As I posted about yesterday I came down to Texas to visit a friend and her husband and got caught up deep in the heart of Ike. Couldn’t get a flight out, nor could I rent a car to try and drive home and even if I could have, not like they had any fucking gas left to get me the fuck out of here.
That being said, I’m posed now to be witness to my first, real live hurricane.
As of right now, the crashing waves and outer rim of the storm has hit the coast with surges expected to be as high as 20 feet in Galveston, Texas. I being some 45 minutes away assumed we would be safe. I mean how much power can a storm really maintain over land, right?
Turns out I’m a fucking idiot because even 2 hours inland they can expect winds as high as 100 miles an hour and flooding with like 10 inches of rain.
That information isn’t however what panics me. It’s watching the news to hear this bitch explain that if they don’t get the fuck out now, “get off the island” and then she explains why they should get out of Galveston and how the winds are so strong that even within a few hours will grow so much that they will throw anyone out in them up against the sea wall and they will die instantly.
Something about hearing that shit on the news, just creeps me the fuck out.
Then they get into a discussion about the debris coming at your ass, so if you don’t die by being pulled in by the winds surely something coming out of the water will smack you in the head and kill you that way.
As you watch the waves crash on TV you really can’t help but get a sense of how really powerless you are in a situation like this.
No gas for your cars so you can’t get out. Really no food as the grocery stores are empty, and the Mayor of Houston telling their people to stay home and “hunker down” and prepare for the storm. And now some people are stranded trying to flee the coastal areas. Yes apparently they were to stupid to leave last night when they were told to. I think the coast guard said something like 200 people. They had plans to leave today but found the roads were closed and the flood waters rose quicker than they imagined. Water is rising as much as half a foot per hour so now the stupid fuckers are stuck and they had to spent a fuck load of money to fly their asses out of there. Seriously those people should be left to die. They are clearly to stupid to deserve to live.
I don’t know about you but when someone says GET THE FUCK OUT AND GET THE FUCK OUT NOW, I’m getting the fuck out now. Unlike those stupid fuckers they had the means to leave and get to “safety”, whereas those of us here further inland are stuck. But then again we aren’t exactly on the coast where a hurricane as big as the state of fucking Texas heading my way with tidal waves as high as 20 feet coming right at me.
Update : 4:49 pm EST. I just heard that the storm is some 200 miles wide and because of its massive size, even if the storm hits land at category 2, it will act like a category 4 as a result of the size. How fucking crazy is that? 200 miles wide?!!!!!!!!! When they say things are bigger in Texas, fuck they aren’t kidding.
Update : 11:47 pm EST. It’s only really just begun. Ike technically hasn’t even hit landfall and things are getting pretty bad right about now. Obviously large amounts of flooding, and that’s without rain – it is from storm surges. Flooding without rain? I honestly would not have expected that. The winds have picked up quite a bit. Rain is hitting and getting worse. More than 535,000 without power in the Houston area alone. They expect this number to hit more than 2 million by 5 am. They are saying that some of these fine folks may be without power for as long as 2 to 3 weeks. TWO TO THREE FUCKING WEEKS!! Transformers are blowing and fires are spreading from house to house to house. Fire crews can’t get into many areas so they just have to sit there and watch homes burn. A pretty strong band of rain has just come through where I am at. Very strong gusts of wind have been going on for at least two hours but it seems to be getting progressively worse. The good news is, so far only one reported death in relation to the storm. Power is out about 6 miles from here. We expect to lose power in this area any time now. Gusts of wind where I am located seem to be hitting about 30 to 40 MPH and that I guess is the problem. As long as there is power I will continue to post random updates.
Update 1:52 am : Power continues to flicker on and off at my location. Parts of southern Houston, this is that area that is closer to the coast than I am, are experiencing sustained winds of about 73 MPH. Almost 1 million without power at this point and they are saying that they won’t even begin to attempt to get it back up for at least the next 12 hours however if you are without power you should expect it not to return for at least the next day or two but it could be as long as a week or so in some areas, those areas I suppose would be the coastal regions. However those as far as 2 hours inland are already experiencing huge gusts of wind as much as 50 MPH and having power outages.
Stay safe!