TW'ers, Others in RITA's Path - Good Luck!

Good luck to all the folks in the path of the storm.

For everyone else, if you host at ev1servers you should grab a backup now as they are in Houston. It sounds like they can survive a direct hit by Rita but I'm not so sure. This thing looks nasty!

She's predicted to be a Cat4, maybe even drop to a high Cat3, at landfall. That puts it in the not-quite-nuclear-devastation group, but the interior should be able to handle the rainfall aftermath much better than the Mississippi delta did for New Orleans.

We are 6 hours drive from any coast, but the last time a storm that was a category 3 hit the Texas coast, the Dallas area received 60 mph winds and 7 inches of rain.

And this storm is a category 5. *wince*

Best of luck to my Texan compadres. Down here in San Antonio, 2hrs from the coast, we expect some pretty sporty winds, rain, and the occasional tornado that these things spin off.

We're in Clear Lake near Seabrook. We left early this morning, but turned back when family reported they'd been in traffic since 4:30 a.m. to make a drive that should have taken a little over an hour.

We came back to the house, ate lunch and are watching the traffic and weather reports and plotting course for one of several destinations. Luckily, friends and clients are calling from all over with offers of a place to stay, so we have several options north and west of town.

It's eerie - absolutely everything is closed, boarded up, the freeway is empty. My son called it a ghost town.

We'll probably ship out of here later this afternoon. Sure hope Rita weakens.

LisaB

She said he was in traffic so long that he nearly ran out of gas before turning back to stay at a friend's place in Houston. All of the gas stations are out of fuel..

to everyone out there - hope your family & homes are safe.

From Webster, TX (31 miles NW of Galveston) Staying

Nick, very thoughtful of you ;)

Hope you and yours all do ok

we came back to Clear Lake yesterday, after seeing what the roads were like, and hearing from other family members who had 12+ hours in transit to get relatively nowhere. We had my niece's 3 week old daughter with us, two 3 year olds and an 8 year old, and my elderly mom-in-law and didn't want to chance being stranded on the road with them.

So we're at the house, battening down the hatches. The winds are already picking up, no rain yet.

LisaB

Good luck Lisa,

do you have a hurricane shelter type thing?

my heart goes right out to you and your family, i can't think of much scarier a thing to happen - please keep us posted.

It looks now like Rita's projected path has moved eastward. That is good for all the folks who were left stranded in Houston, not so good for places east of Houston and New Orleans.

I had two brothers caught up in the mass exodus from Rita. One ended up stranded in Houston (he lives on Galveston Island). When I talked with him he was so thankful to be off the island and have a roof over his head - he was taken in by friends. For a while it looked like he was going to have to ride the storm out stranded with no gas out on the highway. I'm convinced someone upstairs was watching out for him.

Best of luck to everyone in the storm's path. If anyone is up in the Dallas area and needs help, contact me. I also have facilities for horses and other critters if you know someone who needs temporary housing of their animals.

Christine

Well, Rita went more east than first believed and we didn't receive a drop. In fact, we only got one day of cool weather yesterday and today looks like another scorcher.

East Texas got hammered, some places got a foot of rain. Not sure what other devestation happened, planes couldn't get in the air for aerial footage, so we'll see a little later.