<p>Rice is sheltering their students on campus. They are keeping parents up to date with email letters from the president and with emergency updates on the school website. They encouraged all off-campus students and grad students to stay on campus. They seem to be taking care of the kids really well.</p>
<p>The weather channel just said something like 40% of the residents of Galveston Island DIDN’T evacuate. What are they nuts???</p>
<p>I still have internet! It’s a bit slow though. Yes jym…they are nuts. Galveston is a nutty place. I think they are are all remembering the Rita evacuation nightmare and it is affecting their judgment. My fil said traffic was very heavy coming out of Houston…bus after bus, ambulance after ambulance. He, of course, had I-10 East to himself…lol! cangel…no worries, made the hubby actually read a manual for once. ;)</p>
<p>patsmom - laughing over here at that one! I should have said SATX…lol…SACC doesn’t need a generator;, it runs on warm, happy vibes and margaritas.</p>
<p>We are getting gusty winds and things are pretty overcast…and I have the mother of all headaches from the pressure drop. But so far Ike has not knocked on our door yet.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>ldmom - I’ve been watching KPRC from time to time in live streaming. I haven’t been able to find any predictions showing how far up Buffalo Bayou or Braes Bayou they think the water surge could come. What are you hearing? One of my brothers lives north of Westheimer and just inside the Beltway (not far from the bayou - less than a 1/2 mile).</p>
<p>Along the hilarious news line, this brother wrote a short, comedic story in third person (using fictional names, such as Captain Boo Radley and Captain Atticus, etc.) Wednesday night regarding his harrowing experience of retrieving the ‘boat’. Ends up (after all the conversation he and I had last June about getting a car with a hitch in case the other brother with a car with a hitch happened to be out of town when a storm came through) he planned to go down to Matagorda on Wednesday, then realize he did not have his key to the padlock. He called my other brother, only to find out he was in Colorado, and had all three keys to the indestructible padlock with him there. So the brother in Colorado had to find a UPS to overnight the key to the Houston brother, and last I heard, he was off to retrieve the boat yesterday. I really think that this boat has become the child he never had.</p>
<p>teri - I know they are watching Greens, Braes and the other bayous very carefully; but honestly, I think the surge is more than fulfilling forecasters expectations and catching them off guard. Is your brother between Beltway 8 and Loop 610 in or near the Villages? If so, I think surge shouldn’t be a problem, but heavy rain might. That’s a fairly high area in Houston and runoff should be rapid and in the right direction. I think the problem area will be in the downtown area and east of downtown nearer to where the Bayous runs into the Ship Channel.</p>
<p>Check out this FEMA floodplain site…it may help. I can’t get it to work very well because of poor internet performance. But it looks like it has good info and interactives.</p>
<p>[TSARP</a> Interactive Mapping Tool](<a href=“http://maps2.tsarp.org/tsarp/]TSARP”>http://maps2.tsarp.org/tsarp/)</p>
<p>We decided last minute this morning to drive to my brother’s house in Austin. The roads were actually very clear – it only took about 4 hours. (They even have wind advisories here.)</p>
<p>Sending positive thoughts to all of you in the path of Ike. I heard on the news tonight that it’s going to be the worst in 50 years, which must mean Hurricane Carla. In 1961 my family had just moved to Houston when Carla hit. I remember that we had just started in our new schools. Power was out for a long time. My mother was in her frozen-sandwich phase (blessedly short-lived), and she had just filled the freezer with them for school lunches. Guess what we ate a lot of. We stayed in our house (Memorial/Sandalwood) watching debris from the construction site next door fly by the windows. I felt like I was in the tornado scene from the beginning of The Wizard of Oz. It was scary. Sorry for the nostalgia break while you’re dealing with real life, but the TV news made me realize that I can identify with this one.</p>
<p>he’s between Gessner and the tollway, like I said less than 1/2 mile from Buffalo Bayou.</p>
<p>ok… the map you gave me was very helpful. I knew the bayou was less than a 1/2 mile away, but that map shows that the floodway actually extends beyond the bayou to about 10 houses from his. Could be interesting.</p>
<p>btw - if anyone wants local news on Ike, they can check out the KPRC website.
[url=<a href=“http://www.click2houston.com/video/10903347/index.html]Video[/url”>http://www.click2houston.com/video/10903347/index.html]Video[/url</a>]</p>
<p>It’s Houston’s local NBC station. Just heard 200,000 are without power now.</p>
<p>Directv is televising KHOU on Ch. 361 for those who are evacuees and want “local” coverage.</p>
<p>Geezermom, I think we went to the same high school. But I was 2 when Carla hit.</p>
<p>Finally starting to get a bit of wind north of Houston. No rain, though.</p>
<p>OnTopic with the OP’s question – Power Outages, preparations:</p>
<p>If you usually rely on computer for your contact list of emergency and family phone call numbers, print out a hard copy of that.</p>
<p>Ask if your kids have any longterm high school reports or college application essays to work upon these days. They might want to print out drafts or assignment sheets while power is still on, to use some unexpected time out-of-school to work on them a bit. (Note; up North, we lose power with snow blizzards around application and SAT-taking times.) In actual fact, my h.s. kids got involved helping and experiencing the world without power, but after several days were ready to do some academics anyway after much Scrabble and visiting friends with generators.</p>
<p>Tell your family to open the refrigerator door as infrequently as possible (as if!). Each door-opening causes the temperature to warm, just a bit. Just be aware.</p>
<p>Since a full refrigerator and freezer hold the temperature better than one half-empty, some folks move pantry items to better fill their fridge or freezer now.
Choose items with care, selecting what might later return to the pantry without damage.</p>
<p>I’m sure you can’t “hear” me right now, but thanks for the flood map, idmom, I’m trying to look for SIL’s address. Last night before bed, the WC was showing flooded streets that are know are in the same area as her home, but no idea if it is close enough to be meaningful.</p>
<p>We’ve just had a few wind gusts and a bit of rain…more to come in a few hours. It is SO humid outside…the air feels really odd. I’m starting to get my “hurricane headache”…lasted two dys with Gustav…I think it’s the change in air pressure.</p>
<p>I know so many people in Houston…assuming everyone is safe, it would be such a PAIN to be without power for perhaps weeks.</p>
<p>missypie…good to see you here. I am assuming you have power and all is well for now? My step-daughter is there on her way to Houston. She is a Southern California Paramedic that has been staged in San Antonio until this morning. She was in a convoy of 200 ambulances when I last heard from her headed your direction. Our thoughts and prayers are with all of you and all of the rescue personell. Hang in there :)</p>
<p>Unbelievable…I have power. It’s likely intermittent so I’ll make it quick. Damage is pretty darned bad…I think we had a tornado. Brick walls to the neighborhood are down, 100 year old oaks and 50 year old tall pines down blocking streets or fallen on homes. We stopped counting at about 75 homes with downed trees and home damage (out of 250). The next small subdivision has about a third of their brick walls down and powerlines are across the major road…it’s actually a tangle of downed giant oaks, powerlines and scattered bricks. We are at higher elevation, but we have some street flooding, just due to overtaxed storm drain system.</p>
<p>We were hit about 3 a.m. and the thing blew for about 8 hours straight. At about 10 a.m., the wind direction changed. It was kind of scary…but I manage to fall asleep at around 5 a.m. for a couple of hours. We lost a large old tree (not sad…it was too close to the house anyway) and we were fortunate that it did not touch the house on it’s way down. I am sad about one of my uprooted Italian cypress trees. It’s quite large (not California big, but the size of those on the Rice campus) and I’m quite proud of them. The neighborhood men are trying to get it upright as I type. Have several roof leaks, some drywall & carpet damage, but no apparent significant roof damage. Again, lucky…many in the neighborhood have major roof damage.</p>
<p>If we keep power, I will be so grateful. We were told to expect a two week outage.</p>
<p>Forgive the misspelled words. I hear chain saws and have to get back outside to help, so I’m rushed. Hope to hear that all is well with our other Houston CC parents/students.</p>
<p>Glad you are okay.</p>
<p>Glad to hear you are safe, Idmom!
My SIL has a report that there was little water in their neighborhood, some shingles gone - there are no trees in their neighborhood tall enough to do any damage. She’s staying away until the power comes back.</p>
<p>ldmom, sorry to hear about your cypress trees. My son took this photo of two of the downed cypress trees at Rice a little while ago.
[Picasa</a> Web Albums - Kevin - Ike](<a href=“http://picasaweb.google.com/ViaticusOportet/Ike?pli=1#5245640841346067410]Picasa”>http://picasaweb.google.com/ViaticusOportet/Ike?pli=1#5245640841346067410)</p>
<p>Glad you’ve got power back – I hope it stays on.</p>