Rita: Low human toll a blessing
2005-09-26 07:18
Cameron Prairie - Helicopters and boats rescued hundreds from rooftops and trees on Sunday, authorities cursed billions of dollars of new storm damage, but everyone counted the blessing of a dramatically low human toll from Hurricane Rita.
After the 1 000-plus dead from Hurricane Katrina, only two people were reported dead from Rita though many people remain missing in small towns along the west Louisiana coast that bore the brunt of the 195km an hour winds and 6m high storm surge.
Military helicopters, coast guard boats and volunteers who brought their own craft scoured the worst hit towns and fishing villages that were cut off by floods.
Up to 2 500 people were rescued from Vermilion parish alone during the weekend, authorities said. More were saved in other western Louisiana districts from rooftops and even some who scrambled up trees to get out of alligator and snake infested swamps.
Severe flooding
One Vietnamese family rode out the storm on their shrimp boat in Intercoastal City. Many of the stranded people used cell phones to call for help.
Vermilion, Lake Charles, Cameron and other towns are all near the Louisiana-Texas border and took a direct hit from the eye of the storm. Some of the towns are more than 25km from the coast but still suffered severe flooding.
Rita ripped off roofs, sent trees flying into cars, fanned fires through historic wooden buildings and flooded low-lying towns, but the region's vital oil infrastructure was relatively unscathed.
Oil prices fell in special trading in New York on Sunday as fears that Rita would ravage the network of refineries off the coast of Texas proved unfounded.
One million people remained without electricity but state officials spoke of "miracles" after studying the human toll.
Fatalities
Authorities in Mississippi reported one death from a tornado offshot of the hurricane which tore up a mobile home. In Texas one man was killed by a fallen tree.
Twenty-four elderly residents of a Texas nursing home were killed when their bus caught fire on a highway during the evacuation.
But in Louisiana, which suffered most from Katrina on August 29, officials reported no immediate fatalities, though deaths were feared.
Texas governor Rick Perry said the low toll was "a blessing" and praised what he called the largest evacuation in American history which saw about three million people flee the Texas and Louisiana coasts before the storm.
Officials pleaded with the multitudes who fled in advance of the storm not to rush back, warning that the zone remained dangerous due to flooding.
President George W. Bush who had led appeals for people to get away from the coast before Rita struck joined the Texas and Louisiana governors in urging evacuees to stay in their refuges. "The situation is still dangerous," said Bush.
"Please, please wait for the all-clear," said Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco, noting that roads remained closed and bridges could be unsafe.
Costly storm damage
Perry estimated the storm damage in Texas at well over $8bn and Blanco said she would ask Bush's administration for an even bigger sum.
Bush praised the work of state and federal emergency agencies but suggested that the military might have to take over disaster response efforts in the future.
In New Orleans, a virtual ghost city since Katrina left it flooded and beaten, floodwaters stopped rising on Sunday as a levee overwhelmed for the second time in a month was patched up again.
Helicopters were dropping huge sandbags over a gap in the city's Industrial Canal that had enabled water to flood back into the impoverished Lower Ninth Ward, already devastated by Hurricane Katrina.
Mayor Ray Nagin said he hoped the first New Orleans residents, homeless since Katrina, could start returning as early as Monday.