Hurricane Rita Live Thread, Part VIII

Category	Wind Speed	Barometric Pressure	Storm Surge	Damage Potential
Tropical Depression	< 39 mph < 34 kts			Minimal
Tropical Storm	39 - 73 mph 34 - 63 kts			Minimal
Hurricane 1 (Weak)	74 - 95 mph 64 - 82 kts	28.94" or more 980.02 mb or more	4.0' - 5.0' 1.2 m - 1.5 m	Minimal damage to vegetation
Hurricane 2 (Moderate)	96 - 110 mph 83 - 95 kts	28.50" - 28.93" 965.12 mb - 979.68 mb	6.0' - 8.0' 1.8 m - 2.4 m	Moderate damage to houses
Hurricane 3 (Strong)	111 - 130 mph 96 - 112 kts	27.91" - 28.49" 945.14 mb - 964.78 mb	9.0' - 12.0' 2.7 m - 3.7 m	Extensive damage to small buildings
Hurricane 4 (Very strong)	131 - 155 mph 113 - 135 kts	27.17" - 27.90" 920.08 mb - 944.80 mb	13.0' - 18.0' 3.9 m - 5.5 m	Extreme structural damage
Hurricane 5 (Devastating)	Greater than 155 mph Greater than 135 kts	Less than 27.17" Less than 920.08 mb	Greater than 18.0' Greater than 5.5m	Catastrophic building failures possible

1,321 posted on 09/24/2005 10:47:58 PM PDT by Brad’s Gramma (Lord, we need a Logan miracle for Simcha7 and Cowboy. Please.)

1,322 posted on 09/24/2005 10:52:18 PM PDT by Colorado Doug (Diversity is divisive. E. Pluribus Unum)

To: conservative in nyc

It fits. I don't know if you saw gpapa's link or not (there were several) but it showed a bunch of river gauges across southern LA and they showed what was bugging me too. The water got deeper the further east you went.

I know just enough about hydrology to know that this particular puzzle isn't going to be solved by me. It'll take some big computers and someone with access to a lot of data.

I'd like to find out what they come up with though.

1,323 posted on 09/24/2005 10:52:41 PM PDT by jeffers

Red Cross Numbers

Here are some numbers from tonight...

HURRICANE RITA 9 P.M. UPDATE

246 Shelters have been opened for Rita
74,000 People in those shelters (for Rita)
95,000 stayed overnight last night.
80,000 meals were served.

BY STATE

Alabama has 5 Shelters Open
Arkansas has 2 Shelters Open
Florida has 1 Shelters Open
Louisiana has 39 Shelters Open
Mississippi has 38 Shelters Open
New Mexico has 1 Shelter Open
Oklahoma has 4 Shelters Open
Texas has 156 Shelters Open

Impact Summary
Louisiana:
• 50 roads from Slidell to Lake Charles are closed.
• At least 1 million customers are without power in southwest Louisiana and the Gulf Coast of
Texas.
• There are no immediate reports of fatalities or serious injuries.
• Vinton: worst early damage reports - several fires were burning, the roof was torn off the
town's recreation center and homes were damaged by fallen trees.
• Widespread flooding was reported in the coastal Louisiana parishes along the Gulf of
Mexico.
• New Orleans: Parts of the 9th Ward are under eight feet of water; there is a 150-foot gap in
the Industrial Canal levee.

• Lake Charles: There is significant damage to the airport, including hangars, cell tower.
Trees are down. There is major damage and flooding at Harrah's casino. A riverboat casino
and a barge were knocked loose and were floating free; the barge slammed into the
Interstate 10 bridge spanning the Calcasieu River, which was closed while authorities
inspected the damage.
• At least one pumping station does not appear to be working.
• Acadia Parish: Power lines and trees were toppled. Trees have fallen on houses. There is
wind and water damage.
• Calcasieu Parish: The airport was damaged. Homes were damaged by falling trees. Roads
are blocked. Cell phones are down. A building is on fire in Vinton. A firefighter was injured
when he was kicked in the head by a horse.
• Cameron Parish: The phone lines are down.
• Evangeline Parish: There are heavy winds, and no damage assessment has been
completed yet.
• Jefferson Davis Parish: There is flooding, extensive damage and looting in Jennings.
Residents are trapped. Many downtown businesses are damaged. The police department is
without power.
• Lafayette Parish: Roads are blocked by fallen trees. There are power outages in the city of
Lafayette and the parish. The Vermilion River through Lafayette is running north, instead of
south, due to heavy storm surge.
• Terrebonne Parish: Crews are unable to get to trapped residents. Seven to eight feet of
water throughout the parish.
• Vermilion Parish: There is flooding south of Louisiana State Route 14 and downed trees
and power outages. Search and rescue is underway. Eight feet of water has been reported
south of Erath.
Texas:
• Oil refineries suffered only minor damage.
• No evacuees have been allowed to return to evacuated Texas counties as of 1:00 PM EDT.
• Baytown: The water treatment plant is out of service. Power lines and poles are down and
the city is littered with storm debris.
• Beaumont: A 17-year-old was hit by a falling tree and injured. Eleven other injuries have
been reported. A restaurant is damaged and there is debris in the streets, but no major
flooding. Police are checking a collapsed apartment building outside the city.
• Galveston: Two historic residences and a commercial building burned. One building was
destroyed. A restaurant wall collapsed. Wind blew the roof off of a multi-story hotel
downtown. The Galveston Daily News, which lost part of its roof, reports that a woman was
severely burned and a firefighter received a minor eye injury.
• Houston: Two fires, power outages, but no major flooding.
• Lumberton: Some flooding and unconfirmed reports of damage. Trees are down. Downed
power lines are preventing police from rescuing a couple trapped in their home.
• Pasadena: Fire at a Family Dollar store spread to an AutoZone store.
• Port Arthur: Some flooding, with water depths of three to seven feet. Phones are out. There
is widespread wind damage. The levees are holding.
• Texas City: Still assessing damage.
Power Outages
• SLEMCO (Southwest Louisiana Electric Membership Cooperative): More than twothirds
of its 86,000 customers are without power.
• CLECO (Central Louisiana Electric Co-Op) Corporation: 80,000 customers are without
power.
• Jefferson Davis Electric Cooperative: No service to all 10,300 customers.

• Entergy Corporation: 780,903 customers are without power, including many that have not
had power since Hurricane Katrina.
• Center Point Energy: More than 450,000 customers are without power.

Fundraising (FR)
• Have raised $933 million to date
• Developing a plan to assist chapter that have received donations but do not have the time or
the capability to process the donations.
• Modified the fundraising solicitation language that is to be included on all press releases and
parts of it for advertising and other communications to read (new text bolded):

American Red Cross disaster assistance is free, made possible by voluntary donations of time
and money from the American people. You can help the victims of the recent hurricanes and
thousands of other disasters across the country each year by making a financial gift to the
American Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund, which enables the Red Cross to provide shelter, food,
counseling and other assistance to those in need. Call 1-800-HELP NOW or 1-800-257-7575
(Spanish). Contributions to the Disaster Relief Fund may be sent to your local American Red
Cross chapter or to the American Red Cross, P. O. Box 37243, Washington, DC 20013. Internet
users can make a secure online contribution by visiting www.redcross.org. The American Red
Cross honors donor intent. If you wish to designate your donation to a specific disaster
please do so at the time of your donation.

18, 127 Red Cross Volunteers are currently out in the field donating their time to the disasters.

HURRICANE KATRINA UPDATE

There are currently 226 Shelters still open from Hurricane Katrina
Last night 44.332 stayed in shelters because of Hurricane Katrina

818,000+ meals have been served to the victims of Hurricane Katrina

ALMOST 14,000,000 THAT IS ALMOST 14 MILLION meals have been served so far because of hurricane Katrina!

2,444,000+ people have stayed in shelters at least one night due to Katrina.

To date, the Red Cross program has booked [B]$57,015,582 hotel billings.[/B] This is for volunteers and victims to stay in.

Families Connecting
• Calls to 1-877-LOVED1S total 166,068 with 2,365 calls received in the 24-hour period from
yesterday at 2:00 PM to today at 2:00 PM.
• On KatrinaSafe.org, 720 evacuees reported their status and 3,662 concerned family
members and friends registered in the last 24 hours. To date, 275,936 evacuees have
reported their status and 26,194 concerned family members and friends have registered on
line.

1,324 posted on 09/24/2005 10:53:25 PM PDT by silentknight

To: Colorado Doug

And casinos. Levee money was diverted for that.

1,325 posted on 09/24/2005 10:54:05 PM PDT by Torie

Where did the money go?

Search "levee board" and "corrupt".

Make some popcorn first.

1,326 posted on 09/24/2005 10:55:03 PM PDT by jeffers

I guess we now know why some folks refer to her as Blanco Dubois.

“I don’t want realism. I want magic!”

“Whoever you are—I have always depended on the kindness of strangers."

"Yes, yes, magic. I try to give that to people. I do misrepresent things. I don't tell truths. I tell what ought to be truth."

1,327 posted on 09/24/2005 10:56:56 PM PDT by Mad_Tom_Rackham (Hate yourself? Hate everybody else, too? You'll be at home with the Democrats!)

To: Mad_Tom_Rackham

She is on Geraldo saying that her evacuation plan -- planned a year in advance -- was executed as planned? It was grand and she watched it from helicopters?

It makes me sick to watch the media give her a pass on it all.

1,328 posted on 09/24/2005 10:57:58 PM PDT by Colorado Doug (Diversity is divisive. E. Pluribus Unum)

Those questions were more rhetorical than anything else.

Standing on that truly massive levee, it again struck me that the people of NO and LA have once again been sold down the river by their elected 'leaders'.

1,329 posted on 09/24/2005 10:58:37 PM PDT by Spktyr (Dallas TX (Overwhelminglysuperiorfirepowerandthewillingnesstouseitistheonlyprovenpeacesolution))

To: Colorado Doug

1,330 posted on 09/24/2005 10:58:47 PM PDT by Mad_Tom_Rackham (Hate yourself? Hate everybody else, too? You'll be at home with the Democrats!)

Great response from Julia about NO at your link.

In her book she's one funny lady.

1,331 posted on 09/24/2005 10:59:46 PM PDT by Cedar

And casinos. Levee money was diverted for that.

I wonder if they will ever clean out the entire rats nest down there. I almost wonder if it can be fixed at this stage.

1,332 posted on 09/24/2005 11:02:35 PM PDT by Colorado Doug (Diversity is divisive. E. Pluribus Unum)

I like stading up top of big construction projects too, but I never put up anything that big. That kind of work usually means a lot of travel.

1,333 posted on 09/24/2005 11:07:36 PM PDT by jeffers

To: Colorado Doug; All

1,334 posted on 09/24/2005 11:08:29 PM PDT by Spktyr (Dallas TX (Overwhelminglysuperiorfirepowerandthewillingnesstouseitistheonlyprovenpeacesolution))

I cheated, I used a Jeep to climb to the top. :-D

1,335 posted on 09/24/2005 11:09:28 PM PDT by Spktyr (Dallas TX (Overwhelminglysuperiorfirepowerandthewillingnesstouseitistheonlyprovenpeacesolution))

Wow! That's some sky!

1,336 posted on 09/24/2005 11:11:44 PM PDT by Colorado Doug (Diversity is divisive. E. Pluribus Unum)

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y138/jeffers_mz/Rita/20footsurge2.jpg Incident of National Significance?

I would say so. However, after all that has happened in Katrina's wake, any hurricance which causes less destruction, or is perceived to have caused less destruction, is not going to get the attention it should.

1,337 posted on 09/24/2005 11:14:40 PM PDT by laz (They can bus 'em to the polls, but they can't bus 'em out of the path of a Cat 5 hurricane.)

I remember seeing that levee over on the SW side of Dallas once. I wouldn't want to hike up it either.

1,338 posted on 09/24/2005 11:18:57 PM PDT by jeffers

I was bracing myself for the worst scenario, homes totally torn apart like matchsticks and water reaching almost roof tops.

In some places, Rita's flooding is quite bad. However, we're not seeing homes reduced to matchsticks because the storm surge apparently rose rather gently, instead of coming in as a piled-up wall that smashed everything in its path. I imagine the difference is the result of Rita's winds being 20 mph less than Katrina's on landfall. Also, if I'm not mistaken, Rita started dropping from Cat 5 farther away from landfall than Katrina did.

1,339 posted on 09/24/2005 11:20:54 PM PDT by laz (They can bus 'em to the polls, but they can't bus 'em out of the path of a Cat 5 hurricane.)

To: Black Tooth; lainie; Brad's Gramma; Cheapskate; Denver Ditdat

I was watching on KCAL a story that the Burbank CA Army NG unit was depoying to Louisiana as they replace units in the hurricane area. I came across this piece of comm gear on the CANG website. The State of CA built 7 after 9/11, and 5 of them are in service in Louisiana. I think the coolest thing is that you can link the local comms to Sacramento or the Pentagon via satellite.

http://www.calguard.ca.gov/CAAG-MS/current_stories/katrina_ic4u/ Story

http://www.calguard.ca.gov/casmr/ic4u1.htm Video Tour

1,340 posted on 09/24/2005 11:24:53 PM PDT by BurbankKarl

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794