Posts Tagged natural disaster
Hurricane Rita Review
When Hurricane Rita made landfall it was the fourth-most intense Atlantic Hurricane ever recorded and the most intense tropical cyclone ever observed in the Gulf of Mexico. After Rita made landfall in southeast Texas and southwest Louisiana, the storm caused $11.3 billion in damage.
The following story is my personal account of the days right before Rita made landfall, lessons learned, the actual landfall and the following days.
Wednesday morning it looked like Rita might hit Houston so my ex wife brought my youngest kids ages 9 and 11 to Bridge City Texas where my parents live, from there they (my kids and parents, not exwife) were going to evacuate to Jasper – to my house. Wednesday noon my 16 year old calls me, ask me to drive to Houston to get him out, my ex did not ask him if he wanted to leave before she left with the youngest children. At this time there was a voluntary evacuation of parts of lower Houston, Galveston area. So I left Jasper, drove to Houston, really the Bay town area to get my son.
1st lesson, have a full tank of gas going in and a plan for getting out.
Going into Houston was easy, everyone was going north – I was one of the few idiots going south. I was on HWY 96 headed south through Lumberton. Traffic was backed up through the entire city of Lumberton – 3 miles or so and 4 red lights. At this point I knew I was not going to be able to get back on HWY 96 north. I got on the phone with my wife, asked her to get on the internet – map quest, yahoo maps anything, and call her friends to see if they knew a way out of Houston using the back roads – she had about 2 hours till I needed the information. Going through Beaumont where 69-96 joins I-10, traffic was backed up for miles. This confirmed what I already knew, I was not going to be able to get out via I-10. Got to baytown, the Texas Department of Safety (DPS) and Highway Department had closed the exit I needed to take in order to get into bay town, had to go down 2 more exits, then back track. Got my son, got out to I-10 in Houston heading East. Traffic was crawling, I mean crawling because of construction at the San Jacinto River. My wife was able to get directions for me using the back roads. Once I got out of the construction zone, got off I-10 it was smooth sailing. I was one of 3 trucks for about 20 minutes.
2nd lesson, KNOW the back roads – this will be very important later in the story.
80 years old and starting over
80 years old and starting over, that was the sad reality of the facts. There was no denying that around 5 feet of flood water had gotten into the house and there was no denying that the couple did not have flood insurance. The hard wood flooring that everyone had liked so much, after the water went down the flooring swelled and split the walls. There was so much pressure generated from the swelling wood floors, that not only did the walls split, but some of them were pushed off the concert slab.
Having lived in Bridge City for most of their lives, neither the husband nor the wife had ever heard of the type of flooding that was on the way. Hurricane Ike was like a dark cloud in the distance, almost like a bad dream, but this dream was real. For decades Southeast Texas had avoided the critical strike of a major Hurricane.
In 1969, Hurricane Camille made landfall near the mouth of the Mississippi River.
In August of 1992, Hurricane Andrew was working its way towards Southeast Texas and Southwest Louisiana. But the wind currents turned Andrew to the North, and Andrew Made landfall around Morgan City, Louisiana.
In August of 2005, Hurricane Katrina made landfall in the New Orleans area.
Hurricane Ike Aftermath
These pictures were taken in Bridge City, Texas after Hurricane Ike made landfall in Galveston, Texas. Using Google Earth, and measuring from where these pictures were taken, its estimated that 20 miles inland, there was about a 14 – 15 foot storm surge. This is not a scientific measurement, its just an estimate.
How the storm surge was estimated – my parents house is is about 4 feet above sea level and they got over 9 feet of water in their house. This picture was taken 3 days after Hurricane Ike made landfall and the flood waters had receded about 7 – 8 feet.
Bridge City Texas Hurricane Ike
Barricaded store fronts during a disaster
When some type of disaster occurs, the owners of a store will take measures to protect their business and their property. A lot of places like wal-mart will stack bales of compressed cardboard in front of the doors.
These blocks of compressed cardboard act as a barricade to help stop people from driving cars or trucks through the front doors. Most of the time the front doors of these large stores will be made of glass – which offer little to no protection from a car or truck. During the Rodney King riots, some store owners also used these blocks of cardboard as bullet stops. Its kinda difficult for a bullet to penetrate 3 – 4 feet of compressed cardboard. The store owners were able to band together behind these blocks of cardboard, and stop the crowds of looters from destroying their stores .
This video was filmed just before Hurricane Ike made landfall in Galveston, Texas.
This video shows a real life example of some of the measures that store owners will take to protect their property. This is not a fault of the store owner, the items inside the store is their property and they have the right to defend it.
These bundles of cardboard are best moved by a forklift, or wrap a chain around it and drag it to the desired location with a truck or car. Even though it weighs several hundred pounds, it is not too difficult to move with a little help. If hand power must be used to move the bundle of cardboard, use jacks to get it off the ground, then get some pipes under the block. Then just roll the block on top of the pipes.
Hurricane Gustav – Part 1
As Hurricane Gustav approaches the coast of Louisiana and Texas, its time to start preparing. One of the first concerns is fuel for the generator. Gasoline is usually one of the first things to disappear, so its important to stock up while you can.
Even if your area is not directly affected by the disaster, if other people evacuate through your area, those people will clean out the gasoline supply. So if you live along a major (or minor) evacuation route, its important to stockpile fuel before the supply in your area dries up.
Instead of using 5 gallon gas cans, consider using 16 gallon drums. These are still movable by one person, but take the place of 3 – 5 gallon drums. The drums in the video held some type of syrup used for making DR. Pepper. These 16 gallon drums need to be bought in advance of any kind of disaster, washed out with soap and water to remove the syrup and allowed to dry.