Texas Gets Warning As Claudette Nears

[mavsfanforever]

Texas Gets Warning As Claudette Nears
43 minutes ago

By LYNN BREZOSKY, Associated Press Writer

SOUTH PADRE ISLAND, Texas - The National Hurricane Center (news - web sites) issued a hurricane warning Monday for more than 200 miles of Texas coastline as Tropical Storm Claudette gathered strength in the Gulf of Mexico.

Oil and natural gas companies evacuated hundreds of workers from drilling and production rigs in the Gulf, campers headed inland from coastal areas, and surfers were warned to stay out of the waves.


On South Padre Island, workers piled sand into berms at beach accesses, but Mayor Bob Pinkerton said there were no plans yet to evacuate the resort community.


By Monday afternoon, Claudette's center was about 275 miles east of Corpus Christi, with maximum sustained wind blowing at 65 mph, still 9 mph shy of hurricane strength, the National Hurricane Center said. The center said the crew of an offshore oil rig reported wind gusts reaching 85 mph.


National Weather Service (news - web sites) forecasters said the storm could strengthen into a hurricane by Monday evening. It was moving north-northwest at about 6 mph.


The hurricane warning was in effect from Baffin Bay, about 30 miles southeast of Corpus Christi, to the southern tip of Galveston Island. A hurricane watch covered an area from Baffin Bay south to Brownsville, and a tropical storm warning was in effect from Galveston Island to Cameron, La.


ChevronTexaco Corp. said Monday that more than 1,400 of its workers had been evacuated from offshore platforms, although it had started sending people back to rigs in the eastern Gulf.


Shell Oil Co., ExxonMobil Corp., Marathon Oil Corp., Anadarko Petroleum Corp. and Unocal Corp. also shut down some Gulf operations and brought workers ashore.


"We're watching the storm very closely," said Anadarko spokeswoman Lee Warren.


The Coast Guard said it was called in to search for 10 to 12 people who went out in the high waves at South Padre Island and got caught in strong currents. All were accounted for, including an 8-year-old girl on a boogie board who was carried down the beach more than a mile, said Petty Officer Third Class Andrew Kendrick.


Farther up the coast, lifeguards on Mustang Island near Corpus Christi were expected to be out earlier and stay later Monday. Police were to help make sure beachgoers knew of the dangers.


In the Corpus Christi area, city officials were concerned with the potential for coastal and inland flooding. An extra highway lane was being opened on a causeway from Padre Island to Corpus Christi to speed up voluntary evacuations.


Owners of nearly 900 recreational vehicles had packed up voluntarily and left South Padre Island after being warned during the weekend that wind of more than 25 mph would mean they would not be allowed to drive their rigs across the sole bridge off the island.


The storm had swept over Mexico's resort city of Cancun early Friday, battering high-rise hotels with high wind, flooding several streets and closing the international airport for several hours.


Claudette is the third tropical storm of the Atlantic hurricane season. It developed Tuesday in the Caribbean, brushing Jamaica's southern coast with heavy rain and rough surf, battering the Cayman Islands with waves and above-normal tides and scattering rain over parts of Cuba before reaching Mexico.


Experts have predicted a busy Atlantic hurricane season, which began June 1 and ends Nov. 30.

[u2sarajevo]

I wish some of that rain would make it up our way.

sweets will probably get some, maybe even doc......

Chiwas will probably get the worst.....

Have fun singing in the rain guys!!!

[Chiwas]

Chiwas will probably get the worst.....

Yucatan peninsula (Cancun) could have problems. Odd enough, when Yucatan, Nuevo Leon, or Texas have big problems with hurricanes, Chihuahua has plain rains. I mean, destruction for others means benefits here. If you don't have problems with hurricanes, we don't have enough water.

[u2sarajevo]

I want to visit the Mayan ruins. My brother got married in Cozumel on the 4th and my dad went to Chichen Itza. Incredible pictures. Anyways, enjoy the rain that was SUPPOSED to water my lawn until Claudette decided to change it's path.

[Drbio]

Claudette hung a left and is headed west now. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-mad.gif[/img]

So much for much needed rain in CenTex.

[southern_sweets]

Darn! I'm going to have to water the lawn.

[mavsfanforever]

Hurricane Claudette Nears Texas Coast
38 minutes ago Add U.S. National - AP to My Yahoo!


By MARK BABINECK, Associated Press Writer

PORT O'CONNOR, Texas - An invigorated Hurricane Claudette lumbered toward the Texas shore early Tuesday, its outward edge lashing the coastline with heavy wind and rainfall.

Claudette, upgraded from a tropical storm overnight, was packing maximum sustained winds of 75 mph around its core. The hurricane's 25-mile diameter eye was tightening, with forecasters predicting some increase in wind speed before the center reaches shore in about 12 to 18 hours.


At 7 a.m. EDT Tuesday, Claudette's center was 125 miles east-northeast of Corpus Christi and moving west at 12 mph. It was expected to make landfall around Matagorda Bay or Corpus Christi.


As the storm approached, winds early Tuesday were gusting up to 50 mph in Galveston, and heavy rain from Claudette's spiral bands had made it onshore. Tropical storm force winds were also beginning to pound parts of the Louisiana coast.


Minor coastal flooding was reported in Galveston and Brazoria counties.


The hurricane has defied predictions, heading north of where forecasters initially anticipated before taking a western turn.


The entire Texas coastline was under some sort of advisory, with a hurricane warning stretching from Baffin Bay in South Texas to High Island east of Galveston toward the Louisiana line. The warning means the coast should expect sustained winds of at least 74 mph.


Flooding from a storm surge 3 to 5 feet above normal tide levels was expected in the warning area and to the north of where the hurricane's center crosses the coast. Total rainfall of 5 to 8 inches was possible from the hurricane, the first of the Atlantic season.


Tropical storm-force winds extended outward up to 140 miles from the hurricane's center.


Galveston County emergency management officials asked residents of the west end of the Bolivar Peninsula to consider leaving in anticipation of the storm, since anything above 4-foot tides would cut off evacuation routes.


"We are a little bit more under the gun," Galveston Mayor Roger Quiroga said.


Officials at the South Texas Project nuclear plant, about 80 miles southwest of Houston near Bay City, secured records and equipment in preparation for Claudette. The coming storm was not affecting the plant's power output and staffing remained at normal levels late Monday.


Only about half the usual number of crabbers at Seadrift, on Guadalupe Bay near the center of the warning area, were at work Monday despite pleasant conditions, said Josephine London, 50.


T.J. Blevins, 18, who works at Seasonal Seafood, which purchases the daily catch for shipment around the country, had practical reasons to worry about how the harbor will fare in this town of 1,300.


"I hope we have jobs to come back to," Blevins said.


Port O'Connor, one village of vacation homes and shrimpers that found itself in Claudette's sights, was destroyed by a strong hurricane in 1919 and again by the Category 4 monster Carla in 1961. While no one expects such a disaster this time, residents and visitors were puzzling on whether to stay or flee on the only road out of town.


Several state parks on the Texas Coast, including Goose Island in Rockport, Mustang Island between Corpus Christi and Port Aransas, Matagorda Island near Port O'Connor and Galveston Island, evacuated visitors on Monday and were likely to remain closed through at least Thursday.


Claudette developed Tuesday in the Caribbean, brushing Jamaica, the Cayman Islands and Mexico's Yucatan peninsula before entering the Gulf, where it has slowed down and gradually intensified from a tropical storm.

The last hurricane to strike Texas was in 1999, when Bret slammed into a largely unpopulated stretch between Corpus Christi and Brownsville

[irontoad]

Times like this I don't miss living in League City. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img]

[Chiwas]

[u2sarajevo]

Originally posted by: Chiwas

That is okay Chiwas, we forgive you. [img]i/expressions/moon.gif[/img]

[Ummmmm Ok]

Claudette Video

[Chiwas]

We have not even a single small faint cloud, yet.

[Chiwas]

At last Claudette, or her remains, arrived.

One hour raining on the desert. Whoo Hoo!

Women are not all bad, after all. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]