Well, my brother and his family rode out the storm in The Woodlands just fine other than the fact that they were inundated with rain almost all day Saturday. They got word from a neighbor who stayed behind in Friendswood that their home had sustained some damage, so when the rain let up, he drove down to take an assessment. One large tree had blown over and fell on his house and several other trees were down as well. His neighbor's tree blew over on to his fence. Otherwise, there was no structural damage to the house itself, so once the trees are removed, he might have to replace some shingles and rain gutters. Once they lift the ban on driving to Houston and Beaumont, I will probably take a couple of days off and help him get everything squared away.

The irony of the Texas/Arkansas game being postponed is that at what would have been game-time in Austin, it was sunny, 87 degrees, and light winds gusting to 17 mph for about four hours. Also, it never even sprinkled in Austin. They got more rain and wind in Fayetteville than we did in Austin. That being said, I think it was the right decision as it allowed valuable resources to be freed up for hurricane relief.

Best regards,

William R. Sanders
Online Guest Feedback Coordinator
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

[email protected]

The people who came up north to stay in hotels and motels started heading back to Houston yesterday. The people who rode to North Texas on buses are stuck in shelters or FEMA paid for motels until the government decides they can head south again.

Still have people we haven't heard from or about.

The real question will be if Galveston will be rebuilt and the same for the other barrier islands.

Houston and the immediate surrounding communities might be sorted out enough to start taking their folks back, but they are still discouraging a return to the Beaumont area because electricity is a short commodity at the moment. In fact, one report that I saw just now says that electricity won't be totally restored in the Beaumont area for another month.

Now, I understand the desire to want to go back home...to know what to expect next...to know what might be waiting for you when you return, after all I saw it all before when we volunteered for the Red Cross during Hurricane Katrina so I am not without compassion because I've seen the anguish it causes first-hand, but it is really hard to commiserate with some of the refugee reports I'm seeing coming out of the shelters here in Austin. One woman actually said, "I'd rather be set down on my couch and the rest of my sh*t floating in Galveston Bay than have to spend another night here." You're kidding me right? No fresh water, no electricity, no medical services, no shelter, no food, no toilets, and no way to clean yourself up, but plenty of mosquitos, trash, debris, and other sordid crap to wade through... but yes, set my a** down on my floating couch in the middle of Galveston Bay for God's sake so I can get out of this air-conditioned building that has all of the above. Holy cow. They honestly can have no idea what is involved in a natural disaster of this magnitude.

They will rebuild it all, in time, no doubt in my mind at all about that.

Best regards,

William R. Sanders
Online Guest Feedback Coordinator
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

[email protected]

The eye of Ike passed over our house. We are in the Clear Lake area (halfway between Galveston and Houston). Minor damage to our property. Water resumed within 24 hours, still w/o power, and might be like this for a few more days, though plenty of pockets have restored power. People here went to work immediately after the storm to clean things up and to get businesses back in operation. Our cul-de-sac cleaned itself up immediately. Nobody is waiting for the gooberment to come 'help' or even cares about them. Some neighborhoods have chased out reporters who came in to stir up crap by looking for 'victims' so they could get another Katrina-type frenzy going through the country. Kudos to the Galveston mayor for chasing out the muckraker press. Kudos to the mayor of Houston and his team. Lots of folks have taken it upon themselves to clear the roads of debris. Every Texan owns a chainsaw and at least one handgun. Looting has been minimal. Not much whining & sniveling in these parts, Texans like to get after it, and get back to work.

Seabrook and Kemah have been totaled. The Bolivar peninsula has been totaled and might not even be a peninsula anymore. Martial law declared there. Everything west of the airport in Galveston has been totaled. The island was completely submerged, but much more so to the west of the airport. One guy drowned in his car at the airport. There are health issues on the west side of the island also, so only official workers are allowed in right now. Remarkably, the cattle on the island seem to be okay though other animals died, including birds. The cattle must have been swimming around for hours in the dark during the storm. Rumor has it that some surfboards were found near the surviving cattle. Cow-a-bunga dudes! :D

M8

Glad to hear that! Although, I’m not really surprised.

Power came back on this morning. We are about half-way through that now. Power restoration actually appears to be going faster than anticipated, they just can't bring up everything at the same time.

great live feed and videos on www.click2houston.com

Their program is called 'After Ike'.

Please don't forget the people who are still struggling with the damages from Ike!

for news and live feeds www.click2houston.com

Hello all,

I have something more photos during Hurricanes Ike. Its very extremely damaged due to hurricanes in Houston areas. So here it is:

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/200...l_life_of.html

It was incredible pictures that I saw the water is already flooded in HOU areas. I knows it was too tired of them. It was too much hurricanes all of the times.

Also, I saw city of Houston are damaged by the entire building. It was shatters lot of the windows are broken. So hopefully if we are prayers for your friends & relatives, too. Thanks all.

Regards

Just flipping through the news sources in TX... there's still 114,000 "customers" or ~228,000 people (assuming they're calling 1 meter = 1 customer) without power after 18 days?

Jeesh. I had heard early on from a visiting lineman who was out in the area say power restoration efforts were a total mess. Maps of the grid were difficult to get ahold of and wildly inaccurate/outdated when they did get ahold of them.

Does anyone have insider info on what's taking so long with restoring over there? Did the power co's not maintain their infrastructure (similar to FP&L's 40+ year old power poles & Hurricane Wilma)? or was it just not built to handle it at all? Or are the power cos out there really as inept as the lineman told me?

To give Florida Power & Light some credit, after all of the hurricanes I've seen in recent times, the barrier islands usually had power back within a week, city usually even sooner, with a few isolated cases of people not getting power back for ~10-14 days. That said, I did get to work with many visiting power crews, mainly guiding them to substations that needed repair, and a few of them had grumbled that things here weren't done as well as they could have been...and they were going to "do it right this time."

FEMA official says agency response slow after Ike
20 hours ago

There's a lot of frustration about FEMA again. It should be noted that FEMA is part of the federal government, and every decision must take into account considerations which are well intentioned but often absurd.

Now that there is open access, it might be time to move this thread back to OMNI.