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Half a million without power
24/09/2005 14:17 - (SA)
Texas - Half a million people were without power in Houston, Texas, early on Saturday, after Hurricane Rita made landfall at the Texas-Louisiana border, the mayor's office announced.
But no direct victims of the storm were reported.
"In this general area, we have 500 000 people without power," Frank Michel, a spokesperson for the mayor, told AFP in a telephone interview. But "we will have to wait until daylight to assess the damage."
Heavy rain and winds reaching 65km/h were reported in the city as the hurricane came ashore before dawn, according to the spokesperson, adding that Houston still faced the risk of flooding.
"There is always a risk of flooding," Michel said, "it depends how quickly the rain falls."
Hurricane Rita has meanwhile been downgraded to a category two storm, the National Hurricane Centre announced.
But the only victim so far in the area was a police officer who had suffered a heart attack.
Hurricane Rita hammered Texas and Louisiana early on Saturday, unleashing maximum winds of 19km/h and drenching low lying areas threatened by flood tides with driving sheets of rain.
Rita smashed into a coastline bristling with vital oil and chemical installations after its outer bands dumped fresh floods on New Orleans, and an estimated two million people fled its approaching wrath.
Street signs, roofing, tree limbs and other debris careened through the air, in deluged and deserted streets littered with downed power lines and torn down traffic lights and fires fanned by fast moving winds blazed in Galveston and Houston.
- AFP
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