Hurricane RITA...

Rita is a CAT5 and fixin' to hit Galveston Island. Houston is gonna be close. There's no "waiting out" a CAT5 - there's nothing left from a storm that strong. Please get out and stay safe.

God bless & look after our Industry friends & their families in Rita's path.

- Joey



When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

well, as you all may know im dead center mid metro houston. i have friends well along most major ways into mid central texas. problem is that a 3 hour trip is being reported now as close to 10 hours. water has been sold out in most places since yesterday, gas lines are 90 min plus (i have a full tank), generators are sold out and good luck finding a plastic gas can

i have a deadline of tomorrow am on a print project that simply can NOT slide.

my current plan is to pack up all gear, and the studio manager (aka my cat) and head out early to mid day tomorrow.

BUT, here is my option. i have office space on the 10th floor of a 24floor building a bit west of where my house is and ive never seen a high-rise office building fold to a hurricane... anu votes???

will keep folks posted. say good prayers to whomever you choose to do so...

Good luck to you and your cat Wayne and of course all in front of Rita. Keep us posted

from what ive read here, the only LAFCP guys here are myself and jay beeson (hes in austin) and austin is where im going IF i leave... but austin is still going to get a god bit of rita action...

currently, its NUTS around here in houston! the immediate gulf area is already under mandatory evac (im 40 miles as the storm flies from there). it took me 3 stops to find a dog crate for my cat noonish this afternoon. good thing i stocked up on food and batteries yesterday. my clean water is already set and secured at 100+ gal

this will wither be a helluva video OR you guys may be freed of my bithchin' HA HA - JUST KIDDING!

Would rather have your bitchen Wayne, and leave the video to those who get paid to be stupid like your local TV news crews

i dunno, for some reason my gut is telling me more of a straight cross th'gulf path.

there is a light h-press sys right on top of mid central texas and the immediate gulf cost is signnificantly cooler than the deep gulf...

Looking at the cool Hurricane storm tracker it looks like its heading to Mexico/Brownsville.

[hurricane.terrapin.com]

Hay Wayne

If you need a place to stay in Austin
I have a extria room --
It sounds like its going to get perty bad--
My ph# is 512 -694-4514
you can call any time--Jay--

thanks jay! i have tons of family there, but maybe i'll look you up!

"...i have a deadline of tomorrow am on a print project that simply can NOT slide."

wayne,

That probably tops out as the dumbest thing I ever heard from someone staring into the eye of a CAT5. This is a ridiculous time to be a hero and complete your "deadline". It's safe to say that natural disasters qualify for a deadline push, don't you?!

A few chilling facts, folks: The National Hurricane Center / NOAA (and I am speaking as someone that sat through 3 hurricanes in Central Florida last year) forcasts the storm to hit dead-center Galveston Island with Houston right behind that - and they have never miscalculated (in my 21 years in Florida). The storm is now 175 MPH winds (CAT5) and it will be stregthening in the warm waters of the gulf for 2 more days (winds could top out over 200 MPH). Hurricane force winds are expected to carry all the way into Austin & Waco - weakening as it turns north to Dallas. Look at this:

[www.nhc.noaa.gov]

"...I've never seen a high-rise office building fold to a hurricane..."

You have never seen what 175 MPH winds & flying debris do to a concrete or brick structure. Did you see the Hyatt downtown New Orleans? Every window was blown out on every floor. Brick buildings in NO were also broken apart... and that wasn't near a CAT5.

One of my favorite things about Florida is palm trees. They are so beautiful & calming... I just love to look at them - rain or shine. I have this image burned into my head from an older hurricane that hit Puerto Rico. It is a gorgeous thick palm tree (about 30 feet tall - a few feet thick) and in the middle of it (about 12 feet up)... a 10 foot piece of 2 x 4 from a nearby house (that was reduced to splinters) was CLEANLY driven through it - piercing it like a toothpick through an olive. It sat there like a tropical crucifix. Probably one of the most disturbing pictures I ever saw. Can you imagine the raw power it took to make that happen?

[www.photolib.noaa.gov]

...and here's a pic from Hurricane Charley (that ripped through my neighborhood last year) of a sliver of aluminum driven into a palm:

[lightningboy.com]

This is no joke, dude. Pack up your computer, pick up a case of beer, go to your family's place in Austin and finish your "deadline" there. Get the hell out of Houston ASAP.

That's my 2¢

- Joey



Post Edited (09-21-05 21:13)

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

been watching tv all night. a normally 40 minute drive is taking as much as TWELVE hours. EVERY highway out of here is reporting max speeds of no more than 3MPH...

unless it gets better, before friday evening - gonna have to ride it.

It's not gonna get better. The longer you wait & watch...the worse it gets. You could have been out if you left yesterday.

Anyway - moot now. You've pretty much made up your mind so stay on the ground floor in the center of a concrete building - away from any and all glass. My whole family (Mother-In-Law too...don't ask) crammed in my little bathroom in the center of the house when Charley hit us (my son slept in the bathtub). I did manage to sneak out my front door with my little Hi8 (stupid) and get a little ftg of my oak trees bent sideways under a green sky. Looked like the end of the world was coming.

Good luck.

- Joey



When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

as it stands now, it looks like the storm is bending N, NE which although will probably flatten all the small towns between here and new orleans - will mean that houston takes the softer side.

and TXDOT is rumored to be opening contraflow lanes which will double the outgoing traffic capacity...

nothing like a little bit of drama to add some flare to ones end of week!

thankfully we dodged a big bullet. everything here in houston is pretty much ok, just a lot of downed limbs, power outages and missing fences. my property suffered no damage at all and my power was back up by 4pm today. and its actually turned into a very pretty sunny evening

funniest thing is that nearly 2 MILLION people evacuated, so for the first time in probably ever - houston is a very quiet and peaceful city!

Galveston / Houston lucked out BIGTIME. Rita pretty much fizzled out right before landfall to a CAT3 and took a hard right.

Glad to hear not much damage in Texas

There gonna have to bulldoze half of Lousiana and start over.



When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.