Hurricane Ike
 

Well, we have hunkered down and going to ride it out. I am about 40 miles east of Houston, and it looks like Ike is going to center Houston around midnight tonight. We are expecting 100 mph winds and up to 12" rain on the "dirty side", plus the possibility of tornados. At least we are far enough away from the coast to be spared the surge, which is expected to be up to 15' at Galveston with 20' waves on top of that.

We have a generator, plenty of food, water, & gasoline. I'm about 1 1/2 miles from the highway, so expect to have to clear downed trees off the road before being able to get out afterwards. Power will be out for a week or more (it was out 10 days after Rita).

Just ask for prayers that we suffer no major damage to our lives, home and property.
:bigbye:

You're not my only friend in that area Hugh... I have been praying for all of you since yesterday... Start oiling those guns! It's going to wetter than usual.

The Hurricane
 

All of us in the Europe are praying for your survival!
We don`t have that kind of weather here, but we can imagine what it takes to live in that area.
Our hearts are with you! And God is with you!

jussi

Hugh
Our prayers are with you and everyone else in harms way. Bill

Hugh,

Don't you dare get hurt! Sitting down to check my email wouldn't be half as much fun.
All the best and I hope the worst that happens is you have to cut up a tree or two.

We'll definately keep you in our prayers. In 2004 we evacuated for Francis and stayed for Jeanne. We were just tired of running. It was a little scary but we all made it. We live on the barrier island running the east coast of Florida. One of the reasons we wanted to stay was because after the storm its hard to get back over.

Again, please stay safe and let us know how you all are doing the first chance you get.

Steven

Hugh,
We are both getting it right now, as I am typing this. You are furthur west in a direct line of travel of the hurricane, so I am sure you are seeing the worst of it. We got the eye of Gustav only two weeks ago, and it was certainly no picnic. Fortunately, you have a generator. A week or two without power can be mighty miserable without a fan and lights, not to mention trying to preserve your freezer and cold foods.

Mike

Best of luck to everyone. I am in El Paso, Texas as I write this (friends wedding), but waaay far from any wet dangerous water and storm.


Best to y'all,


Ed

Hugh,

Tie down the Dillos and best of luck. We had one in '64, so I know what it's like. I'll keep my fingers crossed for ya.

Ron

Any news on our friends in Texas?

Hugh et al, Please let us know when you can that all is well. Here in the St.Louis, MO. area, were are getting the remains of IKE today. Lots of rain, but no high winds. Best regards, TH

We're still refugees from Ike. We were out of Houston for the storm and have made it back as far as Austin. I'll probably return Wednesday and leave my wife here at our daughter's house until we have power restored.

Don,
I hope everything is OK at your house. If you need anything let me know. I'm up in the DFW area.

Don
Hope everything is fine at your house. The main thing you and your family are ok. Everyone there is in our prayers. Bill

Most of the Houston area is still without power and services. Living here in Richmond, TX (approximately 30 miles from downtown Houston, on the southwest side), I was very fortunate to get my electricity back in less than 24 hours. Local news reports say some may not have power restored for up to a month! Galveston took a beating, but was not as devastated as the areas of Boliver, Crystal Beach, Gilcrest, etc. These areas are east of Galveston across the Houston Ship Channel. These areas are totally wiped out. They look like a war zone! Keep all of these folks in your thoughts and prayers...they are in need of everything...most of these areas were completely wiped out. I've been watching the national news and can't understand why the coverage is not even close to that of Katrina. The local news (four stations) has been running only Ike news twenty-four hours a day. Go figure!

We went through this with Charley in Punta Gorda, FL in '04. Bad situation made worse by confusion. Our house had to be gutted and totally rebuilt--repairs came to about $175,000 for a place we bought for $161,000 in '92. FEMA does nothing if you own your own home and have insurance. I was 70 years old and worked in office jobs all of my life--so really could not do a whole lot of the rebuilding. Anyway, we were fortunate enough to find a contractor with a good Better Business rating.

We packed up and moved lock, stock(s), and barrel (s) and Lugers and moved nearly 200 miles away to get out of the commotion--and into a temporary rental house (Why not? Our insurance policy paid for temporary living if our house was unlivable.) It took 10 months to rebuild the house and it would have taken longer if we didn't bring stuff with us (fixtures, knobs, fans, etc.) every few weeks as we came back to review rebuilding progress. Local Lowes, Home Depots, etc. were swamped with big lines etc. as 20,000 houses were being rebuilt. I can't imagine how difficult it must be to get building supplies in New Orleans or Galveston today.

Our insurance company was fair with us and it all worked out well. We were homeless and living in a car full of guns looking for gas and food right after the hurricane. A year later most of our residential area was rebuilt but the commercial stuff is just now being rebuilt.

I hope and pray that Hugh and the others are OK. Naturally I hope they are adequately insured also and that they have the patience to get through the rebuilding mess if they have damage. Some folks really couldn't handle that after Charley.

OK, I'm starting to get just a wee bit concerned. Anyone heard from Hugh?

I have not, but my brother in law said that they would be without electricity for possibly 2-3 weeks (he is in Houston) and they had warehouses literally knocked flat for his work...

No electricity, no internet and possibly phones....



ed

I didn't think of it until just now, but even if he has a generator and a charged cell phone which he likely does, cell towers rely on electricity which they probably do not have. I guess we'll just have to wait a bit longer.

As I recall his son is in Alaska. Poor guy is probably chewing on a moose with worry by now.

for sure. My brother in law said they got electricity as of yesterday afternoon, so hopefully Hugh will also.


Ed

Hugh lives east of Houston, which got the bad side of Ike. I live on the west side and will be out of power until Monday at least. It will take some time for his to be restored.

Having been thru 3 storms Francis, Jeanne and Wilma, I know how the utility company works, their priorities are to get the biggest bang for the buck. In other words they restore the areas that require the least amount of work or have the least amount of damage first to put more customers back on line for the effort involved.

If you have a pole or a transformer that needs to be replaced and it only serves a few houses it will be weeks before they get a crew to fix it. I think Hugh lives in a rural area, so it may be a while.

Jim

A COUNTRY BOY SHALL SURVIVE:rockon:
We are far enough away from the coast that we didn't have to worry about the flood waters, just 90mph wind! I live in the country at the end of a 1 1/2 mi private road, off hiway 90; we had 80 trees down across the road between here and the hiway. Brought in a big backhoe and grabber thing on tracks to clear the road of BIG & smaller oak, pine, gum & tallow trees. There was a BIG oak & two smaller gum trees with tangled vines laying across the bridge over the creek. It took some work, but we got it off with no damage to the bridge. That is one tough bridge, it isn't very big, but has steel I beams base and handles logging trucks with no problem.

We were only about 20 miles from the center, and the storm was 200 miles wide with a 85 mile center! We were extremely lucky compared to 100's of others down here. No damage to the house other than losing the carport, a tree down across the fence and many limbs in the yard. When the carport went it knocked the rear window out of Mintas new car and put 2" of water in the floorboards. We replaced the roof on our house after Rita with a "20 yr" roof, and it was well worth it, as we didn't loose any shingles this time.

We are still without electricity, and my 10 yr old generator gave up the ghost. Friday I bought a new 6500 Honda generator and we are running the water well pump, fridge, freezer, washer & dryer, some lights & fans off of it. We have a propane tank for the stove & oven, & hot water heater & plenty of food; so not doing too bad. Could have had a nice Krieghoff for what that baby cost!:mad:

They say we may have electric power by the first week of Oct! No TV yet as the wind moved the satallite so we are not receiving a signal. I just got time to plug in my computer to see if that satallite is messed up also, and lo & behold, I am on line!

Thanks to God that our prayers were answered and he protected us from major damage this go round!


Hugh

Hallelujah!!!:thumbsup: Awfully glad you came through as well as you did. Welcome back.

Good hearing from. I am so pleased you and others weathered the storm okay.

Glad you and yours are safe. Sounds like you have enough downed trees to build another house.

Hugh is the type that would be out helping neighbors instead of sitting safely at home. He's definitely made of the "sterner stuff" that is so necessary in time like those which they are experiencing. He'll come through.

Hey Hugh, GLAD you made it okay!! Say hi to Minta foe me!!!

:)

Great
 

Hugh,

Glad you're OK and don't have too much damage. Look carefully--mold will show up quickly if you picked up any water in the ceilings.

My son who lives just north of Pittsburgh lost power for 5 days (he had a generator) and my grandaughter who lives in Concinatti still has no power. Ike's effects were amazing.

Al

Hugh,

Good to hear from ya, Glad you got thru OK! with only minor damage.
Plan to use that generator longer than what they are telling you.

Jim

Great to hear from you Hugh... glad you were so well prepared. I have friends in Houston that got their power restored yesterday morning, and now only their parents house is without power a few blocks away... Hopefully your power will be restored promptly...

What kind of satellite service for tv do you have... there are diagnostics built in to your receiver that can help you re-aim your dish even before helps arrives... you should also be able to call or contact Dishnetwork or DirectTV and their tech support should be able to advise you on the direction asimuth and elevation to get you in the right area of the sky to get some tv service...

John,
I climbed up on the roof today, the angle had been blown off about 1/2", put it back to the original position and we watched TV tonight! An Entergy man came by today and said that we should have power tomorrow!:cheers: