Coverage of Rita from Two Houston Apartments

Wednesday, September 21, 2005

It's getting worse

I have to wonder whether the frenzy caused by this hurricane will be worse than the damage itself. On the way home from dinner at a nice Indian restaurant named Shiva, gas station lines were pouring out into the street. The prices seem to be the same so far, but I'm sure that's going to change soon.

Rice University is suggesting that all off-campus students come to stay at the school. They allegedly have food for everyone for three days. The master of Brown college evacuated his family but stayed to oversee things there. He said his family was stuck in stop-and-go traffic for hours trying to get out of the city.

I heard from another friend that usual 5-hour drive between Texas and Dallas is taking people 17 hours. There is only one major freeway between those locations, but still...

My roommate is evacuating tonight to college station. He hopes that by leaving at 5 AM the roads will be clear.

All the major grocery stores are fully shutting down for this weekend. The Kroeger where I usually shop is closing tomorrow at 5:00 in preparation.

The apartment complex leasing office closed today, and proceeded to be boarded up with plywood by some anonymous contractors. When I spoke to them earlier today, they had no advice for us except to stay indoors. When pressed, the staff confessed that they were leaving Houston. They said they would be OK with any damages that come about from us attempting to defend our apartments (such as nails in the wall).

The hurricane's predicted path has now been adjusted to send the brunt of it within 40-50 miles of Houston. The wind speeds are reportedly over 170 miles per hour.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home