Hurricane Ike (calling FL/hurricane peeps)

[meresal]

A full street view. This is one of few that we are able to drive down.

 

[meresal]

Then there is our apartment, about 5 or 6 miles closer to the water, only about 500 ft from the water. Somehow in the middle of ground zero, we never lost power (or for a VERY short time at that. We are contributing it to the fact that we are on the same grid as NASA and was turned on almost immediately). Not a window is broken and the flooding never reached our front door. We are very fortunate.

Sadly though, not 150 ft down the street is where the devastation begins. There are boats everywhere, a major hotel is missing large parts of its walls, and booies (sp??) that were once on one side of the bridge have miraculously found their way to the other. The high water level is very apparent.

Here are some shots that I took this morning when we walked down to the coast.

The water level in this one has yet to return to it''s regular level.

 

[fieryred33143]

Mer--I''m so glad to hear from you. I''m glad you guys are safe.

 

[meresal]

Here are some of the boats that are sitting at the edge of the road. They are about 50 ft from the waters adge and have raised about 15. However the docks where they are housed are over 200 ft from this spot.

 

[2Artists]

We are thinking and praying for all of you out there.
Those pictures......speechless

Mrs.2Artists

 

[meresal]

Here is another one of the boats. This shows the water level (maybe 8-10 ft high, not too sure), for the marina. This is taken from the edge of the boats in the previous picture.

If anyone is from this area. This picture is taken on Nasa Rd 1 where Boondoggles, Turtle Club, and Clear Lake Marina are.

 

[appletini]

Hey everyone...checking in. We were really lucky, we don''t have power but that is it. We actually lost our power really early...8pm on Friday just after we finished dinner, and since all our windows were boarded up we couldn''t see anything. About 1am we made pallets on the floor in the hallway and slept in there. We spent most of the day Sat and Sun doing yard work. We also lost our land line at 4am during the storm so talk to our friends we just walk to their house and everything else primarily text messaging. However our frozen meat lasted us until last night thanks to the 4 bags of ice that were in our freezer. We''ve had our dinner that two nights at our friends house that has a generator. Today I''m at my grandma''s house in Richmond (Ft.Bend county) to do laundry, and I went grocery shopping at Super Walmart so it was less chaotic and had cold things as opposed to trying to do anything near our neighborhood. Our local burger joint was selling burgers for $1 yesterday...basically use it or lose it. DH texted me today to tell me saw some centerpoint trucks driving around...so that sounds promising.

Meresal, I''m glad everything worked out for you since you were so close the path of destruction.

 

[Courtneylub]

Meresal, I'm so glad your place is ok. That is amazing how close you were to the water and yet didn't get any damage. My cousins place in Seabrook didn't get any damage as well, but my aunts place in LaPorte is a disaster. Their boat was up in between 2 trees.

Appletini, did you spend a lot of time at Beau's? We left 2 nights ago for Austin and I'm glad we did. I tried to stay up for the storm and actually opened the front door once or twice. It was a sight to see, that's for sure. I'm glad your place is ok too. I hear 25% of Houston's power is back on, so I'm just waiting on our area!! Our work hotline actually said they'd like us to return to the office tomorrow...HA...right. I am pregnant and require AC!

Were the $1 burgers at Annie's or in Richmond?

 

[meresal]

Date: 9/15/2008 5:19:58 PM
Author: fieryred33143
Mer--I'm so glad to hear from you. I'm glad you guys are safe.

Thanks Fiery!! I really appreciate you thinking of me.

2Artists and Appletini: Thank you for your thoughts and prayers, we were very fortunate. Apple, I'm very glad to hear that you are safe as well.

Courtneylub: We know some people in Kemah and Seabrook as well, very lucky not to have much damage. The worst we saw was Clear Lake Forest, and it was mainly damage due to the high winds and the huge trees that fell like dominos up and down every street.

I drove back to Austin this morning to work for the rest of this week and next. My office in dowtown Houston is ravaged, and we won't be able to work from it for at least 3 or 4 weeks. All windows on East side of building, 24 floors, are gone. There is also flooding, wind damage, and glass on every floor from the broken windows and a partial cave in of the roof.

On a much more serious note. The admin for our office has a 21 yr old son that moved to Galveston a few months ago with a friend. She talked to him before the storm and couldn't convince him to leave the island. He and his friend decided to ride it out, and now she has yet to hear from him. Please keep her family in your thoughts and prayers. I will be sure to keep everyone updated.