston. There are about 315,000 customers in the area without power. Katy is supposed to be on the good side of the storm. The Coast Guard has set up a staging area in our school district's multipurpose center. They warned people days ago, issued mandatory evacuations, sent hordes of buses down, sent ambulances for those who needed it, knocked on doors, and yet 40% of Galveston residents still refused to evacuate. They rescued several people by boat this afternoon. It just goes to show that no matter what the government does or doesn't do, there will still be those who are simply hard headed. Now that it's dark, there are people calling for rescues, but it's too late. It would be dangerous for the rescuers at this point. The mayor of Galveston has asked people to write their social security numbers on their arms in magic marker! I can't imagine doing that, and not thinking of the reason why I am being asked to do so!

Anyway, I'm going to bed. When I wake up in the morning, we should be on the back side of the storm. Hopefully I will have electricity and water. Otherwise they are predicting weeks before all power is restored. Do you know what Texas is like in early September? Not to mention the mosquitoes that will soon follow!

 

[BDMc]

Lisa, Thanks for the reports. I saw a post on a sailing forum this afternoon. A guy that had his shop washed out in one of the hurricanes (Katrina?), just had it washed out again from Ike. The surprise is, he is in Florida! Very scary. Brian

 

[aussigal]

I hope you stayed safe last night Texan friends. Though from what we have seen on TV Ike is mighty wide and apparently as big as Texas...I saw the stories and live video etc on TV today of when this hurricane made landfall. It was early Saturday afternoon in Aus. Why do these cyclones/hurricanes tend to make landfall in the middle of the night?.
My prayers are with you guys and all who will suffer from Ike.

 

[Cooker]

It appears bad ... you Texas folks hold on!!! .... prayers in route

 

[EVELYN]

Hi All

I've been following this storm through the night. My prayers are with you all. I can't imagaine NOT evacuating a place like Galveston. So many are without power. May God Bless you all. The good thing is it will look better....or worse....in the daylight when Ike has moved on.

Evelyn

 

[skeptic49]

WOW! The flooding in downtown Galveston looks horrible! The Texans are in my thoughts this morning.

Jim

 

[WayneGM]

Best wishes to all you Texans. I hope you are all safe and sound.

 

[zipper2]

This is terrible on the news and with the flooding
just terrible and oh my goodness continued prayer
for all of you to remain safe in this mess.
I am so sorry you have to go through this monster.

zipper2 (DEB)

 

[Freddie]

This is terrible on the news and with the flooding
just terrible and oh my goodness continued prayer
for all of you to remain safe in this mess.
I am so sorry you have to go through this monster.

zipper2 (DEB)

Zipper took the words right out of my mouth.

For those of you who have stayed, Please be careful and be safe and try to keep into touch.

Many prayers.

 

[geebee]

My BIL and his family live in Houston and they lost power even before the storm hit - apparently the power company turned off some residential service to prevent overloads.

We have not been able to reach him since around midnight so I am hoping all is well. I am guessing some cell towers are down.

Prayers going out to everyone.

 

[Lisa in Katy]

We lost power about 3:30 this morning and are still without. I'm at my sister's right now. Lost some shingles, lots of limbs down, other than that okay. Some of the houses in our neighborhood are down to plywood roofs, so we were lucky. I'll let you know more later.

 

[Jackie]

Prayers and best wishes to everybody.

 

[marie]

We came through just fine here but how horrible in Galveston and those areas that got hit so hard. Hope everyone is OK

We had lots of tornado warnings, some rain and high wind gust. A tornado touched down about 30 or 40 miles from here destroying 10 homes and killing two people. Not nearly the damages and probable loss of lives we are seeing on TV. in the Texas area

Thanks for all of your thoughts and prayers

 

[Ross]

I've been tied up with my own personal hurricaine and haven't got to respond here. Prayers to all of you. I have many friends in and around Galveston and Houston and pray they are safe.

 

[catwoman]

Lisa:

Glad to hear that you're OK.

My friends in Galveston survived the night. Their roof (new, I was told) failed, master bedroom ceiling has collapsed. The e-mail I read said they had 5' of water in the house at one time, another place said 1'. No power, of course.
Put a query on another website for friends in Clear Lake, just north of Galveston, near Kemah.

My firefighter/EMT nephew-in-law is in a convoy en route from San Antonio to Beaumont to assist in search and rescue. He's been able to check in with my niece several times.

 

[ShezaGirlie]

stay safe out there folks..!

stay safe out there folks..!

At the end of the day, Ike totally missed us -- no rain, no wind -- just hot and humid. We've got friends/relatives who are without electricity and it's HOT in Houston and Tyler. Sad part is the electricity won't be back on for some time..

We were about town - New Braunfels - while ago and a flashing sign on IH35 said, "Hotels/Shelters full in town - go to Port San Antonio". People are coming in droves now because of no electricity/water/public services..

Our fuel is still reasonable at $3.69/gallon...., but isn't it a sad day when one refers to that price as 'reasonable'... Wonder how long that'll last..

Have y'all seen Anderson Cooper of CNN standing in that waist deep water with his rubber britches on.....wonder what he'd do if a water moccasin got in there with him...

 

[Lisa in Katy]

WE HAVE POWER! WE HAVE AIR CONDITIONING! WE HAVE ANTS AND MOSQUITOES!

The power was off from about 3:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. At least the meat didn't defrost. The house was pretty musty smelling there for awhile though. Of course we "worship" our air conditioning, but we still take it for granted. Prior to our power coming on, my mom and I drove around town to enjoy the air conditioning in the car and saw lots of downed trees and severely damaged roofs. We were definitely lucky.

Thanks for all the prayers. I don't guess I will be needing my FEMA check, but if they come by and offer it, I'm not turning it down! I'll use it for the shingles. (or maybe a Coach purse like some of those New Orleans residents did!).

 

[Phyllis]

So glad you are okay, Janie. We couldn't believe Anderson Cooper either- Dick kept yelling, "Get out of the water, already!"

 

[Dina]

Used to go to Galveston every Saturday when I lived in Houston.
Alot of happy memories.Galveston enriched my life as a kid.
Now I am praying for everyone there. Very sad.
Glad that most of our VR people in the area seem to be okay
--Dina

 

[marie]

Jay is a close friend of our family and is a camera person for CNN. We saw him on Thursday and he was on his way to Houston for Ike

http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2008/09/13/swaying-in-the-wind/